- Charles Barkley
The 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona marked the first time in which NBA players would be allowed to enter competition. The resultant roster compiled for the United States men's basketball team, eleven NBA players and one reserved NCAA player, was nicknamed the "Dream Team", and is often regarded as the greatest team ever assembled in sports. The roster was essentially a preemptive list of players who would be enshrined the basketball Hall of Fame upon retirement. In fact, with the induction of Chris Mullin in 2011, every NBA player from the Dream Team roster has made it to the Hall of Fame.
This past May marked the 20th anniversary of the Dream Team. Last Wednesday, NBA TV aired an excellent documentary which featured interviews with all of the players on the team, as well as rare footage from the intense warm up scrimmages held between those same basketball icons.
The documentary does a good job at summarizing the events which led up to the admission of NBA players. Narrator Ed Burns explains that the Olympic ideal had always been about "amateur" competition and as a result the United States sent college basketball players to compete. From 1936 until 1972, America won the gold medal in basketball. But following a infamous and controversial finish to the Soviet Union in the 1972 gold medal final game and another loss in 1988, the rest of the world was seen as catching up to the United States in basketball. Indeed, the line between "professional" and "amateur" on an international level was seen as hypocritical, as many European rosters were composed of older players who were being paid salaries on pro teams. The hypocrisy was evident to FIBA Secretary General Boris Stankovic, who proceeded to change the Olympic regulations.
The NBA TV documentary largely follows the selection process and pre-Olympic practices of the team, as the competition itself was a relative cakewalk, a testament to the pedigree of the roster. No team came within 30 points of the United States, with some competitors losing by over 60. Many of the games took on a surreal atmosphere, as competing players shook hands, took pictures and asked for autographs from the Americans before games.
The appeal of the documentary lies in the personalities of these players, some of them among the most recognizable faces on Earth. From the eagerness demonstrated by Magic Johnson and Chris Mullin, to the feet-dragging of Michael Jordan, it is very revealing to see the perspectives offered from these players both then and 20 years after the fact. Charles Barkley, however, is by far the most charismatic; I would recommend watching the documentary just for some of the classic quotes from the man, who is definitely not a role model.
To watch the documentary online, you will need to have a subscription to the Canadian feed of NBA.TV. Or if you have NBA TV in your cable package, there will be plenty of replays this week. There are a few YouTube links up as well, but these are violating copyright and will probably be taken down soon. Whatever format, I would urge and sports fans to watch.
"NBA.TV's The Dream Team." nba.com. 13 Jun. 2012. Web.
How professional high jump had is a track and field athletics event in which competitors must jump over a horizontal bar placed at measured heights without the aid of certain devices.
ReplyDeleteI like the ad because I like to watch the NBA very much.
Lam Wuor