Topic: FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 - Betting and Discussions - page 14. (Read 3080 times)

For me its insane how Serbia dropped the win against Italy and complicated the group . Bogdanovic wasnt in the zone at all and couldnt hit a three at all and that made the difference. Serbia could have finished them when they had a momentum in the third quarter and ended up losing a won game. I think they will pass the group but it made things complicated a lot now.

It's unbeleavable that nobody isn't talking about today's games... Fun things started and we have some upsets. I already said that Latvia and Slovenia looks understimated too much, so, their wins didn't surprised me that much. But what Brazil did against Canada is huge upset.
So happy not just about Lithuania win, but also how confident we played against elite team Greece, it was difficult to predict that we will win by 25 points. We're in 1/4 final already, don't want to get hyped too much, but I think we are capable to beat USA, after I saw how Montenegro played against them. Monenegro forced USA to play serious until very end. And Montengro managed to do it with 22 turnovers.
Italy made another upset by beating Serbia. At one moment it already looked that Serbia will run away, they already had 16 points lead. But Italy made comeback with amazing Fontechio performance (30 points). There was some chaos in the end, but ot's typical thing for Pozzecco team
Latvia - win against current World Champions is serious statement. And they done it without injured Bertans!
Puerto Rico win against Dominican Republic probably can be counted as upset too. Seems that both teams forgot about defense, scored 199 points combined. This time 39 points of KAT wasn't enough for a win.
Brazil win against Canada probably is biggest upset in tournament so far. And Brazil did it basically without 3-pointers. So, Canada is vulnerable too. Now situation in this group before last round looks crazy interesting with all 4 teams having 3 wins.

Yeah he definitely would make a difference.  He played well in the euroleague and that type of play would carry over for FIBA.  It's differemt than the NBA so I have more reservation on how he will handle the rigors of nba ball.  Smart though no need for him to stress his body before his first season in the NBA.

I do believe that we can't really consider Gobert as someone who would help a team out. France is getting a new star though, not that he is ready yet, but in the future he could make them go better. They do have a few players coming up soon enough and I think it is going to be a good one, it is going to end up with a good thing for them.

Finding a new generation of players that will play well together for a long time is a hard thing, most teams do not find them at the same time. You find one star, and then another 5-6 years later, and then another 5-6 years later, so the first star becomes 30+ years old by the time you get the third one and they  can't grow together. Finding some all around same age to each other is a tough one.

I believe that as long as he maintains his health, his journey in the NBA will continue to improve. The primary weakness I see in him currently is his body size; he appears quite thin compared to the big men in the NBA. However, with more focused physical training, he has the potential to build muscle and become stronger. I'm confident that his team will work to ensure that this physical development doesn't make him injury-prone.

However, if he was allowed to play, would it change the fate of France?

Indeed, if he evolves and manages to reach that expectation, he will earn that hype, like what you said set Luka as an example
and if Wemby will also manage to do the same thing,

We may see more hypes in his NBA career, for now, we can't conclude as we are not seeing him playing yet against the stars of stars of NBA.

He will be tested once he faces well-known super teams and if how he will handle the game giving his impressive numbers if possible.

They may also be factoring in the risk of injuries. Wembanyama is their franchise player, being a top pick, and he's expected to make significant contributions to the team. In physical games like FIBA, injuries are a genuine concern, and if Wembanyama were to get injured, it could jeopardize the future of the San Antonio Spurs, especially since they have been grappling with rebuilding the team. As a coach, he likely can't afford to witness such an unfortunate event.

Other than that, they could send Wembanyama to play and get some experience because FIBA is also a good experience ground to help him in the Spurs in his rookie year but I understand the Spurs when they excused him in this instance because they cannot afford if ever Wemby will get injured as he is somehow vulnerable to it specially after the fact that he is the #1 overall pick. This is their lottery and they will protect him whatever it will cost them.

There's certainly a lot of hype surrounding Wemby, and while he's demonstrated his abilities in international games, he has yet to prove himself in the NBA. However, if he evolves into a true superstar similar to Luka, there's no doubt he will also excel in international competitions like the FIBA World Cup. Take Luka, for example; he's currently leading Slovenia to a perfect record of 3 wins and 0 losses in the first stage, and his NBA experience has undoubtedly been instrumental in their recent success.

They will undoubtedly improve, especially considering that Wembanyama is continually training. Once he represents his country, his skills will likely see significant growth. Being the number one overall pick, he's in a different league compared to Gobert, who was a first-round pick at 27th overall in 2013. I anticipate a major improvement from him. Perhaps France will make a strong comeback in the future. I'm eagerly looking forward to seeing how Wemby performs in the upcoming regular season, and I hope he won't disappoint us.

Yeah, I also believe Gobert is no longer in his prime and Batum is also old. But still, they should be enough to at least proceed in the next round. That game against Latvia was very winnable and they were leading more than 10 in the 4th quarter before the rally. So I agree that luck is also not on their side in this tournament.

If they're ranked 5 in the world then they will be dropped hard once this tournament officially ends and updates are available. Maybe outside the top 10 already? I wonder what France look like if Wembanyama played. The Spurs decided to excuse him from the national team for further development. But he and Gobert will have their chance to team up and get back their glory in the 2024 Paris Olympics. That will be the biggest basketball event and at the same time, their nation is the host. Should be fun to watch.

Lithuania -5,5 is a good pick.
Greece showed nothing so far and also won't do in those next 2 games. Should be an easy one.
With Slovenia it's a tricky game. First of all it's do or die for Australia. They lose and they are out pretty much, so they will throw in everything they can. Slovenia of course depends on 1 player and 1 player only. If Luka has a bad day, it's good night for them.

It's really hard to predict, so I will just enjoy watching this one.

By the way, the new power rankings are out and Germany is on 2nd position, very cool.

I'll bet for Lithuania in this case too. -5.5 seems reachable so I will take that.
Lithuania - Greece - Lithuania (-5.5) @1.71

The 17-32 placement may be pointless for some but other countries are still doing their best to be qualified for the Olympics. Who knows, maybe it will be different when that event happens and some country will shock us by winning the world championship.

Slovenia is now an underdog against Australia.
I will be taking the risk for the money line of Slovenia @3.00. This is not a recommended bet but I am just relying on how Luka Doncic can handle the Boomers. I am a fan of Josh Giddey but I am a bigger fan of Luka first.

Good luck with your bets today guys. We might see some upsets but I wish no blowouts.

Nice, Japan is no doubt an interesting team on this world cup. I have remembered them as a nation that's not really for basketball but they're doing better than the Philippines. I'm sad but at the same time happy because they're improving their basketball. I am sad because of our team didn't even took any win, maybe because of how strong these teams are when they've faced it and they didn't able to beat them.

The score was that far when they've won against Philippines. You just don't wanna watch the entire match when you know that there's something wrong with them defeating South Sudan. It's for Paris Olympics and these teams did also bad on this world cup but they still have that chance for the Olympics with these wins that they've made. The point system of FIBA is actually giving hope but not anymore to the national team of Philippines.

Very basic because he's the play maker and other teammates were just relying the play on him. They all knew what's going to happen and one boxout to Clarkson then it's gonna be a hard attack for the team. This has been repeatedly done and it's like a forceful points in the paint being made all over the time by Clarkson.

Well i honestly dont know why fiba made this kind of competition,it would be better like in football if you get knocked out in the group you go home. The only games that are intresting in these kind of matches are those that are fighting for the olympic games,still those teams are really weak so i dont think they can do anything big in the olympic games aswell.

These 17-32 placement games is such pointless thing. I know that teams that fighting for spot in Olympics, but most of games is just unwatchable. I'm sure that teams like France want that tournament would end faster for them, but their humiliation continues.

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Finally fun things begins. Can't wait to watch Lithuania - Greece game. I'm a bit surprised that we are quite heavy favorites against Greece, but probably it's logical, we won our games by 25 points in average, including against quite solid Montenegro team. While Greece, ok, don't look at thei game with USA, but they struggled a lot against weak New Zeland. In general, it's do or die game for both team.
In other games we have very clear favorites, but IMO Latvia (vs Spain) and Slovenia (against Australia) is understimated a bit too much.

Agree with you, those games were mostly unwatchable.  I too am looking forward to the ger/aus game. Both good teams but the one I really want to see is Spain Canada.  Canada is looking pretty good this year and are a sneaky pull to win this whole thing.  Just hope the games are good.

Plenty of upsets on Thursday, too bad for the winners these are just games with no real meaning. 

Finally we are in the exiting phase! After seeing maybe 4-5 good competitive games in the first round it's time to see what we were waiting for. No more blowouts but good action!

Some groups are still less exiting than others ( talking about group I ) but the others hold at least 2 power house nations in each group. USA has another relatively easy one with Montenegro and Lithuania but games like Canada vs Spain, Slovenia vs Germany/Australia gonna be some real nice ones.

Hopefully we, team Germany, can beat Georgia today so we don't have pressure versus Slovenia. If we win and SLO beat AUS we are through, we lose and we must beat Slovenia which will be tough.

Looking forward for the next game day!!!

Don't be brutally speaking the truth mate but that's really the truth. I didn't watch the game today because I was expecting that it would be another disappointment to see how these boys are playing basketball and you're right. The other teams are just better, with or without an NBA player, I guess those people who have been talking about the system of how they play inside is the one that needs to be changed. Yes, there goes the blame on the coach and it's what most of the fans are talking about. But that's it, the other teams are just the better team and our national team just lost and needs to become better.

Agree. I’m already done playing the blaming game since other team really show dominance against us. It only means that the level of basketball in our country is inferior compared to the rest of the world except SEA country which the only country we can dominate.

It’s still a waste if we can get the spot for Olympic while we have that kind of performance since we will face much stornger country in there that will give us more shameful defeat. Coach chot is right after all that this is a good learning experience to wake up and adjust to the basketball level that we are playing on our country. Basketball is popular here but the game play is just the same since we are not applying system that EU and US using. Also our size and genes is very unfavorable to this sports when against country like US that has a bigger and quicker built.

Look at Kai, Has the height advantage but moves really slow compared to other player in NBA with same size.