Sonny Weems 26
Quiz: The NBA- and Euro-centric year in basketball, 2011-12
Quick! Before those memories of basketball championships European and NBA fade completely, take a brief look back at the season that was – one crazy one on The Continent that began with Tony Parker, Ty Lawson and Mehmet Okur playing over here and concluded with titles taken by King James and Emperor Spanoulis. Get out […]
The BallinEurope All-American Euroleague team (also all-Russian, -Greek and -former Yugoslavian teams)
Now here’s an argument starter for you … with much debate perpetually going on among European basketball fans vis-à-vis the influence of American and/or NBA players on the Euroleague, BiE decided to take a look back at the 2011-12 season in hopes of drawing some comparison on an individual, player-by-player level. Below, then, runs four […]
Explaining BallinEurope's Euroleague MVP ballot (plus the top 25 for 2011-12, highlight clips)
In the interests of complete transparency – hey, somebody in Hungary should aspire to such – BallinEurope today presents the outcome of a heavy Euroleague basketball-watching habit plus several hours of intense thought: Namely, the five names that went onto BiE’s media representative’s ballot for 2011-12 Euroleague MVP. Since there’s no way the chosen quintet […]
Why Andrei Kirilenko and CSKA Moscow must win the Euroleague
Regular readers of BallinEurope may recall a similarly entitled writeup on Montepaschi Siena on these pages from a long time ago – actually two weeks, but already it *feels* like quite a spell. Contributing writer Enrico Cellini was as surprised as any of us when Olympiacos began Siena’s ejection from the tournament, Facebook-messaging BiE with […]
Injured and possibly done for season in Lithuania, Sonny Weems tweets an S.O.S.
Bad news from Lithuania for Žalgiris Kaunas, NBA teams seeking a viable free-agent guard for 2012-13, and Sonny Weems himself. After suffering a foot sprain in Žalgiris’ LKL 88-71 victory at Rudupis, Weems’ season may now be done and, if so, the former Toronto Raptor reports he’ll be heading back home to the ‘States. Making […]
Sonny Weems + LKL dunk contest + awesome production values = Video of the month
The best basketball video clip of the roughly half-done month? Well, about a week before James White was bagging his fourth European dunk contest crown, Zalgiris Kaunas’ Sonny Weems was earning his first in Lithuania. Below runs not just any dunk contest highlight clip, but an amazingly edited 100-plus seconds replete with amazing angles and […]
Euroleague Power Rankings: Do-or-die Week Edition
The key word in week three of the 2011-12 Euroleague Top 16 round: Blowout. The closest game was decided by eight points (Bennet Cantù 82, Maccabi Tel Aviv 74) and the average match showed a 16-point differential as certain teams (CSKA Moscow, FC Barcelona, Montepaschi Siena) asserted their superiority, a couple of sleeping giants (Olympiacos, […]
Posters absoluts & Monsterdunken: The Eurocentric slam dunk of 2011 – plus 25 others
Before BallinEurope signs off for 2011, let’s give a late Christmas gift to the dunkaholics out there, shall we? Below runs a collection compiled through the year featuring dunks by Europeans, on Europeans or perhaps simply in Continental games. The first 20 will listed by competition, followed the top five runners-up and the champion jam […]
Sonny Weems caps Žalgiris Kaunas win in memorable fashion
Think Žalgiris Kaunas fans are happy Sonny Weems has no out-clause? The Greens were able to stay alive in Euroleague play last night, rising their record to 2-5 in besting Unicaja Malaga in Lithuania, 67-65, thanks in no small part to some clutch play from their American import. Weems accounted for the final points of […]
Thanks for the memories: Top performances by locked-out NBA players in Europe
BallinEurope bids adieu to the all-too-brief wackiness that was the ENBA: A period of time shorter than Allen Iverson’s career with Beşiktaş, though for a sweet, brief while it seemed like forever … ah, the feeling of a too-fast love affair dragged down by unfeeling reality, leaving only fond memories and bitter tears to … […]
Highlights from Ty Lawson’s epic Twitter venting (P.S. Unicaja over Žalgiris, 85-78)
Has a Europe-based basketball player ever garnered so much attention in one day on Twitter? Those who follow locked-out Denver Nugget/current Žalgiris Kaunas baller Ty Lawson on the ‘site watched for a span of two hours as a complaint about practice snowballed into a barrage of speed tweeting among Lawson, detractors and supporters. The story […]
Artest agent: No on Britain, Finland; maybe on Israel, Russia, Greece, Turkey…
After capturing the blogosphere’s attention with yesterday’s reportage of Ron Artest, a.k.a. Metta World Peace, looking to options in the British Basketball League in case of an extended NBA player lockout, ESPN Los Angeles went straight to the horse’s mouth – or the horse’s agent’s mouth – to learn the truth. Said agent David Bauman […]