USA Basketball chairman Jerry Colangelo to contact players for 2012 Olympics soon: NBA Update
The roster for team USA for the 2012 London Olympics is due in June next year, but USA Basketball’s chairman Jerry Colangelo has started to make his moves
In a recent telephonic interview, Colangelo said that he will contact the NBA players in a couple of week’s time in order to verify how many players want to represent United States in the 2012 Olympics.
"Just to make contact with all of the people on our list, give them a whole picture of what is coming. Basically to get a read from them as to what their interests and intentions are in advance."
The training camp for the London Olympics will commence in July, but with the lockout prevailing, there is no assurity that the next season will actually take place and whether there will be any official basketball before that. This has made the situation complicated for not only the players, but also the international body of the sport in the country.
The players association and franchise owners are still far apart over new Collective Bargaining Agreement and it seems that this is not going end very soon. What has made the matters worse is that owners have already started taking measures, including sacking their employees, to cut their expenses in order to survive the lockout. On the other hand, union has urged players to look overseas for playing option so that they do not feel the financial crunch.
Team USA will be the defending champions in 2012 Olympics. They won the gold medal in 2008 Beijing Olympics, which was full of NBA’s top players including Los Angeles Lakers Kobe Bryant, Miami Heat’s Dwyane Wade and LeBron James. After the win, all of them had committed that they will return in the next Olympics.
The chairman however revealed that till now, none of the players have informed him about their unavailability. However, with such a large pool of talent available, he seems satisfied even if some of the big names prefer not to play.
"I'm really not worried about (anyone) not being available. If someone chooses not to play, that's one thing. The one thing I do know, we have an outstanding pool of players. Whoever the 12 turn out to be, they will represent our country very well."
Since team USA won the gold in the previous Olympics, therefore they have already qualified for tournament and wouldn’t have to take part in the qualifying round i.e. FIBA Americas. This has become a blessing in disguise as Colangelo doesn’t have to worry about convincing the players to take part in the tournament during the lockout.
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