All-Americans

No, not high school or college, but I'm thinking about NBA All-Americans. It's weird timing with the tourney going and all, but after reading John Hollinger's now annual list of the Top 30 Foreign Players in the NBA (although this is "Insider" content, as of right now it's a free read for everybody), I felt compelled to put together a list of the top 12 American players that would square off against this team (although I am fully American, kindly insert joke here about how I'm a Canadian living in Canada composing an American team. Thank you). If you can't read his article, Hollinger (whose work I love- can't stress that enough) includes guys like Tim Duncan (Virgin Islands), Al Horford (Dominican Republic), Raja Bell (Virgin Islands), and Wally Szczerbiak (yes that same Wally World. Did you know he was born in Spain? Me neither) because they were all foreign born even though most people, including myself, would consider them American players. For the sake of argument, and for this post, we'll keep them on Hollinger's list.

While he puts them in a list, I thought it'd be fun (because I'm a nerd like that) to give a starting five and seven bench guys for both squads. I'm only making one change to Hollinger's list by excluding Zydrunas Ilgauskas (who he ranks 9th) because I just don't feel he's one of the top 12 Euros (while I know there's a more correct term, and that players like Nash and Ginobili and Yao are not technically Euros, let's be honest: they're all Euros). Before I get to that, what stands out to me is that there's not a lot of young blood on the Euro team. Not many young guys banging on the door of the top 12. Of the 30 listed there's only five (and this includes Horford, who I don't consider foreign) who are 24 or under. Remember a few years ago with Darko and the flood of foreign players that were going to take over the NBA? Yeah that didn't happen. When we get closer to the draft I'm putting up the biggest post I've ever done on why you should never ever draft a white center, domestic or foreign, in the first round under any circumstances. Seriously, never. Ever. Anyway, in researching that I was amazed at how few foreign guys have actually panned out. For awhile there I think everybody was scared to death to miss the Next Dirk, but the failure rate for the Foreign guys has been so high it looks like GM's are more than willing to take that risk again.

ANYWAY here's the Euro Team from Hollinger's list:
Starting Five
C Yao Ming, 27, Rockets, China
PF Tim Duncan, 31, Spurs, Virgin Islands
SF Dirk Nowitzki, 29, Mavs, Germany (Can you believe he's only 29?)
SG Manu Ginobili, 30, Spurs, Argentina
PG Steve Nash, 34, Suns, South Africa (now Canadian)

Um wow. That's a helluva starting five right there. Not an athletic group, but great players and a lot of good ol' fashioned fundamentals.

Bench (this is in order of who's coming off the bench first):
PF Pau Gasol, 27, Lakers, Spain
PG Tony Parker, 25, Spurs, France
PG Jose Calderon, 26, Raptors, Spain
SF Luol Deng, 24, Bulls, Sudan
SF Hedo Turkoglu, 29, Magic, Turkey
PF Andrei Kirilenko, 27, Jazz, Russia
C Andris Biedrins, 21, Warriors, Latvia

Drops off pretty fast after Parker, doesn't it? Some good players but no real big stars after that. While Kirilenko's had a couple of rough years and Biedrins is young, I'd still take those two over Big Z and anybody else available.

AMERICAN TEAM
Starting Five
C Dwight, Howard, 22, Magic
PF Kevin Garnett, 31, Celtics
SF Lebron James, 23, Cavs
SG Kobe Bryant, 29, Lakers (like Dirk it's hard to believe he's not even 30)
PG Chris Paul, 22, Hornets

As good as the Euro's starting five is, this one blows it away. Howard's an absolute beast, and while you could debate putting Amare Stoudemire over Garnett, KG's leadership and willingness to share make him perfect for this lineup. King James, Black Mamba and CP3 are simply the three best players in the league right now.

BENCH
PF Amare Stoudemire, 25, Suns
SG Dwyane Wade, 26, Heat
SF Carmelo Anthony, 23, Nuggets (not a misprint: he's really only 23. Wow)
PG Baron Davis, 28, Warriors (another shocker for me)
PG Deron Williams, 23, Jazz
C Marcus Camby, 34, Nuggets
C Shaquille O'Neal, 36, Heat

You cannot argue the first two, but there's plenty of debate after Amare and DWade.

OK I'm going to have to devote an entire paragraph to Dwade. This started as a quick bracket comment but needs much more than that. So what happened to Wade? It was just two years ago he was in the conversation with Bronbron and Kobe for the best player on the planet. Now? Definitely not. This is a hypothetical team, and if he's 100% healthy I'd definitely take him, but if he plays in the Olympics this summer he's certifiably insane. Crazy. If he cares at all about his career he needs to skip it because his health has become a major major issue. Looking at his bio, in his five years in the league he's only played in at least 75 games twice, played only 61 his first year, and in the past two he's only played in 51 apiece. That's alarming right there. The Heat shut him down to get him fully healthy for next year (and also to get better draft positioning for Mike Beasley or Derrick Rose), and next year will be a YUGE one to determine if he's going to continue on the path to be one of the all-time greats, or become one of those Bernard King/Shawn Kemp/Chris Webber types who had a few unreal years but couldn't put a hall-of-fame career together. The knock on Wade when he was drafted was whether his smaller frame (only 6'4) would be able to handle his kamikaze-style of attacking the basket. After absorbing nine million hard fouls (he's shot a mind-boggling 2879 free throws in just five years) on his way to the basket, he's clearly taking a beating, and his body is not holding up well. Can he learn to pull up for the mid-range jumper or do a better job of avoiding contact? If he wants a long career, he's going to have to.

This is also a good time to point out how ridiculously good and tough Allen Iverson is considering he's built like a kicker (6'0, 165 lbs), yet drives to the basket hard all the time, and is in his ELEVENTH SEASON averaging almost 70 games a year, over 40 minutes a night, and is still scoring in the mid 20's and averaging over 7 assists. Wow. Still, I wouldn't put him on the team because he wouldn't be one of my first three or four guys off the bench, and would worry about how he'd handle a reduced role. It was him or Baron Davis for that spot, and I'd rather have Baron right now. I actually debated having Baron at all, but he's playing SO well this year, he has to be there (and he's only 28? Seriously? Wasn't he at UCLA with Tyus Edney, the O'Bannon brothers, Toby Bailey, Don McLean and Tracy Murray. Apparently it just seems that way). After that Melo provides instant offense off the bench as a swing man, and Deron Williams is a great backup true point.

Camby? So underrated and so good for this team. Second in the league in rebounding and first in blocks by almost a full block per game, and in the last five years he's been healthy, averaging double digits boards and 3 blocks a game. I don't think he's ever shaken the frail injury-prone tag he rightly got stuck with early in his career, but he has not been that guy in awhile. He'd be perfect for this team as he doesn't have to score to be effective or happy.

And finally for the 12th man- I thought about Mark Madsen to wave a towel and give awkward high-fives, but after seeing what Shaq's done for the chemistry in Phoenix, he gets my vote. He'd be great for team morale, and I THINK would accept a role of playing in short spurts. Plus he seems like a guy who really likes beating up and dunking on Euros. So if he'd accept the role, he's in.

So there's my team, and I'm stressing TEAM here as Camby and Shaq aren't the 11th or 12th best American players available. But to make the best team to win, this is my group.