The 2012 U.S. Olympic Team Would Beat The 1992 Dream Team.
There was a minor stir yesterday on Twitter and if you follow Chris Palmer of ESPN, then you probably got caught up in the middle of it.
Palmer said this and sparked an international incident on everyone’s timelines. Within the hour, everyone had an opinion and some people even had an opinion on someone’s else’s opinion. It was the highlight of Wednesday for sure. I’m in favor of anything that promotes conversation and debate, and Palmer certainly did that. Eventually, the hysteria died down and mostly everyone forgot about it.
Especially the fact that Palmer was right.
You heard me. He was spot on. The 2012 Olympic team will be the greatest team of assembled basketball talent that we have ever seen, even surpassing the iconic ’92 team.
Granted, this year’s Olympic team has taken a hit as they’ve lost two starters in the past two months with Derrick Rose tearing his ACL and Dwight Howard having back surgery that will keep him away from the court all summer and maybe into next season.
For purposes of this discussion though, let’s say that they’re both healthy and able to play since they would have been in a perfect world. To make all things fair, let’s say that Larry Bird’s back hadn’t deteriorated as far as it had in 1992 and was mostly pretty healthy and was 75% of him in the mid 1980’s.
Let’s compare the starting line-ups:
That’s not bad. That’s not bad at all actually. Magic’s size and strength would cause problems defensively for whoever the 2012 team threw out there at point guard. Rose, Chris Paul and Deron Williams would be quicker than him, but they would likely never shoot over him. Magic’s ability to post up Rose and Paul could be crucial for the ’92 squad as well.
Michael Jordan is always going to be advantage Jordan, even against the guy that some say is Jordan’s equal in Kobe Bryant. However, Jordan’s game would translate better to the international game than it did in the NBA, where he dominated for most of his career anyway. Jordan’s pit bull defensive mentality would put the pressure on Bryant and Wade as well, where neither are anywhere near his league. Again, Jordan’s the greatest player of all-time, so he naturally dwarfs anyone that isn’t him, even two greats like Bryant and Wade.
Dream Team head coach Chuck Daly famously platooned his two best guys at the 3, 4 and 5 from game to game in an effort to spread the wealth. When you have Scottie Pippen and a now healthy Larry Bird, that’s a pretty slick set-up. As good as Jordan is defensively, Pippen is the best defender in NBA history and Bird is one of the five or six best players ever. Bird would also be key for the Dream Team as he or John Stockton would be the team’s options to stretch the floor from the three-point line.
Barkley and Malone represent the start of the Dream Team’s fall off of a cliff. ’92 was hanging in there until we got to the ground-bound power forward duo of Malone and Barkley. First of all, these two guys would have always been able to score, just not at their usual clip in today’s game. Barkley was actually quite athletic for a guy that was as undersized as he was, but he never took care of himself and that partying in Monte Carlo was just a microcosm of a career spent staying up late and being able to dominate anyway. Malone was the opposite as he was maybe 6’9 and a lumbering guy, but he got the most out of his career just on sheer determination. They say that outside of Jordan, nobody took better care of his body. Both were awesome players, but could they hang with today’s young stars? Especially when 2012 switches LeBron to the 4 to play Durant or Anthony at the 3? I’m skeptical to say the least.
Ewing and Robinson were also great and would give Howard fits on the block, but the international game does it’s best to phase centers out of the game offensively. International rules have a narrow lane and allow a zone defense all of the time. A zone is known to neutralize being able to get the ball into the post.
This rule really hurts the ’92 team as they had two giants and ’12 only has Howard and maybe Tyson Chandler, the latter of whom isn’t known as a guy that scores a lot.
This is our best guess at the starting line-ups at this point as we still don’t really know who will be on the team. We can guess that the guys that were on the Redeem Team (2008) and still on the roster will return this year. However, this team will be more explosive as the U.S. would be adding Rose, Durant and Love in place of Jason Kidd, Tayshaun Prince and Carlos Boozer.
In fact, that’s not even an upgrade, that’s a shot of whatever that guy had in the Crank series. Did you see those names?! Going from Kidd and Prince to Rose and Durant is like going from walking to work to taking a Corvette and Love brings some three-point shooting ability to the team where Boozer was not really a threat from there.
Offensively, the point guards would be able to get anywhere that they needed to against Magic Johnson. If the ’92 team decided to switch Pippen or Jordan to cool one of them off, you risked putting them in foul trouble, but would it be worth it to slow down the table-setters from the ’12 team? It just might. If that happened, it could change the game a little bit, but I still feel like if we saw that tactic, it would be used sparingly.
I would pay $50.00 to watch Jordan and Kobe play one-on-one. That’s a lot of money to me and would probably pay more if need be. Being able to put the ’92 Michael Jordan (at his all-time apex) against the ’12 Kobe favors Jordan, but even the ’08 Kobe wouldn’t have a chance to slow the ’92 Jordan. But would it be entertaining as Hell? You know it would! Why are you asking me? Kobe and MJ one-on-one!!!
The interesting thing about the ’92 team would be that they would still have Clyde Drexler and Chris Mullin off the bench to throw at Wade, but he would eviscerate either one. He would be like James Harden on steroids, but was also doping his blood. Both were great players, but neither one could hold a candle to Wade’s world-class athleticism and ability.
Look at this freaking small forward rotation. Seriously. That’s almost 100 points a game that those three would be able to put up just by themselves. If the ’12 team ever decided to move LeBron or Anthony to the 4 to get another one on the court that’s even scarier and if they experimented with Durant at the 2? I love Pippen but he can only guard one guy at a time and Bird was always a mediocre defender. He wouldn’t be able to guard either of those three unless he was allowed to use a chair and a whip as though he were fighting a lion.
The power forward rotation is just alright. Bosh and Love are All-Star caliber guys, but aren’t huge names like the two Hall-of-Famers on the ’92 team. Still, Bosh’s athleticism would give them a different look and Love’s ability to stretch the floor from the three-point line and the ’92 team’s guy having to step out to guard him can’t be overlooked. Again in crunch time LeBron or Carmelo will be playing the 4, so this may be a moot point.
Howard is one of the biggest men in the World and would be able to play in any era, but would have been even better in the early 90’s. He could guard Ewing or Robinson, challenge shots in the lane and control the boards. Even his poor free throw shooting couldn’t overcome his advantage here.
My Verdict:
The 2012 Olympic Team wins in 6 games over the ’92 Dream Team.
Look, the ’92 team is one of the biggest reasons that I love basketball today. They were mesmerizing and some of my earliest memories were seeing them blow somebody else out. Still, the game has changed since then and while the 2008 team wasn’t as dominant as the ’92 team, it has to be mentioned that the rest of the World is catching up to America’s talent level.
The Dream Team was never ever seriously threatened, but the team that they beat for the Gold Medal was Croatia who featured only Toni Kukoc as a future NBA stud. The rest of the World either didn’t have the interest or ability at the time. Now they do.
Spain features the Gasol brothers, Jose Calderon and Juan Carlos Navarro. France will have Tony Parker, Joakim Noah, Boris Diaw and Nicolas Batum. On and on it goes.
The 2008 team only really played one close game and that was the Gold Medal game against Spain. It may not have been a blow-out like the Dream Team’s exhibitions, but it had the same effect and that Spanish team was much better than anyone that the ’92 team played.
That said, no basketball team will ever have the effect that the Dream Team did. How could they? Are you watching a documentary about the 1996 Olympic Team? How about the 2000 squad? They were great for our country and won the same Gold Medal that the ’92 team did, but the Dream Team was the epitome of America as we know it. We came up short at the 1988 Olympics and as soon as FIBA allowed NBA players to partake, the league’s best guys stepped up to right the wrong in 1992.
It was typical American swagger, “our pros will beat the brakes off of your pros. But if you doubt it, let’s find out.”
They found out in a hurry. It was a landslide. The Dream Team influenced at least two generations of basketball fans as it bridged the gap between the 1980’s (Magic and Larry) and the 1990’s (Jordan and Pippen.)
You can always argue the merits of the Celtics, Lakers and Bulls, but you couldn’t deny how awesome it was when they teamed up with one goal in mind.
The 2012 Olympic Team may be able to beat the 1992 Dream Team in a best-of-seven series but we know that they’ll never have the impact on Americans that the Dream Team did once upon a time. There’s a place for both teams and instead of tearing one down to build the other one up, it’s important to realize that fact.