The original 1992 Dream Team set the gold standard—both literally and figuratively—for Olympic basketball. Recently, Kobe Bryant made headlines when he claimed the 2012 Dream Team could beat Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and the rest of the 1992 group.
This set off a week of reactions—both from ex-players and just about every sports columnist everywhere. While there are some that believe Kobe is correct, popular (and correct) sentiment is that the team with 11 Hall of Famers (including the best player of all time) would win.
However, it may have served Kobe better to make the comparison four years ago as a member of the 2008 US Olympic team. While the 2008 squad received a scare in the gold medal game against Spain, who had a formidable roster of its own, a position-by-position breakdown shows that the 2008 team holds an advantage if matched up with this year’s group.
With that in mind, here is the positional preview for this hypothetical world matchup. Get your tickets now.
*All stats and facts are provided by basketball-reference.com.
Point Guard
2008—Jason Kidd, ...
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Article written by Scott Polacek
USA Basketball: The 2012 Dream Team Would Not Beat 2008’s Squad
July 14th, 2012 by Scott Polacek Leave a reply »
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