re: We really need Odo

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That's not what he said ever, but good try. He said it takes a year of adjustment from playing amateur ball overseas to playing college ball in the states. And in general, it does.

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Actually, he qualified it by saying because high school ball over there is terrible.

That's where the bone of contention is.

The point is, no it's not terrible and, further, the kids that play American college basketball from over there are usually not the elite 17-18 year olds anyway. Most of those take the money and play club ball (and are usually already doing that at 18).

It's like if you had a Rivals 100 for 18-year-old Europeans, maybe 10 of the 100 would want to play college basketball in the states, the other 90 will just advance up the club system and often get drafted to the NBA as 18, 19 year old bench players on European Club teams -- you ever notice how many Euros are drafted averaging 5 ppg for some Euroclub?

European kids grow up playing against these guys and it's world class competition. Yes, there's an adjustment coming here at any level because of language and style of play, but the biggest thing to understand is internationals that play college ball aren't, generally, the top-tier players over there. You don't get the Euro Nerlens Noel in the college game. Their expectations should be treated as such.


Hammink is adjusting about the same way a 2-star/3-star American player would in the same circumstance, which is what he would be if he had gone to U-High instead of a basketball academy in Spain.

I will say this: Hammink is not from one of the better basketball playing countries. However, like I said, he went to a school in Spain and probably played better competition than most American players see in high school, including touring the U.S. every year.