# France: What Holds It Back?



## luther (Nov 2, 2007)

Right now, the following players represent France in the NBA: Tony Parker, Boris Diaw, Mickael Pietrus, Yakhouba Diawarra, Johan Petro, Mickael Gelabale, Ian Mahinmi, Ronny Turiaf. 

They have or have had the services of other relatively high-level players such as Tariq Abdul-Wahad (Michigan, Long Beach, various NBA, Euroleague), Vasco Evtimov (McDonald's All American, UNC, Euroleague), Jerome Moiso (UCLA, various NBA), Florent Pietrus (Euroleague), Michel Morandais (Colorado, Euroleague), Tariq Kirksay (Euroleague), Frederic Weis (1st rounder, Euroleague), Alain Digbeu (Drafted by Atlanta, Euroleague) and the great Antoine Rigadeau (brief NBA stint, European legend).

Generally speaking, the French team is among the most athletic teams in international competitions. The talent is not legitimately up for debate.

So why have they tended to struggle in international competitions? They finished 2nd in the 2000 Olympics, 4th in the 1999 Worlds and 4th in the 2003 European Championships. Those are their _good_ recent finishes. They were 8th in the '07 ECs, 5th in the '06 Worlds, failed to make the '04 Olympics, failed to make the '02 Worlds, 6th in the '01 ECs.

And with the occasional exception of Pau Orthez, their domestic league teams are weak entries into Euroleague. And their domestic league itself is pretty mediocre, certainly worse than Spain, Greece and Italy.

wtf, France?


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## Krstic All-Star (Mar 9, 2005)

The first thing that comes to mind is injuries.


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## croco (Feb 14, 2005)

The lack of shooters, it is easy to make a game plan against them. I remember when they barely lost the semifinals at the European Championships in 2005 though, might have won that tournament if it wasn't for Diamanatidis three right before the end.


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## luther (Nov 2, 2007)

^ But while I know there was the prominent injury to Tony Parker a couple of years ago (I forget which tourney that was), is it realistic to think they've had more injuries than any other country in the past 20 years?

And besides, they're not lacking for other PGs. No, there's no other Tony Parker. But there is Yannick Bokolo. And regardless, their best passer is Diaw.


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## luther (Nov 2, 2007)

croco said:


> The lack of shooters, it is easy to make a game plan against them. I remember when they barely lost the semifinals at the European Championships in 2005 though, might have won that tournament if it wasn't for Diamanatidis three right before the end.


That could be true. They might be the worst (non-American?) shooting team in major competitions. Although it still begs the question: why? So many good players, how can you not find a shooter?


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## Krstic All-Star (Mar 9, 2005)

luther said:


> ^ But while I know there was the prominent injury to Tony Parker a couple of years ago (I forget which tourney that was), is it realistic to think they've had more injuries than any other country in the past 20 years?
> 
> And besides, they're not lacking for other PGs. No, there's no other Tony Parker. But there is Yannick Bokolo. And regardless, their best passer is Diaw.


Well, it's not just the injuries, but their inability to overcome them. It sometimes looks as if they give up once someone goes down - even though there's no reason to.

Lack of outside shooting is a great point.


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## croco (Feb 14, 2005)

They have shooters, they are more in the Eric Piatkowski mold though. Good at shooting the basketball, but average or bad at everything else and they can't be a factor therefore.


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## luther (Nov 2, 2007)

croco said:


> They have shooters, they are more in the Eric Piatkowski mold though. Good at shooting the basketball, but average or bad at everything else and they can't be a factor therefore.


I don't think that having a few Eric Piatkowskis is a bad thing in international ball. So few teams are particularly athletic that if you have one guy on the floor, particularly someone with decent height for his position, it could make all the difference in the world. You can always hide him in a zone on defense. And on offense, you can run plays that free up a guy, or use all those penetrators they have to attract attention and kick it out.


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## croco (Feb 14, 2005)

If they want to beat the best teams, they can't hide those guys. It might work against inferior opponents, but the problem is that the good teams or contenders will find a way to attack the weak links in the defense despite various zone defenses. They are just too one-dimensional and unless that changes I don't see France winning any title.


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## knickstorm (Jun 22, 2003)

they all play too much soccer, by the time they get to basketball the kids in the US have years of AAU experience, hard to catch up


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## luther (Nov 2, 2007)

knickstorm said:


> they all play too much soccer, by the time they get to basketball the kids in the US have years of AAU experience, hard to catch up


Well, soccer is definitely their #1 sport. But I'm pretty sure you could say the same for Serbia, Spain, Argentina, etc., and they've all kicked our (me being from the U.S.) asses in recent years of international competition. A lot of the competitions they've been in (and done poorly in) were won by those other countries, not us.


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## starvydas (Jul 16, 2002)

Krstic All Star said:


> The first thing that comes to mind is injuries.


You made me laugh


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## Krstic All-Star (Mar 9, 2005)

^ I have a gift, it's true.


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## starvydas (Jul 16, 2002)

luther said:


> Right now, the following players represent France in the NBA: Tony Parker, Boris Diaw, Mickael Pietrus, Yakhouba Diawarra, Johan Petro, Mickael Gelabale, Ian Mahinmi, Ronny Turiaf.
> 
> They have or have had the services of other relatively high-level players such as Tariq Abdul-Wahad (Michigan, Long Beach, various NBA, Euroleague), Vasco Evtimov (McDonald's All American, UNC, Euroleague), Jerome Moiso (UCLA, various NBA), Florent Pietrus (Euroleague), Michel Morandais (Colorado, Euroleague), Tariq Kirksay (Euroleague), Frederic Weis (1st rounder, Euroleague), Alain Digbeu (Drafted by Atlanta, Euroleague) and the great Antoine Rigadeau (brief NBA stint, European legend).
> 
> ...


Very interesting. 

Firstly, France never was a dominant force in European basketball. Historically, France was good at the beginning (Euro Champs began in 1935) as they won silver or bronze in international competitions (Olympics included) from 1948 to 1952. Then nothing else significant (bronze, EuroChamps 1959) since the silver medal in the 2000 Olympics. Which let’s admit it was a bit of a fluke and in my opinion a disappointing tournament overall. 
Just to let you imagine that while the Yougoslavs and Russians dominated the continent and were the first teams to believe they could compete with the US, France was just not able to produce basketball players. 

As a poster above said, France youth, up until circa 1984, dreamt about being the next Platini and basketball was just not very popular. Basketball was popularized (?) with the creation of Canal+, the first pay channel, in 1984 which owned the rights to broadcast the NBA. This was the first time a weekly program of basketball was seen on French TV. The French domestic league was not to be seen on TV, except for the most important games that were broadcasted by the public channel. And while the revenues generated by "le foot" (soccer) through sponsoring and TV rights began to skyrocket in the early 1980s, basketball audience was just miserably low due to the lack of quality in the French league and just simply lack of basketball culture. The fact is also France lacked the infrastructure and the "expertise" in order to train basketball players as efficiently as young footballers. Which explains the lack of quality of French basketball up until the 1990s.

Now I have my own little "sociological" approach as to why French players are generally poor shooters and pretty solid, spectaculer athletes. As I've said before, basketball was popularized in France partly by the internationalization wanted by David Stern and his staff through Canal+. So French youth who were into basketball _watched litterally more US basketball than French basketball_, as is the case with me. US basketball was an appealing "product" and it was well marketed as it emphasized the athletic prowesses of players such as Charles Barkley, David Robinson, and of course Michael Jordan who dare I say was ideolized by the French media (outrageous numbers of French basketball magazines in the 1990s with MJ on the cover).


At around the same time, international corporations such as Reebok, Nike and Adidas tried to take advantage of this trend and showcase their products by creating street basketball tournament, very popular in the mid 1990s. France produced their own streetball legends but they were truly recognized quite late by professional clubs. Often those young men were sons or grandsons of immigrants of African descent and marginalized in working class areas. They often live in "les cités" (projects?) in an environment of high unemployment, small criminality, and generally speaking with nothing to practice any kind of creativity. A player like Moustafa Sonko, young Parisian of Malian descent, signed almost straight from the playground a professional contract and became in four years one of the best guards in Europe. Sonko's dream had come true but he had the luck to find an open-minded coach who let him express his "street" skills and blossom into one of the most exciting French player ever.

(OT to KAS: That coach is Alain Weisz who has strong ties with Israelian basketball because of his religion. He recruited or helped recruit many Israelian talent such as Meir Tapiro or Afik Nissim in the French league and has coached several Israeli selections, for example at the Mediterranean Games.)

Players like Tony Parker, Boris Diaw and Ronny Turiaf often refer in interviews to memories of the most famous voice in French basketbal, French-American George Eddy. George Eddy is an interesting character, graduate from Florida U. who played professionally in France, adopted the French nationality and was hired as the first true basketball commentator on French TV. With his American accent,enthusiasm, and passion for US basketball he greatly contributed to make French youth consider pro basketball as a spectacular show, with lots of highlights waiting to happen.

I think that partly explains why a lot of players from France are more turned towars making the athletic, spectacular play. Also you have to realize that the France is a large market for American sports and leisure industries (films, Disneyland, hip-hop and RNB sells big in music, etc...). I would say that contrary to pouplar belief, France overall accepts American products or concepts pretty well. The globalization (americanization ?) has had its effects on the French popular culture. Black youth living in urban areas tend to identify their games more on LeBron James’ than savvy white players’ like Stéphane Ostrowski or Antoine Rigaudeau.


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## starvydas (Jul 16, 2002)

The future seems unclear for French basketball. The main piece of achievement is the formation process of young players, which has shown its sucess: many Euro titles in youth categories for boys as well as girls. Please note that in France there is no school championships like in the US. If you want to play, you subscribe to your town’s basketball “society” and championships are made for each area. For those who have the most potential, they can either go to a private school that will mix basketball and studies or, more likely, to the State-owned formation structure which is called INSEP (Institut National du Sport et de l’Education Physique or National Institute for Sports and Physical Education). INSEP has been a major success in training elite sportsman in baskeball (Tony Parker, Boris Diaw, Ronny Turiaf, etc...) as well as other sports (Thierry Henry, Marie-José Pérec...) and has tremendously helped put France on the basketball map.

On the other hand, training by French professional clubs is almost inexistant, compared to their Italian or Spanish counterparts. This is largely due to economic reasons. The tax system for professional sports clubs is _very_ disadvantageous (?) compared to countries like Spain, Italy, or Greece and when you look at budgets in the Euroleague, French clubs always appear at the bottom at the list (but then again, the money is partly used to fund INSEP so it’s a matter of poilitical choice). That’s why French clubs cannot afford to have farm teams, and it’s litterally impossible to see young foreign prospects like Skita (Treviso) or Maciej Lampe (Real Madrid) being introduced to professional basketball in France (ok they’re busts and therefore bad examples but you see the point). 

Due to the economic pressure, French pro clubs cannot afford to wait on the long term to have good results and therefore prefer hiring lesser known professional athletes from “small” basketball countries rather than giving playing time to French prospects. You now have several teams in the French League that have 2 or 3 French players and the rest is a group of different nationalities. As a result, only the elite prospects, who are generally recruited from INSEP, get to see a chance of earning a professional contract and getting exposure. The rest of the French basketball players is usually stashed in the 3rd or 4th domestic (amateur) championship. 

The result is you have a widening gap between players trained by INSEP, a tax-funded structure that bases its results on the long term and can hence produce “finished” basketball players, and the players not good enough to make INSEP (but still potentially good) who have to struggle to make a pro rotation, compete with foreigners, and produce immediately. You can see this situation in the French NT, where the NBAers and those who play in Italy or Spain are the leaders, while the players from the domestic league are usually scrubs or specialists and in no way able to compete at the highest international level.


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## luther (Nov 2, 2007)

It's interesting that you bring up INSEP, though, because isn't it a similar institution to Australia's Institute of Sport, which has recently gotten a lot of glowing press for having produced recent and upcoming basketball players? True, it's the opposite of strong club systems, but on the other hand, it could in theory develop a united system for the country to do well in youth and national team tournaments. (Again, in theory.)


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## starvydas (Jul 16, 2002)

luther said:


> It's interesting that you bring up INSEP, though, because isn't it a similar institution to Australia's Institute of Sport, which has recently gotten a lot of glowing press for having produced recent and upcoming basketball players? True, it's the opposite of strong club systems, but on the other hand, it could in theory develop a united system for the country to do well in youth and national team tournaments. (Again, in theory.)


Yes, I believe it is more or less the same system than in Australia. You're right that it should in principle help national teams get good results in international competitions as its intent is to gather each generation's best players and train them together. Although I am not aware of Australia's results in the recent past, there's no denying that in France's case it has been a sucess, especially in youth categories.

INSEP has recently caught some criticism because a lot of money is being spent on something as "futile" as training professionnal athletes. I can see the point its detractors are trying to make, as I would myself prefer to see money being poured in schools and hospitals and so on, but that's a whole other subject.


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