The 2018/19 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague season is coming around fast. For the 16 teams taking part, preseason has already started, as teams work to gel their new rosters of players for the upcoming season in preparation for the first round of matches on October 2011. Teams new to the competition this year include Bayern Munich, Buducnost, Darussafaka and Gran Canaria, taking the places of Brose Baskets Bamberg, Crvena Zvezda, Unicaja Malaga and Valencia. With rosters now mostly set, there follows over a series of posts here at GiveMeSport a look at all sixteen teams participating in the 2018/19 Turkish Airlines EuroLeague, in a preview of the upcoming season. First in the alphabetical series will be Anadolu Efes of Turkey. Anadolu Efes Out: Errick McCollum (unsigned), Vladimir Stimac (to Turk Telekom), Sonny Weems (unsigned), Derrick Brown (unsigned), Toney Douglas (to Sakarya), Zoran Dragic (unsigned), Berk Demir (to Darussafaka) In: Adrian Moerman (from Barcelona), Rodrigue Beaubois (from Baskonia), Ahmet Tuncer (from Eskisehir), Shane Larkin (from Boston Celtics), James Anderson (from Khimky), Vasilije Micic (from Zalgiris), Tibor Pleiss (from Valencia), Sertac Sanli (from Besiktas), Metecan Birsen (from Sakarya) – By their own standards, Anadolu massively disappointed last year. The big spending Turkish team have not made it to a EuroLeague Final Four in the modern era, despite great expense and acquisition of name-recognition talent along the way, and yet lats year was a particularly troublesome one as they finished stone cold last in the regular season. To that end has come yet another significant overhaul, and a whole new load of import players, as, once again, Efes find themselves with a distinct lack of domestic talent on the team. Being so reliant on imports and the short-term contracts they play on means to constantly have to work things out on the fly, as opposed […]
This post is a bit late, considering the Magic have played their games. However, the site’s outages just before free agency started set us back a bit, and then obviously free agency itself kind of blew the cock off the whole thing. Sorry about that. Since I’d already started it, we’ll do it anyway. Jeff Adrien It’s hard for a 6’7 power forward to make it in the NBA. You have to be pretty exceptional at something to do it. Adrien, though, is exceptional at nothing. He’s solid at most things except foul shooting; decently athletic, willing and able to rebound, capable of defending the post, prepared to run, and able to shoot right handed hook shots. But despite his height, he’s in absolutely no way a small forward. He’s a very undersized power forward who is neither really athletic nor Chuck Hayes. Adrien played in the LEB Gold last year, averaging 12.3ppg and 7.7rpg for Breocgan Lugo. It’s a league ideally suited for him. Joe Crawford Crawford is slightly undersized for a shooting guard at 6’4, could use a slightly better three point stroke (and definitely from the foul line), and is not exactly consistent; he is, however, a talented and versatile scorer, mainly through penetration. Crawford is a former draft pick of the L.A. Lakers, 58th overall back in 2008. Had he been drafted somewhere else, he might have stuck in the NBA by now. He’s good. As it is, he’s appeared in only 2 games, for the Knicks in the last week of the 2008/09 season. He scored 9 points in 23 minutes. Not bad. Joe Crawford fact: Joe Crawford is Hawks draft pick Jordan Crawford’s brother. That is all. Paul Davis Davis has spent at least part of three years in the NBA, including starting last […]
