NBA absent World Cup star inventory: Jokic alphabet GoDurant leads 5 reasons for withdrawal
The opening of the 2023 Basketball World Cup is imminent, although this World Cup has 55 active NBA players participating, but it is still relatively "star-bleak", not only the US men's basketball team lacks Durant (the Tokyo Olympics led the US men's basketball team to win the championship), James, Curry, Harden and other superstars to participate, but also Serbian core Jokic, Greek core alphabet brother, Lithuanian core Sabonis Jr., Canadian core Jamal Murray and Japanese core Hachimura base, etc., too many NBA stars are absent.
A list of NBA stars absent from this year's Basketball World Cup
USA: Durant, James, Curry, Butler, Mitchell, Tatum, Jaylen Brown, Dream Green, Thick Eyebrows, Adebayo, Booker, Irving, Middleton, etc
Serbia: Jokić, Mišić, Pokushevski, Boban, Belica
Greece: Alphabet Brother, Kostas-Slokas, Karais, Dorsey
Lithuania: Sabonis the Younger, Grigoniš
Latvia: Porzingis
France: Embiid, Venbanyama, Nilikina, Killian-Hayes
Canada: Jamal Murray, Trey Lyles, Corey Joseph
Australia: Ben Simmons
Japan: Hachimura Base
Puerto Rico: Alvarado
Spain: Rubio, Lorenzo Brown
Slovenia: Dragic, Chanchar
Germany: Kléber
Mexico: Toscano-Anderson
Italy: Gallinari, Manion
Dominica: Horford, Duarte
A large number of NBA stars choose not to participate in the Basketball World Cup, mainly based on the following 5 factors:
First, the impact of the basketball World Cup is not enough. The Football World Cup is the most influential event in the world, and it is natural that football superstars want to participate. On the other hand, the influence of the basketball World Cup is relatively limited, or even not as influential as the Olympic Games, which naturally makes many NBA superstars disdain to participate in the basketball World Cup. What's more, as the top basketball event, the NBA's influence is much greater than that of the FIBA International Competition, so NBA stars do not value the basketball World Cup and want to participate in the Olympics.
Second, avoid unnecessary injuries or injuries or helpless absences. NBA superstars are reluctant to play more high-intensity games in the offseason, naturally hoping to reduce unnecessary injury troubles. In this case, Serbia's Jokic, Japan's Hachimura, Australia's Ben Simmons, etc., all chose to withdraw from the World Cup, they want to use the offseason to rest or focus on preparing for the new NBA season. As for Alphabet Brother, Jamal Murray, Porzingis and other stars, they are all helpless to miss the basketball World Cup due to injury.
Third, NBA stars are more willing to participate in the Olympics than the World Cup. Although the results and rankings of the Basketball World Cup are directly related to the Paris Olympics, for some strong teams, even if they do not arrange superstars to play, they can still qualify directly for the Olympics. What's more, as long as the Olympic results can be guaranteed, such as the 2019 basketball World Cup, the US men's basketball team only finished 7th, but they still won the Tokyo Olympics under Durant. For the U.S. men's basketball team, there is a huge difference in the attitude of the stars towards the World Cup and the Olympics.
Fourth, FIBA's blind reform has led to adverse results. FIBA began to reform in 2019, learning FIFA to change the World Championship to the World Cup, especially learning football for the window design of the qualifiers, which needs to be qualifiers every two months, naturally wanting to make national basketball associations and players pay great attention to this.
However, NBA players basically put the NBA first, and many NBA stars will not participate in the World Preliminary Round at all, resulting in some strong teams directly falling in the World Preliminary Round and failing to qualify for the Basketball World Cup. Croatia did not qualify for the basketball World Cup this year, Argentina men's basketball also missed the basketball World Cup, and the Nigerian men's basketball team, which has the most NBA players in Africa, was also eliminated in the World Preliminary Round.
Fifth, NBA players want to make money by participating in more commercial events in the summer. This summer, a large number of NBA stars, such as Alphabet Brother, Klay Thompson, Aaron Gordon, Harden, etc., have come to China to start a trip to make money, and other stars also have various business activities.