Orlando Magic guard Gilbert Arenas Tweets a lot, in case I haven’t mentioned it before, and his 140-character thoughts usually fall somewhere between “LOL wut a jackazz” and “OK I’ll admit that’s pretty funny”. But on a few isolated occasions, when he’s not calling Orlando a state or planking in random places, he has been known to make a pretty good point, and two of his Tweets caught my attention yesterday.
rumor is DWill has a contract to play overseas if the lockout continues pass oct 1st…he aint the only one u know ya boy Agent has one also
all this overseas talk..and when we had to play preseason games over there everybody started complaining about the flts and food
By “flts” he means flights, I assume, and he makes an excellent point about the mindset of professional athletes. I knew some guys who played college basketball and after they graduated they went to play in Japan, Ireland, Turkey and Greece. A few of them did it for the experience, but mostly they all did it for the money, because these teams were offering as much as low 6 figures (considering conversion rates and living expense) to 22-year old guys who had no chance at making the NBA.
That’s important to keep in mind, because with the exception of Rudy Fernandez’s record offer from Real Madrid – which is more about bringing a star home and less about pillaging the NBA – the offers aren’t going to be as considerable as some players might think. That’s why this supposed mass exodus of angry and vengeful players isn’t going to be as large as some pundits expect, because it comes down to the difference between a comfort zone and culture shock. Basically, these players can make all the threats they want but after a few weeks they’d be Tweeting xenophobic rants that would haunt an Arizona legislator’s dreams.
After the jump, you can check out the latest in NBA-players-heading-overseas developments, as well as Arenas’ latest planking escapades.
