The FIBA 2006 Wold Championship in Basketball just finished. Strange things have happened. The Greek team has beaten the American dream team fairly easily. The same team lost 2 days later to Spain in an overwhelming manner. This means two things:

1. Conventionally speaking, the Spanish are the World champions in basketball
2. Surely, it has not been proven in an overwhelming manner which one of the final 4 teams (Spain, USA, Greece and Argentina) is the best

Why do you think so one may ask: The Spanish have won all games that they played, therefore they have proven to be the best. There are two problems with that deduction, both related to pragmatics:

1. The FIBA world championship is seriously flawed as a system of games that is supposed to select the best team in the world as a world champion:
• There are no playoffs. In a single day/game, anything can happen. Greece can beat America. Spain can overwhelm Greece. Of course European basketball has caught up and the Americans really have to sweat it with their absolute best NBA players if they want to win, but if Greece and the US team were to have say three different games in three different days I believe things would have been different.
• Not all semi-finalists (or even quarter-finalists) play with each other. Everybody knows that teams match with each other differently. You can beat easily a team that however can beat a team that you could never beat. This is an important factor. For instance, Spain beating Greece does not say much about the potential or capability of Spain to beat the US team.
2. Even with the present FIBA world cup system and due to the history of the game and status quo as well as sheer strength of the American team in all respects, no team can ever feel or convince as world champions in basketball if they do not beat the Americans during the games - and Spain did not. There is a further historical fact that adds to the importance of what I am saying here; Take a look at the history of conflict between the national teams of basketball of USA and Spain and compare to the corresponding record of Greece vs USA
   

Olympics
USA vs Greece (1-0)
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77- 71 2004

USA vs Spain (8-0)
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102- 94 2004
122- 81 1992
97- 53 1988
96- 65 1984
101- 68 1984
72- 56 1972
81- 46 1968
2- 0 # 1936

World Cup
USA vs Greece (3-1)
-------------------
95- 101 2006
84- 61 1998
97- 58 1994
103- 95 1990

USA vs Spain (4-2)
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76- 81 2002 - in this tournament USA was also beaten by Argentina and Yugoslavia (the game with Spain was for positions 5 and 6)
75- 73 1998
115-100 1994
95- 85 1990
99- 109 1982 - this was an NCAA US team (college boys)
114- 71 1974

* overall USA vs Spain (and removing the NCAA win) is: 12-1
* overall USA vs Greece is: 4-1

What these stats basically say is that the single Spanish win was during a game of no great importance or psychological pressure and therefore in the long history of conflict between the two teams Spain has no single convincing win to demonstrate. Also note Spain's propensity to not just lose but actually be crushed by huge scores by the Americans. This historical fact adds considerable legitimacy to the feeling that Spain (or any team) will not convince as World champions as long as they don't beat the US team, fair and square, in the process.

1. maybe the FIBA people feel that the game is more exciting if it provides windows of opportunity for such surprises/upsets to happen - I thoroughly disagree: sport ought to eliminate the chance factor as much as possible
2. maybe it is not feasible to have the FIBA world cup last any longer than it does (and it would have to, due to the play-offs process) - I think time should be made
   

A further point that I want to make about these games is the ethnic/national pride issue that is attached to them in many European countries. I mean it is normal to see fans celebrate after a national team win in all countries of the world. However, this is a very different thing than what happens in countries like Italy, Spain and Greece (even France) and pretty much all Latin American countries. In such countries the whole population is watching the game as if the result somehow implies something of grave importance for each one of them. Whole cities, complete with their services and transportation come to a standstill. People become ecstatic. People die of excitement. There is filthy politicizing of the event and an underlying need to somehow satisfy various complexes of inferiority through a bunch of kids that shoot hoops or kick a football. The whole deal is pathetic and makes me wish the US team could win each and every time for two reasons.

• First, a US victory feels partly yours no matter who you are and there are good historical, social and political reasons for that.
• Second: in the US, before, during and after all important wins, including the final, services and normalcy of life endure. The game is treated and really is what it is supposed to be: a game.

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