[Vilius]

What about Pini? Was his contract till the end of the season or does it include next season too?

[moxur]

ok kobi ,i'll continue here as right. the israeli guard ex le mans is a good player but no the one who can give something important to a team like macabbi . we need first of all shooter from long(and he isnt so good) beacause give u one more offensive choise instead of the only game under the basket. for every coache who played against maccabi this year, was enoigh to creat a solid defensive wall under the basket to stop our offensive skill,since we just searched the offensive option under the bsket and never never from long distance. considering everithing my ideal maccabi for next season is first of alla another point guard instead of arroyo that absolutely can't player anymore for us. i know i can't dream greer or champs like him,but a player like kus for example for one season could be the ideal. great organizer and great shooter who doesn't earn so much . hope we can confirm fischer and ely ,so we will be strong as always under the basket, but we need guards ans small forwards.so just 2 players of our actual starting five . gaines is ok for the bench and probably d.brown too, but we need a revolution . i even think we' d need a different coach, somebody who is able to work with young players ,better if from east of europe as i wrote lately (lituania,serbia, croatia for example) for them way of play basketball. we need to play as usual now in europe,not as usual to play in the states.

[kobimel]

Pini is signed for 2 more seasons, I think. Maccabi aren't going to release him easily after all he's done for the team and because of his reputation...

moxur, Maccabi may need a European coach, but after their experience with Spahija a few years back, I don't believe they'll bring one in. If they someday fire Pini, they'll probably either promote Sharon Druker to head coach or try to bring in David Blatt from Dynamo Moscow.

I agree that Arroyo is not the right point guard for them, but again, they've invested a lot of money and hype in him, and they're probably going to keep him at least for one more season. Limonad is ok as a backup guard for them, but he's not starter material. Maccabi need shooters, as you said. It'll be interesting to see who they pick up on the market in the summer, especially since they have a reputation of going for exclusively American players, as you said.

[moxur]

so, we are right kobi. i read u are hapole fan so u guess u use to view israeli league matches. are there players who maccabi's could be interested in as shooters and who are really good player for a so ambitious team? about arroyo yers i know he have another year contract,but if u see that somebody really have a so terrific impact on your wa of play, u have to sacrifice something. i mean than even adgag , being more rational as organizer, is better than arroyo for us. so u have to cut him anyway. in my opinion , arroyo this year was the worst starting five player since i see maccabi!limonad...u don't need to create the bench , now u need to start thinking to the starting five. and actually i want to consider we just have ely and fischer, hoping they'll not go somwhere else.spahja was a bad experience , but is a great coach. i really esteem him for things he made here in italy, and maybe u are right, in maccabi it was shocked by him altought he was in quarter final with a very bad team, even worst than this one. blatt..i consider him an european style coach, it could be the right solution. pini...a great team should consider history of a coach, or the fact that there s a contract . to get things better u need to sacrifice a coach who see a play a so old basket.
i inform u about one rumors very fresh: in maccabi somebody is thinking in belinelli again . he is a great shooter , it will be a good step but this would means that there money and we know, there aren't. last think, money...maccabi is the team of the whole country and there are many rich companies in israel. is so hard to find some of them who could be interested trading with actual macca owners?

[moxur]

to vilius. whay do u follow maccabi being from litu and being a zalgiris fan? i'm couriuos about it

[Vilius]

moxur, on Mar 15 2009, 02:12 PM, said:

to vilius. whay do u follow maccabi being from litu and being a zalgiris fan? i'm couriuos about it

Maccabi is not the only team I follow in Europe. I watch Euroleague often so I see many teams in action. How could I call myself a fan of European basketball and not know situation in other teams

[moxur]

u are right , but i asked u beacuse u talk as a maccabi fan and being in lithu it was strange. now i understand anyway. if u follow unicaja as i, hox could u explaine they are out? for me is a big surprise. i really touyght they were a great team. another surpise is tau that always make a bad step at the end

[kobimel]

moxur, on Mar 15 2009, 02:08 PM, said:

so, we are right kobi. i read u are hapole fan so u guess u use to view israeli league matches. are there players who maccabi's could be interested in as shooters and who are really good player for a so ambitious team? about arroyo yers i know he have another year contract,but if u see that somebody really have a so terrific impact on your wa of play, u have to sacrifice something. i mean than even adgag , being more rational as organizer, is better than arroyo for us. so u have to cut him anyway. in my opinion , arroyo this year was the worst starting five player since i see maccabi!limonad...u don't need to create the bench , now u need to start thinking to the starting five. and actually i want to consider we just have ely and fischer, hoping they'll not go somwhere else.spahja was a bad experience , but is a great coach. i really esteem him for things he made here in italy, and maybe u are right, in maccabi it was shocked by him altought he was in quarter final with a very bad team, even worst than this one. blatt..i consider him an european style coach, it could be the right solution. pini...a great team should consider history of a coach, or the fact that there s a contract . to get things better u need to sacrifice a coach who see a play a so old basket.
i inform u about one rumors very fresh: in maccabi somebody is thinking in belinelli again . he is a great shooter , it will be a good step but this would means that there money and we know, there aren't. last think, money...maccabi is the team of the whole country and there are many rich companies in israel. is so hard to find some of them who could be interested trading with actual macca owners?

Being in California this year has severely limited my access to the IBL, unfortunately. There aren't too many great Israeli shooters that would play a lot of minutes for Maccabi. Sharon Shasson played for them for a while, and now plays for Hapoel Jerusalem. He's probably the highest profile Israeli shooter. Maccabi are adding Guy Pnini next season, a great Israeli SF with a decent shot. I agree that they should focus on rebuilding the starting 5, though. Belinelli would be tough to get since he's under contract until the summer of 2011 with Golden State, and it doesn't look like he will be released any time soon. As for Pini, he may deserve to be fired but again, Maccabi value tradition and history and so do their fans...he's not going to be fired quickly. If he is, I'd bet that Blatt replaces him. Maccabi have wanted Blatt for years now. He's a great coach. Arroyo is problematic since they're paying him a lot of money for weak production...I have no idea what they'll do with him in the summer but I think he'll get another chance.

There are plenty of successful companies in Israel, but at this point everybody is cheap. Nobody is going to invest a lot of money in Maccabi, since sports teams usually cause you to lose money.

Anyway, living in Italy, how did you become a Maccabi fan in the first place?

[gambit]

First of all, i have to say I'm not so objective- I just love to see Arroyo and play for me it sometimes look's more like art than basketball.

This season Arroyo Literally was Maccabi, everytime he was substituted Maccabi just looked lost. It is hard for a PG to play offense when there isn't any big-man in the team, the main scorer (Marcus Brown) is MIA all the important games in the top16 and everyone is just looking in your salary check.
Arroyo is far from being the "perfect PG" but i believe he is in the top 3 PG in the Euroleague and his salary is much smaller than the other top PG salaries. in addition Maccabi "paid the price" of Arroyo getting used to the Euroleague and European basketball, it will be a shame that another team will enjoy the fruit's.
Nevertheless I don't think Maccabi should keep Arroyo at all cost's, Maccabi was affected by the the economic crisis, and if Maccabi can't make a decent team and still pay Arroyo than Maccabi shouldn't ink Arroyo for another season.

Gershon is a great coach and I will even say a brilliant coach, he doesn't need to prove it, he has 2 Euroleague titles and one Suproleague title to prove it. Anyway Maccabi should let Gershon build his own team in the summer, this team was built one patch on top of the other by Efi Birnboim and not has Gershon would have wanted.

I wish Belinelli would sign with Maccabi- he is one of my favorite shooters, but he has a contract with Golden State and i don't think that they will let him go, but again it is Golden State and there isn't so much reasoning in that franchise.
About a Shooter from the Israeli league, I like Timi Bowers from Hapoel Jerusalem (YES! TAKE ALL THE PLAYERS FROM THE ISRAELI LEAGUE!!! ) he is a good ball-handler, very good shooter (but not automatic like Belinelli) and a good slasher. is only problem is that he can sometimes be little bit passive at games, but as a bench player in Maccabi he could be great. anyway I don't see him staying in Jerusalem, he is too good for only Israeli league and he probably would want to show his abilities in a Eurocup top teams or Euroleague teams.

In general my opinion is Maccabi should build around Arroyo and Casspi, Eliyahu should stay if his demand's are reasonable, he doesn't worth over 1 million Euro. Maccabi also should keep Fischer, Limonad' Green and Pnini as a susbtitute's. Maccabi should bring another Big-man with a decent post-game and defensive abilty, bring a good swingman (also has to have a good defensive skill), and if Maccabi can afford it they should bring a PF with 3-Pts' range.

[moxur]

hi gambit
i respect your opinion but i m really surprised about it. i guess that somethimes fans loves players and not always can see things as real because of theyr love. i know that when macca added arroyo many fans were so happy . they remember what he was against usa with p.rico one day and also arroyo's fame was bulted on that match because even in the states , his first fans ,changed opinion quickly because of is a so irrational and forced basket. i even think something more about him: i think is one of the worst players maccabi had in in the last 10 ys because if u don't want to consider his so bad stats, or how many time he forced action, or how many tornovers , well u ahould even consider that he was the "director" of the taem and he never care about his teammate . maccabi had no offensive plan this year ,all is based on his istinct and i m sure many teammetes should nt like he will stay again. u know ,if u just see the box score he is the main scorer but that's doesn t mean anything if always have the ball in your hand, if u just force unde basket, if u try 25 times every match, if u don't drive the game, is a disaster for a team. me eyes never make me tought there was a worst play for us lately. kobi yes i'm from italy and as every italian i loved soccer,but lately there were many affairs that make me be disappointed, so since i was always fascinated by this game(more by euroleague than nba!) i obviously am for macca couse i'm jewish.lately fortunatly by rumors macca is searching shooters altought i m not sure that shooters with pini could have success since he love to play just under the basket(his main and fatal error)

[gambit]

First of all don't exaggerate, how Arroyo can be one of "the worst players in maccabi" in the last 10 years, when he is one of the best PG in the Euroleague - he is fifth in Asist's and ninth in ninth in points in the Euroleague full season. Arroyo has 4.1 asist's per a game and only 2 turnovers per a games- this is a great asists-turnover ratio. Even the Israeli media that (in my opinion) is "killing" Arroyo say the he is one of the most talanted players that played in Maccab, but they also say that he is too expensive for Maccabi's budget.
As I said, I believe that if around Arroyo were better players he probably would looked better, in the top16 Marcus Brown didn't show up to the important games (had only 4/17 FG in the important games in the top16), D'or Fischer was injured and didn't played 2 games (and in the other 2 games he wasn't so good) and even Eliyahu was mediocre. Arroyo is the only one that looked good in the top16 (exept one game against Barcelona). Most of the games Arroyo didn't score much in the first quarter and tried to let his team-mates into the games but most of the player's just sucked! Arroyo started to take games on himself when he realized that he is the only player that is "in the game". BTW Arroyo has great stats - 14.6 points, 4.1 asist's and only 2 turnover's, in statistics he is one of the best PG in the Euroleague.
Maccabi lost her important games to Real Madrid and Barcelona because Maccabi didn't had one decent Center this season, Fischer is a great player but he is better as a PF, he didn't looked good against Real Madrid and Barcelona strong Centers.

I respect your opinion, but maybe we see diffrent games :-)

[moxur]

arroyo stats on euroleague.net:
arroyo 75'place from 2 point! av.44%
68' place as three pointers 25%
94th place on field goal
about turnover i ddn't find stats on euroleague site but on an american site that i don't remember he was the
remeber he earn 2,5 mln and he was our main addition . we had to base our way of play. considering everything, a disaster. don't know if u remeber that in madrid and barcelona in the third quarter, we were 5 point down , ball in our hand , he inveted an impossible penetration, open field for others, and down 7 . our euroleague was full of this episodes.if u just consider point, is very partial because u have to consider how many times he tried and how many times team cant make a good offensive play because of his forced option. brown for example was very conditioned buy his way of attack.
also, since he played fischer(i m agree is a pf and not a center) was the best player of euroleague and ely the fifth. we really need to hope they will stay with us.

[gambit]

Arroyo maybe 75 in 2 FG% in the top16, but a better and more expensive players have eve less % - Ramunas Siskauskas 42.83% and Igor Rakocevic has only 40%. they are Euroleague top players too. in 3 FG% the situtation is the same VASSILIS SPANOULIS has only 13% and PAPALOUKAS and Siskauskas has only 25% from 3 FG% too. so his low % is better than many great Euroleague players.

In Madrid and in Barcelona Arroyo started to take the game on himself when the other players didn't scored, he had some great "almost assists" because Eliyahu, Marcus Brown and most of the other players missed. As I saw it Arroyo started hard going to the basket when the other players just didn't came to the game.

We probably will just have to disagree about Arroyo... But about Fischer and Eliyahu I agree, we most try our best to keep them. Fischer as a contract to next year, but Eliyahu don't have and Eliyahu got expensive offers from other Euroleague teams- like TAU Vitoria. I just hope he will stay in Maccabi.

[moxur]

talking about players we are agree on, u live in israel and i ask u if there are news about ely in tau. yes he has no contract but maccabi is still a top team and i can't understand how can we loose another star like him after halperin and morris. do u have any rumors about new players for next year. i know maccabi like lavrinovic, a huge player ,but he is seriously injuried .also, maccabi fans and maccabi's staff ,finally understood we need shooter from 3?

[gambit]

I will give you a little update:
The rumore's say that Eliyahu was offered 1 milion Euro for a season in TAU, this is probably a salary that Maccabi can't match. Eliyahu is bad in defense so it is hard to build on a player and pay him a large salary when he doesn't do defense. I believe that in the end Eliyahu will stay in Maccabi- he will prefer to be a star in Israel rather than be just a regular player in TAU.
Israeli media say that Chuck Eidson (LIETUVOS RYTAS) that won the Eurocup MVP title is in deep negotiation's with Maccabi.
another player's that rumored that Maccabi intrested in: Alan Anderson (Cibona), Sani Becirovic (Lottomtica Roma), Ksystof Lavrinovic (Siena), Mirza Begic (Olimpja Ljubljana ) and Thomas Kelati (Unicaja Malaga). All of this is just rumor's nothing solid, only the rumor about Eidson seem solid.

[moxur]

well , considering the name that are on maccabi's tought i can say that finally somebody there understood that we need shooters. don't know if u read my first posts here. the main problem we had this years (exept arroyo this year:) was that we don't play an european basketball style. we don't play the basket all great teams play. every great team play a perimetral basketball that consider the game under the basket as important as the attack from outside, the tipical yugoslavian style, the one who dominate in europe since the marvellous yugoplastica. we play just the american style and pini is a coach who like the american under basket life. so in this way was easy to read maccabi offensive choise and even was hard for us to defend the perimetral style of other teams like unicaja, madrid,barca,because we even are not trained to defend the perimetral choise. with ely gaines(do u think he will stay next year?) and hopefully with fischer we are ok under basket but we need option form outside and other player who "wanna live on the line"from 3 points. in europe that's the way every team play. we can't hope in anything if we will have this same options of this year. i'd love lavrinovic, begic, kelati and edison but you have to spend money for them ,i'd be surprised about it. is hard to think macca will not build a good team ,but also is hard to imagine we can spend a lot.

[gambit]

I trust Gershon completely, you need to remember that he didn't build the current team, for next year he will bulid a team around his basketball philosphy. probably only a few (if any) of the names that are published will join Maccabi next season - it is mainly rumores. Israeli media reported that Arroyo is rumored to Maccabi a day before he signed, so you can never guess who will join.

about gaines, i guess that Gershon will see how he play in the rest of the Israeli league and then decied if Gaines will continue. In the last game Gaines played only 5 minutes so based on the last game i guess that he will not continue.

This season Maccabi didn't used almost any 3-pointers, but last year i didnt saw a problem with shooting from long distance. last time Gershon coached Maccabi almost all of the European coaches copyed some of Pini Gershon play's. last years Maccabi had Nikola Vujcic so they had one of Europe best big men.

[moxur]

gambit, today there s no tean that play like macca. we are the team with less shot on three and we always always seach only the game under basket. that's so rare in euroleague today.about pini. yes he didn't build this team but after his sign macca added some players and nobody was a shooter. we added other big men ,no shooter. pini failed his experiece for almost same reason . oly played a very old basketball when he was there.i think is is a good coach, just good ,but mainly he is an old style coach. its easy to be a symbol if u have baston saras parker. i know he will be our coach for net year too but i'm a little bit sisappointed by his second who is considered a great and modern coach ,but who never put his hand on macca choise. what do u think about mcghee?i can't see him usually ,ti could be a good player in euroleague at high level?

[gambit]

What i mean is that Gershon always play diffrent and try new things. last time he coached every coach in Europe copyed from him, and i believe that Gershon will be great.
this year maccabi didn't had a real big man, fischer is more a PF and there isn't a real C. so he tried to find another C to match-up with Real Madrid and Barcalona C. Maccabi added Dee Brown to help with the shooting, but he didn't worth so much. it is hard to find good players in the middle of the season, when you search players in the middle of the season i bring the one that is available and not the one you want. Gershon had succeses in Israel with team's that are not Maccabi (he took the Championship from Maccabi in 93 with Galil, he took the Israeli cup from Maccabi in 95 with Jerusalem- he almost the only coach the took Maccabi titles since 1970). so he can do a great job without Saras, Baston or Parker. I absoultly believe in Gershon and in Druker (his assitant).

Mcghee is nice. in the last 2 games he score over 10 points, but I really don't like his defense. he maybe could be used next year as a subtitute PF in the Euroleague. Limonad is great for up until now, he had 7 asissts last game and he is a good defender.

[moxur]

gambit ,limonad couldnt play in any team of top 16.i this is maccabi, histort, tradition. u are right , no added in the middle of the season can be a good option. is important they are working now for the next season.