Bring on the Olympics

Talk about the dog days of summer.
No more NBA, NFL, NCAA, even the NHL was fun to watch there for a second.
Luckily the Olympics are little over a month away and there will be plenty of NBA players on display when the Games tip off (Aug. 8-24).
The U.S. squad has already been announced and is currently training in Las Vegas, taking on Canada at UNLV on July 25.
The team also competes in the USA Basketball International Challenge in Shanghai, China, Aug. 3-5, where it will face Russia and Andrew Bogut’s boys from Australia.
For those planning out their summer, the Olympic quarterfinals are Aug. 20, followed by the semifinals Aug. 22 and the medal games Aug. 24.
Hopefully Coach K and the Americans can drudge up a little more support than the A.I. & Melo squad, which went a disappointing 5-3 and settled for the bronze four years ago.
While this year’s team should get a better backing after the Celtics and the West Coast teams breathed new life into the NBA in 2008, the U.S. squad still has a ways to go and has some obvious holes in its 12-man roster.
The main concern is at center, where the Americans have just one true big man in Dwight Howard. Sure, few foreign teams will have a dominant big man, but the few that do have legitimate post play will put a lot of pressure on guys like Chris Bosh, Carlos Boozer and '04 team "leader" Carmelo Anthony (especially if Howard gets into foul trouble against the Boguts and Yao Mings of the world, on Ming’s turf where the refs won’t exactly be giving the Americans any breaks).
Then there is the chemistry concern. Chemistry, passion and defense are what led the Celtics over the Lakers in the NBA Finals. But this team doesn’t have a Celtic and has only one player who reached the '08 Finals in Kobe Bryant, who didn’t exactly will his team to victory in that series.
Another concern would be health and age when talking about Dwyane Wade (who will be rusty after failing to finish the season because of injury) and 2000 gold medalist Jason Kidd (who didn’t exactly turn the Mavs into contender this year and could be preparing for the Senior Olympics).
Then there’s the rest of the roster, which is decent but untested when it comes big-game experience. Chris Paul, Michael Redd and Deron Williams are up-and-comers in the league, but they haven’t won the big one.
Luckily for the Americans, they have Coach K, MVPs like Kobe and LeBron James and recent NBA champions like Wade and Tayshaun Prince to bring in that championship mentality.