{"id":99506,"date":"2025-08-26T23:55:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-26T23:55:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/99506\/"},"modified":"2025-08-26T23:55:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-26T23:55:09","slug":"tim-mcmahon-brings-up-luka-doncics-statement-to-explain-why-giannis-antetokounmpo-doesnt-play-well-for-greece","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/99506\/","title":{"rendered":"Tim McMahon Brings Up Luka Doncic’s Statement to Explain Why Giannis Antetokounmpo Doesn’t Play Well for Greece"},"content":{"rendered":"

Once the 2025-26 NBA season begins, you could pretty much pencil Giannis Antetokounmpo to average 30 points while filling the rest of the stat sheet. The two-time MVP is simply one of the most dominant forces the NBA has ever seen, which is it would only make sense that his home nation of Greece would be among the top international teams. Unfortunately, that isn\u2019t the case and NBA insider Tim McMahon knows why.<\/p>\n

In the 2024-25 season, Antetokounmpo<\/a> averaged 30.4 points while finishing third in MVP voting. The Milwaukee Bucks<\/a> superstar has, however, struggled to find that same level of success playing for Greece<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Antetokounmpo has played in two friendly matches<\/a> ahead of the 2025 EuroBasket. The 6-foot-11 forward led Greece to a 104-86 victory over Latvia, while finishing with 25 points. But in their next game against France, they were able to neutralize the nine-time All-Star.<\/p>\n

France dominated en route to a 92-77 victory over Greece as Antetokounmpo was held to just 20 points on the night. That is an off-game by every metric for the \u2018Greek Freak\u2019. His performance led to a conversation between Brian Windhorst, Tim Bontemps and Tim McMahon regarding the inability to dominate in international play. They believe the answer is quite simple.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe international game is tough on Giannis,\u201d said<\/a> Windhorst on\u00a0The Hoop Collective. \u201cThey can just beat the hell out of him and they just flop incessantly in front of him.\u201d<\/p>\n

The level of physicality allowed in international play is one of the biggest differences from the NBA. Team USA\u2019s roster for the 2023 FIBA World Cup learned about the discrepancy the hard way. The types of calls from foul baiting or minimal contact in the NBA don\u2019t exist in FIBA.<\/p>\n

Antetokounmpo uses his strength to overpower his opponents<\/a> in the NBA. Now, international teams always play with more physicality, which can throw the Greek star off his game. It doesn\u2019t help that that style of play also restricts him against stronger opponents, at least in comparison to the league.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe spacing is completely different with that lane and that style of play,\u201d McMahon proclaimed. While speaking, McMahom remembered a key quote from Luka Doncic, which can explain Antetokounmpo\u2019s struggles.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn Luka\u2019s rookie year, he said something about how much easier it is to score in the NBA than in Europe. People tried to make it a thing that he was taking a shot at NBA defense. All he was saying is that the spacing is completely different and much more open in the NBA. That obviously makes it a lot tougher on Giannis, who\u2019s the best downhill attacker in the world,\u201d McMahon said.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not the just the international teams either. Back during the 2019 NBA playoffs, the Toronto Raptors proved that the one way to stop Antetokounmpo was to form a wall. However, that roster had the necessary components for that defensive scheme to fully flourish under the NBA\u2019s rules. European teams can adopt that philosophy even if they don\u2019t have the best defenders, since the physical play substitutes.<\/p>\n

McMahon and Windhorst aren\u2019t ruling out the possibility that Antetokounmpo could thrive in the EuroBasket. It would be asinine to doubt one of the greatest players of all time but the harsh reality is that the path isn\u2019t simply as linear as it is in the NBA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Once the 2025-26 NBA season begins, you could pretty much pencil Giannis Antetokounmpo to average 30 points while…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":99507,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,82],"class_list":["post-99506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99506\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}