When the U.S. Olympic basketball team takes the floor at Oracle Arena on Tuesday night, Warriors president Rick Welts will be on hand.
Though no one tosses around the term “Dream Team” anymore, Welts was instrumental in the development and birth of the concept, back in the late 1980s.
[...] it was a concept that not only changed Olympic basketball, but also the course of the NBA.
The concept started even before the 1988 Olympics, in which the United States, still fielding an amateur team, took home bronze.
The Americans lost in the semifinals to a Soviet Union team fielding professional players.
“We had international aspirations,” said Welts, who was the president of NBA Properties, responsible for marketing the game.
To foster a more formal relationship with the governing body of basketball, FIBA, the NBA created the McDonald’s Championship, a tournament that featured an NBA team, a foreign national team and an international club team.
In 1989, FIBA modified its rules to allow NBA players into the Olympics; they had been the only professionals banned.
The only countries voting against the proposal were the Soviet Union and the United States.
[...] it was a very popular decision with NBA players and the companies interested in associating with the team.
Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen, John Stockton and Karl Malone, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Patrick Ewing, Chris Mullin, Charles Barkley and David Robinson.
Once in Barcelona, there was a controversy because the team stayed in a luxury hotel with a large security contingent.
There was also controversy when the Nike players on the team draped a flag over their uniform’s Reebok logo, causing criticism of millionaire mercenaries.
[...] there was little controversy over the inclusion of Johnson, who had retired from the Lakers the previous season after his diagnosis of HIV.
[...] his joy at playing with his teammates probably helped further acceptance of people diagnosed with HIV and AIDS.
In 1996 in Atlanta, while the rest of the Olympians sweltered in their villages, the men’s basketball players complained about room service at their hotel.
Coming off a disappointing sixth-place finish in the 2002 World Championships, the Americans finished third, losing to Argentina in the semifinals.
[...] USA Basketball appointed Jerry Colangelo to oversee the program, and he sought only players who were fully committed.
There’s a new generation of NBA players who think winning a gold medal is a pretty cool thing.
