101 Greats of European Basketball

greater competitiveness and making our sport accessible
to the general public through the media, especially
through television. An evolution that has also reached
a pan-European level with the creation of an own
league, the EuroLeague, whose mission is to bring the
beauty and quality of European basketball to all the
fans around the world. Never ever since 1959 have our
clubs, players, coaches and officials enjoyed the attention
they have today.
Today basketball is the second worldwide sport
thanks to the above.
Although the book is retrospective, it is historical,
because it introduces the characters who have built
this bright present throughout the years, it is always
necessary to look ahead and see the challenges facing
us, anticipate the needs arising from this growth and
look for the suitable solutions that will allow us to keep
on growing. Nonetheless, without a doubt, the future
cannot be designed without knowing the past. The
road cannot defined if we do not know where we have
come from. In this regard, this is a key book to provide
us with models, make us aware of our strengths and
our weaknesses, and prepare us better for this fascinating
trip.
The sports globalisation and its economy raise
difficult and exciting challenges: Finding and properly
managing the necessary resources to continue with
the task of our predecessors has become a top priority.
Defining the appropriate framework for our players,
coaches and officials to perform their activity in the
best possible conditions and be able to offer all their
talent to our fans. Managing our clubs upon the basis
of a much wider and much more dynamic professional
market than the one we had until the beginning of
the current century. Adapting the players’ training
programmes to the new market reality, where volatility
and the rush to run too fast are becoming a risk.
Competition and competitiveness have always been
the decisive factors in the appearance of sports stars.
Our policies, our rules and our decisions must promote
these criteria if we want to keep on growing.
Our organisations will need to understand that
in the era of technological change, permanent communication
and image, fans no longer understand
entertainment in a passive way, but, on the contrary,
they want to be part of the show and want to interact,
and for this reason we need to be near. When physical
proximity is no longer significant and the sports consumption
is so different, we have to present our competitions
and the relationships among the different
stakeholders in such a way that we can satisfy millions
of basketball lovers.
It was the personalities of this book who gave that
response in their time in history. These players have
been the top stars on this road, and without them
nothing that European basketball has achieved would
have been possible. They are our example, and for this
reason it is so useful to get to know them the way this
book will allow us to do.
Thank you so much, Vlady, for such a fervent effort.
101 greats of european basketball