(Brent Darby, circa 2006 with Italian A Club Air AV)(Unrelated bit on European/International crowds)
In the scripted world of Pro Wrestling, athletes perform actions with the goal of eliciting certain reactions from the audience. This reaction is sometimes referred to as crowd 'pop' or most notably 'crowd heat' (basically just a hot crowd, loud, involved & boisterous) As Sports fans, we love that we have real life examples of theater, meaning different personalities or real life drama. Some athletes play to the home crowd for momentum, others like Rasheed Wallace for example, might act kind of grumpy on the road (BTW, things like Wallace entering an arena with a championship belt is why we love the NBA, leave that stuff alone Stern), and then there are players who are just indifferent to it all and just play. A passionate game or series of games can end up being like a short move itself.
Crowd heat in international basketball games in one of the more unique aspects of the sport overseas. Many appreciate it, while a bunch of others neglect to even notice, but for us the audiences are definitely interesting & entertaining at the same time.
International basketball crowds are a combination of NCAA fan support & World Football (Soccer) passion. Like an NCAA program, a club with a good brand i.e good players & a winning culture will have a built in devoted fanbase. Another similarity is that many of these clubs are in small cities or towns. Oldenburg (Germany) for example, does not have a football team, so Rickey Paulding, Je'Kel Foster & the boys (a rising European team are the show. The other day we were viewing a game between two top teams in the Czech Republic, we see a lot of senior citizens in these old European town audiences. (which also brings the interesting moment when they play Soulja Boy during timeouts. American influence overseas is always fascinating as well) There was a man who had to be in his 70's rocking a CEZ Nymburk jersey.
These guys have a special passion too. Not only are they loud like any good college crowd, but they add their football culture too. This is where the constant singing, chanting, & sometimes group dancing comes from. They are also allowed to bring instruments so you will hear anything from horns to drum, ect...even sirens..it will sound like a war zone or something!..and they whistle..European crowds whistle in anger instead of just booing. In addition, some of the more edgy crowds (Turkey, Serbia, Greece) will actually light torches and shoot flares during the game.
All the noise is straight, we get used to it and we guess the players just have to get used to it of course. But some of that stuff like shooting flares is stupid. It is fairly common to see physical 'dugout' like barriers between the team bench & crowd because of uncivilized fans throwing objects at players. European homers like to say that Euro crowds go harder than American crowds, well duh! if you are shooting flares in the arena then I guess you do go hard..Americans treat basketball games like basketball games though, not like football or soccer games. But overall, we do appreciate the environments overseas, and of course love it when one of our Bucks are performing in such settings.
Former Buckeye guard Brent Darby switched from French Pro B Limoges to Italian B Umana Reyer in late February, early March. Brent joins fellow Americans Alvin Young & Tyrone Grant for Reyer (9-16). He played his first game with the club on March 14 vs Trenkwalder.
-Video..
Not the best of quality, but it is Brent's first game in his return to Italy. The always exciting Darby checked in with 1:55 to go in the 1st. He attacked right away, and then picked a guard's pocket, but shuffled his feet on the layup. Darby came back and broke the same guy off with the Motor City crossover to a jumper. at 2:15 a bigger Italian guy thinks he is going to post Brent up, but does not know about Darby's strength yet. Brent gives him a swim move, steals the ball and starts the break..the next play is just Brent being Brent..prompting the announcer to emphatically state Brent Lamar Darby!
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