Jeff Taylor has been covering European basketball since 1997, when he first worked on the television program SLAM. He has been a basketball writer and broadcaster since that time, traveling the continent and covering the game in depth for FIBA Europe since its launch in 2003.

 

How do you feel about the possibility of Becky Hammon, the pride of South Dakota, "putting on a Russian uniform" as USA women's coach Anne Donovan put it?

Here's what I think. Hmm, actually, I'm not sure what I think about this.

Back in Donovan's day as a USA international, her country's government boycotted the 1980 Moscow Games.

JR Holden has made a great career for himself in Russia and helped bring them a EuroBasket title in 2007.

Cold War tensions were high.

The Soviets, not to be outdone, boycotted the Los Angeles Olympics four years later.

Now that was a real shame because we could have watched Michael Jordan, who was just coming off his junior year at North Carolina and a player on the US team, take on the USSR's great Lithuanian Arvydas Sabonis - a player who at the time many believed to be the best in the world.

Times have changed.

In 2008, long after Gorbachev, Glasnost and the break-up of the Soviet Union, we have Russia.

And this is now a country where clubs, just like in the USA's rich professional leagues - the NFL, NBA, Major League Basketball and NHL - pay big bucks for players.

Hammon is one of those foreign players who gets a lot of dosh from CSKA Moscow, reportedly $2million US over four years.

She is a scoring machine, and not just one who stops and pops from behind the arc. She'll also score off dribble penetration or backdoor cuts.

And Hammon, now 31, has never played for Team USA.

She was more than happy to receive Russian citizenship, and not just because it made her more valuable to CSKA.

It also gave Hammon her first shot at being an Olympian.

I spoke to Hammon at the EuroLeague Women All-Star Game in Russia earlier this year after she had just become a citizen of the country.

She said while growing up, playing in Europe had never crossed her mind "... especially, probably not in Russia, during the eighties."

So why did Russia make Hammon a citizen?

"There are benefits for the team, and myself," she said. "They (CSKA) are able to bring two more Americans on. It's something that a lot of people do. A lot of Americans have foreign passports, it's just my turn to go and do it."

At the time, Hammon said she didn't know if she would make the Russian Olympic team but spoke with a lot of enthusiasm about taking part in the Beijing Games.

"Any chance to play in an Olympics is a one-in-a-lifetime opportunity for anybody, so it would definitely be a dream come true for me," she said.

"I'm just excited to see how things play out."

For the record, Americans Deanna Nolan and Kelly Miller also have a chance to make the team.

There have been numerous cases of Americans playing in foreign countries and becoming naturalised citizens and ultimately playing for those countries.

The United States have even had foreigners suit up for the red, white and blue.

Hakeem Olajuwon was born in Nigeria and played for Team USA at the 1996 Olympics.

Tim Duncan, who hails from the Virgin Islands, played for the Americans at the 2004 Olympics.

Duncan, remember, was uncomfortable with the idea of taking on his homeland at the 2003 FIBA Americas Championship in Puerto Rico and sat out the game.

Americans have even helped coach foreign teams.

Dallas Mavericks president Donnie Nelson served as an assistant coach to then Lithuania boss Jonas Kazlauskas at the 2000 Olympics and loved the job until he went up against the United States in the semi-finals and almost watched the Baltic country upset the Americans.

"The only thing I can compare it to is it's like you're in a boxing match and you're getting ready to go for the knockout punch, and suddenly you're looking at your mother's face," Nelson said in Friday's edition of the Dallas Morning News.

So how do you feel about Hammon playing for Russia? I don't know how I feel.

The world is a different place now and certainly that applies to basketball.

JR Holden, the pride of Pennsylvania, reminded everyone of that at last year's EuroBasket when he buried the game-winning shot near the end for Russia to beat Spain in the gold-medal game.

He celebrated on the court with Russia's America-born coach, David Blatt.

The question I have for Russia is this. You beat the Americans in the semi-finals of the 2006 FIBA World Championship, and last year you won the EuroBasket gold medal in Italy.

Aren't your players good enough?

I understand Donovan, and I understand Hammon. I think maybe what I don't understand is Russia.

I think I have to share the sentiment of China's Australian coach, Tom Maher.

"I think the Russian point guard (Oxana Rakhmatulina) is great, but they seem to have a problem with her," he told me. "She can play for me."