Aug 18th 2008 9:08AM by Tom Ziller (author feed)
Filed under: Clippers, FIBA, USA BasketballChris Kaman was invited to participate with the USA Select team, the squad of youngsters which serves as both a scrimmage opponent for Team USA proper and a pipeline for potential future Team USA players. Guys like Kevin Durant, Kevin Martin and Al Jefferson participated this year. Kaman declined, for this reason, as told to ’s Kelly Whiteside:
Kaman was asked by USA Basketball about playing on a select team of NBA players who practiced against Team USA last month, but Kaman wasn’t interested.

“I want to be the beat-up dummy for the U.S. basketball team?” Kaman said. “No offense to those guys, I appreciate everything. But I want to win a medal. I wanted a chance to play in the Olympics with Dirk.”
Chris Kaman, who agreed to play for Germany because he wanted to be involved in the Olympics but did not want the beat-up dummy for the U.S. basketball team, sees his team trailing the U.S. by 41 points in the third quarter. Something’s not adding up.