It's rhetorical, of course we are all selfish at times. But are Americans more so than foreign player?

While guys like Yao Ming, Luis Scola, Dirk Nowitzki, Tony Parker, Anderson Varejao, Pau Gasol almost always participates in their respective country's national team ventures (Barring injuries and recovery). Almost the entire re-deem team has decided against committing to USA basketball this summer, and most of them were noncommittal before the the nightmare team happened . While nobody understand more about the toll of playing year round basketball better than the Rockets, I cant help but think patriotism comes behind capitalism sometimes for US players.

Now I understand if your body is aging, you take better care of yourself and use all the rest you can get, so guys like Kobe(though he turned down one earlier in his career), J-Kidd, Duncan, Garnett(though both he and T-mac pull out of one for marriage), they get a pass from me since they do have legitimate reason regarding the longevity of their career. I can even let D-wade(who has his own injury concern at times) off the hook, Paul just recovered from an injury. Maybe not so much Lebron and Bosh due to the fact they are young and relatively healthy and owe their unholy matrimony to the program, but for at least the media fiasco and other issues that comes with relocation, I may not agree but I can at least understand. Melo got married, which is like universal excuse for I cant play this summer. These are legit guys who already played together(3 of them will play a lot together) and some of them should all be back for the Olympics.

However, for guys like Rajon Rondo, Al Jefferson, LaMarcus Aldridge to waver and even turn down an opportunity to represent their own country really burns me. These are young man who are on top of their game, given a chance to shine on an international stage for their own country. They, for whatever reason, turned it down. Mind you , it's not even to play in the world championships, but only to practice in Vegas.

While the US is plentiful in basketball talent, I think we have seen enough to know the rest of the world has caught up. However, while our players' national spirit declined over the years due to perceived domination, others has only risen. While it's not the end of the world to no longer dominate, it's another new episode in the long running series  " The End of an Great Era", back when nationalism was at an all time high and people cared about their country's pride enough to dominate the crap out of a game

Thoughts?