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Andrew Bogut calls out FIBA on investigation into Australian team

Sergio Moraes / Reuters

While he's not in uniform for the national team this summer, Australian center Andrew Bogut has a problem with FIBA looking into Australia allegedly tanking a group-stage game to improve its path to a medal at the FIBA World Cup.

Bogut's defense of Australia "tanking" a game seems fair, as the public has appeared to be split on whether the team really did anything wrong in trying to improve their chances later in the tournament (even if it did backfire, suggesting basketball karma was at play).

His issue with naturalized players is a more nuanced topic. FIBA allows players to play for a country if they show nationality "by birth or by naturalisation," and have not played for a different nation at the senior level in the past. Each FIBA team can have one naturalized player on a roster, like in the case of Andray Blatche with the Philippines in this tournament.

Wherever you stand on each issue, they are largely unrelated in this case. Credit Bogut for sticking up for his countrymen, though.

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