Panathinaikos wanted to buy Jokic, Denver replied in seconds

Panathinaikos owner Dimitris Giannakopoulos admitted he sent a serious offer for Nikola Jokic this year - to the player and to Denver. "Don't laugh at all. If I don't sign Jokic, I'm not going anywhere," he said on the Euro Insiders podcast, explaining that he tried to buy out the final year of the contract. Denver's answer was, in his words, ready in seconds: "Who? Greece? Where? What? Have a nice day." The numbers explain why. Jokic is due to earn around 59 million dollars next season and holds a player option of nearly 63 million for 2027/28. If he waits until the summer of 2027, an extension worth 359.5 million dollars over five years awaits him - the most expensive contract in NBA history. The 31-year-old centre has already said he wants to stay in Denver until the end of his career. European basketball can talk about ambition as much as it likes; there still isn't a single club that can pay that bill.

Giannis misses the qualifiers for Greece - and it isn't his decision

Giannis Antetokounmpo will not play in the August window for Greece in the World Cup qualifiers. The reason isn't injury but his new club - Miami Heat reportedly withheld consent, fearing workload and injury. The Heat acquired the two-time MVP together with Bobby Portis from Milwaukee, in exchange for Tyler Herro, Jaime Jaquez Jr, Kel'el Ware, Kasparas Jakucionis and significant draft compensation. Greece travels to Riga to play Ukraine on 28 August, and on 31 August hosts Spain. With a 3-3 record in Group I, where Spain leads on 5-1 and Ukraine and Montenegro are both 4-2, every game is decisive - only the top three qualify directly. So: the national team fights for Qatar 2027, and a club in Florida decides who plays. This is the model of modern basketball and nobody pretends otherwise any more.

Wembanyama says he could score 100 points. He isn't joking.

Asked whether he could score 100 points in a game, Victor Wembanyama answered briefly and in the affirmative. In the entire history of the NBA only Wilt Chamberlain has done it, in 1962. Kobe Bryant reached 81 points in 2006, and last season Bam Adebayo passed that with 83 points. Wembanyama's own record is 50 points against Washington in 2024. But the story that makes the statement serious is another one: last February against the Lakers he scored 25 points in under eight minutes and finished the half with 37. Then San Antonio led so comfortably that he barely returned to the floor - adding just three points in a 136:108 win. He is 22. If anyone in the current generation has the arithmetic for that number, it is him.

Cair loses its place in the elite, and the federation seeks a replacement for 40,000 euros

The basketball federation confirmed that Cair 2030 did not receive a licence for the Super League, so after four seasons in the elite the team drops to a lower tier. So far - procedure. What follows is more interesting: the federation opened a call for the vacated place, and the condition that reached the public is a sum of 40,000 euros. So a place in the best Macedonian league is filled by payment, not by a result on the court. Public reaction, as domestic sports media note, has so far not affected the decision. The question the federation doesn't answer is a basic one: if a licence is the criterion for Cair, what exactly is the criterion for whoever pays? Sport has its own logic - it is called competition. Everything else is administration with a price list.

Pelister in a full rebuild: Savicevic is the seventh new name in Bitola

Basketball club Pelister has signed 24-year-old Luka Savicevic, who arrives from Feniks 2010 with experience from a Spanish academy and the NCAA. He is the seventh new name in the squad for the new season - Bitola isn't reinforcing a roster, it is building one from scratch. At the same time, former Macedonia head coach Aleksandar Joncevski is taking over Vllaznimi from Gjakova in Kosovo, and Marjan Srbinovski has taken the bench at Sokoli 1933 in Stip, where the "Jackson" sports centre is meant to bring top-flight basketball back to the city after many years. Three pieces of news in one day about clubs remaking themselves, and not one about a club with continuity. That is the portrait of Macedonian basketball in August: every season starts as if it were the first.