Being part of a gold medal-winning Olympic team is truly an honor which not a lot of NBA players can experience. Harrison Barnes happens to be one of those select players when he won gold in the 2016 Rio Olympics in Brazil. Someone asked the Dallas Mavericks forward on Twitter what the best thing about being in Brazil was, and his response was an honest yet amusing one.
Front row seat to every game was unbelievable https://t.co/MSkFY6ciqU
— Harrison Barnes (@hbarnes) August 20, 2017
Barnes certainly spent a lot of time watching those games from his “front row seat.” He played just four of the eight games during that Olympic run, one of only two players on the team to not play all eight. DeMar DeRozan was that other player, and he played in seven. In total, Barnes spent just 32 minutes on the floor in Rio, 45 fewer than DeRozan.
With the likes of Olympic Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Durant, Paul George and Jimmy Butler all ahead of him in the pecking order, Barnes was never going to see significant playing time on that team.
But hey, he was still part of Team USA at the Olympics, was able to travel to the beautiful city of Rio, got to witness some terrific Olympic basketball in the best seat in the house, and got a gold medal for his troubles. That’s a pretty sweet deal, and he’d probably do it all over again, as would many other players if given the chance.
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