Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to beard free...

As one of the few Americans not in support of building a giant wall to keep out the Mexicans (except for Zenitram- who let him in here?!?) I feel it necessary to warn the teeming masses looking to huddle onto a boat from Europe or South America to join the ranks of the NBA: at some point during your career you're going to grow a beard. When that happens, everyone is going to laugh at you.

Case in point:
Dirk Nowitzki is German, and has the face of a 12 year-old-boy, but I love him anyways, because he regularly calls out Dwayne Wade for flopping around on the floor like a toddler on "Super Nanny". This lead Dwayne Wade to call out Dirk's leadership abilities, which lead Mark Cuban to post "I love watching you shoot free-throws, Dwayne Wade" on his blog. (Yes, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks franchise has a blog where he takes pot-shots at players from other teams. Do you think I could just make that up?) That being said, if Peja Stojakovic can grow more hair on his knees than you can on your face, it's time to go clean shaven, Yankees style.
"No I'm not wearing leggings. Why do you ask?" Honestly, I'm fine with Peja growing a beard because it keeps me from looking at his back.

Other NBA Euros subscribing to this methodology are:
Jorge Garbajosa
When mothers in Toronto tell their kids not to talk to strangers, what they're really trying to say is not to talk to Jorge Garbajosa.
"Don't talk to Jose Calderon either."

As for the mothers of San Antonio...
Tim Duncan hates Fabricio Oberto with a passion he usually reserves for Gypsies. This man is so hairy and awful that they should hold him down and shave his back in order to send his back hair to genetic scientists who can make sure that it never, ever happens again.

If those same scientists can study the emotional centers of Oberto, Andres Nocioni, and Manu Ginobili's brains, maybe they can tell me how they can make basketball AND soccer so dramatic and unwatchable whenever Argentineans are involved.

Manu Ginobili is one Nair treatment away from starring in daytime television drama.


Here, Andres displays his "basketball skills" or "elbows" as we call them in the states.


Oh, Carlos. Of course we didn't mean you. You're an angel. We'll reserve judgment on you for when Flip Murray goes away and you start playing actual minutes.

Enough of people pretending to be from Italy. This young man is the real deal. Please try and say the name "Andrea Bargnani" and not sound like Super Mario. Can't do it? Maybe this beard will help:


Here's Lithuania's Zyldrunas Ilgauskas, who used to matter before David Stern tinkered with the league enough to make big men irrelevant.

Zyldrunus got bored when he didn't make it downcourt on time for 18 consecutive plays, so he grew a beard.

Overkill? You have no idea how many international players I ignored just because they never play. This image doesn't do Vladimir Radmanovic's beard justice. Lately, he looks like a post-news SNL parody of George Michael.

"Maybe if I grow this beard, Kobe will pass me the ball, or at the very least, stop raping me..."

Former Piston Mehmet Okur, from Turkey:

After the championship season, the Pistons banished Mehmet to Utah, where the kind of inbreeding that makes your eyebrows grow in like this is excepted publicly.

Pau Gasol the "Spanish Fly":

Gasol is actually a great player, and if the Bulls don't pull a trade for him soon, they can kiss this small window for a championship goodbye. You're not gonna win anything starting Nocioni's beard at power forward.

BOOOOring.

The man that started it all, from Serbia & Montenegro (apparently a real country) Vlade Divac.

Vlade knows how a man should properly stroke his beard.

Finally:

John Amaechi's beard isn't fooling anybody.