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90's and 2000's league was so amazing to watch.
So physical!!!

Today's league is for pussies!!!

Lol speak for yourself. Maybe not the best time for this I thought the two basketball games last night were some of the most entertaining in a long time. I am loving the parity.

The one thing I miss compared to the 90s is how players used to take pride in rebounding. Two guys fighting for positioning was kind of how the average fan envisioned the NBA.

Nostalgia is a hell of a drug.

Petre1978 wrote:

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90's and 2000's league was so amazing to watch.
So physical!!!

Today's league is for pussies!!!

I fully agree

Turning into **** soccer

I'd love to see a true simulation (not NBA2k) of now vs then using early nineties rules, early oughts, and present as parameters. Maybe similarly ranked teams. 2nd place in the east 1991-2 vs this years celtics. Turns out the Celtics also finished 2nd that year.

Looking at the 92 Celtics, i have a hard time believing they all their guys would be able to stay on the floor against the present day athletes, regardless of rules. Reggie Lewis and Larry Bird are two pretty outstanding wings. Actually they have a lot of depth at wing. The bigs are 1980 bigs. Point guards are super tiny (Dee Brown and John Bagley, both probably under 6")

This is probably the most parity I've seen in years. Legitimately most of the remaining teams could win the title. (Outside of the Knicks).

It's not really my preferred style of play either with all the 3pt shooting contests, but objectively, there's a ton of talent in the league currently and the parity is decent with no current true superteams.

But some more variety/physicality would be nice, yeah.

Hand checking rules changed the league. New rules about shooters space and quicker shot clocks on offensive rebounds have made the pace faster.

This is why shooting is at a premium at almost every position. You are essentially mitigating effective defense because the rules benefit the shooter in every possible situation.

You have to be extremely proficient defensively in order to make a real difference without fouling.

Just a few reasons why the game has evolved the way it has.

The only reason Los Angeles is in these games against better shooters is when they take 100 free throws.

Cynical vainglorious revanchist bull from insecurity. Cannot imagine being this bitter about younger professionals in my field.

Regarding parity, I'm glad that we're moving away from superteams, but I think the overall perceived parity across the league this season (with only a handful of teams being in the cellar while everyone else was in the mix for something) is an illusion. The prevailing style of play across the league (3pt shooting in high volume) may be mathematically superior on a large scale, but on a small scale (individual games), it's high variance. Crappy players go off for big games more often because they get hot, crappy teams can get hot as a team on any given night, or a good team can just be cold on a given night. The bottom teams aren't any closer to the top teams than they've ever been, W-L records are just being rubberbanded by a high variance style of play. At the end of the day, the championship will be won by an actual contender just like always, not a darling underdog.

The eras are different but that doesn't mean one is better. It's personal taste is all.

Imo it's just way more obvious now than it was in past ( maybe because players say & treat game like that) that regular season has no value to anybody.
Players just coast and tend to go through motions. That's why every night some random scrub goes off for 25,30,35, even 50 points.

Whole parity thing is illusion tho. League never had parity.
Lakers menaged to swap Westbrook & few scrubs for:
former allstar Russell
Vanderbilt
Malik Beasley
Hachimura

All that in last few weeks of deadline and go from non-play in team to one of title favorites.

Suns were dark horse contender with nagging injuries of Paul & underachiver, than they pulled Durant trade

pepe1991 wrote:Whole parity thing is illusion tho. League never had parity.
Lakers menaged to swap Westbrook & few scrubs for:
former allstar Russell
Vanderbilt
Malik Beasley
Hachimura

All that in last few weeks of deadline and go from non-play in team to one of title favorites.

Suns were dark horse contender with nagging injuries of Paul & underachiver, than they pulled Durant trade

I don't think you're defining parity though. Your point is something else entirely.

Bucks are out, Kings out (after tough series), Cavs out, Clippers out (injuries be damned)

Memphis out, one of Warriors/Lakers out.

One of Philly/Boston will be out because of upset/parity.

One of Denver/Phoenix will be out because of upset/parity.

Favorites in any sport will still always be whoever finishes top 3 in their conference and who are healthy, doesn't mean parity doesn't exist. I'd argue that less than 1% of people would guess Lakers/Suns (or Denver) and Heat/Philly in ECF/WCF if it came to be, which means there is parity.

Basketball in nature will always be driven by stars and talent unlike most other sports where you can be a wildcard team and win the championship. It's way more difficult in the NBA. But I'd argue very little people would have potential Lakers/Miam in their conference finals.

I think todays league is much, MUCH more skilled than past eras. The ballhandling and shooting is better across all positions. The craft is better.

I couldn’t say one era is better than another though. They’re both enjoyable, but very different. Magic were more enjoyable in the 90s and late 00’s because we had two of the best big men in the era of big men. Most of the last decade sucked though, before Suggs, Franz and Paolo showed up.

For a long time teams have tries to perfect the Warriors game plan.

Toughness looks to be what the Magic is building. In one of the youth's above, Shaq said "high percentage shots". An And-1 field goal is more efficient (scores more over time) than a 3-ball.

I love this toughness - nothing "soft and boring" in this:










p.s. what I hate about the modern NBA more than any other play is the step-back three.
It is the ultimate ' There is a "me" in team ' play.

SOUL wrote:

pepe1991 wrote:Whole parity thing is illusion tho. League never had parity.
Lakers menaged to swap Westbrook & few scrubs for:
former allstar Russell
Vanderbilt
Malik Beasley
Hachimura

All that in last few weeks of deadline and go from non-play in team to one of title favorites.

Suns were dark horse contender with nagging injuries of Paul & underachiver, than they pulled Durant trade

I don't think you're defining parity though. Your point is something else entirely.

Bucks are out, Kings out (after tough series), Cavs out, Clippers out (injuries be damned)

Memphis out, one of Warriors/Lakers out.

One of Philly/Boston will be out because of upset/parity.

One of Denver/Phoenix will be out because of upset/parity.

Favorites in any sport will still always be whoever finishes top 3 in their conference and who are healthy, doesn't mean parity doesn't exist. I'd argue that less than 1% of people would guess Lakers/Suns (or Denver) and Heat/Philly in ECF/WCF if it came to be, which means there is parity.

Basketball in nature will always be driven by stars and talent unlike most other sports where you can be a wildcard team and win the championship. It's way more difficult in the NBA. But I'd argue very little people would have potential Lakers/Miam in their conference finals.

But it's not parity if in a league of 30 teams, 15 in Western conference, and since 2000- 2022, Lakers or Warriors played 14 out of 23 finals. ( given that Western conference teams win 65% of finals since Jordan era with Bulls ended). Add Spurs & Duncan/Pop era and you fill that with 19 out of 23 finals.

From 1998 to present day, only 4 non- Lebron teams on East won championship.

Parity, by definition is the state or condition of being equal, especially as regards status or pay.

it's not equal playfield if some teams can go in lenghts of luxury others can't reach ( Warriors) and it's not equal as long as Lakers by their name value alone can s*** their bed as much as they want and will just sign Lebron in FA than establish fake player's agency that will pull top 5 player in one of most forced trades in sports history where media outlets knew it will happen months before it happend. ( Davis). ( For people who forgot, Davis had that's all folks for last Pelicans home game shirt, right before trade).
And ofc his agent secured trade to Lakers by telling everybody he won't resign for anybody else.

Westbrook thing was yet another "there isn't parity here" moment where Lebron & Davis were pitching Westbrook their vision of future around 3 weeks before trade, showing up at his house.
Trade didn't work for them, but nevermind, there is always good samaritan to help them out so they send Westbrook's salary for non other than another allstar level player ( + 2 solid role players). Team that gave them assets didn't even kept Westbrook...

Maybe they are just masterminds of business. Or maybe game is always rigged in their favour. Reagrdless, they won 9 championships in time period of 2000-2022.

pepe1991 wrote:Maybe they are just masterminds of business. Or maybe game is always rigged in their favour. Reagrdless, they won 9 championships in time period of 2000-2022.

It does seem like the new CBA will make it hard for a density team to exist. Only if several stars accepted being paid "only" 30M a season could a dynasty exist. But - we now have Jaren Jackson eligible for a super-max deal. Would even he accept 30M a year? I would doubt it.

Parity won't come, but a 9-year GSW flout of the cap will end.

And let me beat this dead horse: the fact that the Knicks has not won 10 titles in the last 40 years proves how horrible managed that team is. It should be the location for dynasty rosters. But: nope.

drsd wrote:

pepe1991 wrote:Maybe they are just masterminds of business. Or maybe game is always rigged in their favour. Reagrdless, they won 9 championships in time period of 2000-2022.

It does seem like the new CBA will make it hard for a density team to exist. Only if several stars accepted being paid "only" 30M a season could a dynasty exist. But - we now have Jaren Jackson eligible for a super-max deal. Would even he accept 30M a year? I would doubt it.

Parity won't come, but a 9-year GSW flout of the cap will end.

And let me beat this dead horse: the fact that the Knicks has not won 10 titles in the last 40 years proves how horrible managed that team is. It should be the location for dynasty rosters. But: nope.

I always wonder how some nogotations go, like Lebron to Miami for example.
How execlly player who made less than $400M in nba ( contracts) is officially a billionaire ?

What would stop some team & ownership group from team to offer player i don't know, $30M in nba money and 10% of shareholds in some offshore company worth $150M where he could extract , tax free $15M every year?

Even whole "1,5M a year on body" sounds like money laundering scheme.


in general basketball & soccer just smell like loundering schemes nowdays when you know what money can you wash and in how short period of time. Let alone gambling & game betting witch is whole another level of scams & sport mafia. Best handball player probably of all time, in 2015 was cought fixing matches for money. Nothing to see there ,just olympic gold medalist & one of best known French athletes, randomlly, with 10 other players , fixing match where they got cought making €200 K .

During 2009, German police arrested 17 people for fixing 200 football games in Europe, over 9 countries. We can all agree that mafia & mobstership & money washing is always well connected.


In Europe and i assume in most other countries you can bet on players scoring over/under some criteria.

Let's say your cousin's friend has friend who plays in nba, let's call that player Mark.
Mark averages 15 mpg on some piss poor Pistons.
Mark knows they play Suns and he knows that he will get 20 mpg because he saw his teammate Joe has flue and will probably sit more, or won't play more.
What stops Mark from telling his friend that he will play more.

Playing more = more shots = more points.

And than you and me, with right information , can invest $50K on 1,85 odd that Mark will score 8+ points. That simple data, would turn us profit of whooping $42000. It will cost Mark nothing. And it's NBA so every random scrub goes for 30 so nobody will notice anything dirty.

now next game Mark knows he won't play, betting houses will now uptick his over /under to 12. We know Mark won't play that much so we will invest $50K to under.
Now, over 2 games, we just washed near $100K. We now have 80 games left to keep doing so.

And there are just about 50000000 online casinsos & betting houses to make sure we don't look suspicius by doing so. England is kingdom of dumb bets. You can bet on yourself making into nba.
btw some guy won $75M on bets couple of months ago i think baseball

JF5 wrote:This is probably the most parity I've seen in years. Legitimately most of the remaining teams could win the title. (Outside of the Knicks).

Its not a parity issue though. Its an issue of competitiveness and heart. The NBA has lost its soul. Defenders have no rights nowadays, stars want to take night off seemingly all the time. Theres no committment to their team or city. Ive said it for years but the nba could learn a lot from Australian rules football and the English Premier League.