What former players get completely WRONG about today's NBA

[70sFan]

Excellent video, nothing to add.

People like generalizations like that, but it's true that offensive schemes are more complex than ever before and defenses also have to adjust to that. It doesn't mean that the game was worse in different eras, it was just different and required different skills.

I love watching all eras and this era is very exciting.

[70sFan]

The game is extremely fast... compared to prior eras

This is patently false.

Average team game pace this current 2024-25 season is 99.8 poss/48min. In 1977-78 it was 107.7 poss/48min, in 1978-79 it was 106.8 poss/48min.

As a matter of fact, average team game pace has not been as high as even 101.0 poss/48min in any season since 1988-89. From 1979-80 to 1988-89 it ranged from 101.0 to 104.2 poss/48min.

I know the 1970s is the greatest era, so please choose one game from 1978 to take a look at what happens on the court. We can compare that to Ben examples.

[og15]

Watching old games on youtube and videos like this make me appreciate the scoring of yesteryears players even more tbh.

Like its amazing how much some players were able to score in the paint back then when both of their bigs were literally bringing their man into their way every possession.

"He shot too many long jumpers for my taste"

Yeah okay, some of that is explained by the paint looking like Beijing in rush hour. Teams these days are 5-out and the PF spot is basically manned by small forwards to help spacing, and the other team may not even be playing a center.

There's much more creativity these days in general and the players are ubiquitously more skilled imo, but its definitely easier to score now than it was then.

Definitely, sometimes looking at how crowded the paint is hurts, but when I watched at the time, there was no other way, so it just felt like how it was supposed to be.

Excellent video, nothing to add.

People like generalizations like that, but it's true that offensive schemes are more complex than ever before and defenses also have to adjust to that. It doesn't mean that the game was worse in different eras, it was just different and required different skills.

I love watching all eras and this era is very exciting.

Different eras had their own exciting thing and there's different players and strategies that are fun, interesting or just different that can be appreciated.

An argument that offensive and defenses are not more advanced though is just lazy, even simply from the reality that every generation is just learning and improving from the previous ones and then adding new things in terms of schemes.

We also have to account for the larger influence of international basketball expertise in the modern NBA. Yes, there are non US basketball minds who are amazing and came up with better strategies then Americans, and the exposure to, and ability to take that is much higher.

I think a big problem we have is also how basketball is presented. Too many of the former players who make up a lot of the analysts aren't too interested in analysis vs just talking. Now imagine a halftime show where they breakdown what's going on and why like Ben Taylor is doing (and many others are capable of), instead of just highlights (not no highlights), it's far more engaging, informative and interesting.

Also, the KG short little clips, you know he understands the trying to put players into a box when he tells about Wemby, because many tried to do the same to him. If you're tall, you MUST play a certain way kind of mentality.

[70sFan]

Also, the KG short little clips, you know he understands the trying to put players into a box when he tells about Wemby, because many tried to do the same to him. If you're tall, you MUST play a certain way kind of mentality.

That's especially ironic, considering that these people talk about creativity and everything, while they want Wemby to play the way most bigs played back in their times...

[FarBeyondDriven]

yawn. We're not even able to compare across generations because we're talking about two completely different sports played by a different set of rules. Of course it's much harder to defend now since everything is geared towards the offense with offensive players allowed to break every single rule in order to promote offense. It makes the offensive numbers laughable in comparison. People have wondered how Lebron could still be so good. Well, he's obviously one of one in that he won the genetic lottery, likely aided by PEDs since he was a teenager on top of that, but most importantly, he played in a joke era his whole career especially the last decade.

I know it's cute looking at old highlights from the 80s and 90s and it seems like there was no defense being played and there were far fewer athletes. But that's because they weren't allowed to travel, carry, push off and use illegal moving screens. When the elite scored back then they were truly skilled because they had to be. Now it's whoever has the ball forces a switch using an illegal moving screen, which teams are happy to do since they're all in this together to promote offense in their attempts to grow the popularity of the game (it's backfiring btw) and then you have centers left trying to defend guards and wings. They easily break them down which gets them easy shots, go to the FT line or forces help which leaves shooters wide open for three. Rinse and repeat almost every single possession. It's so boring.

In past eras you had guards guarding guards, wings guarding wings and bigs guarding bigs. And each position had their role and manner in which they could attack each other. There was more variety in offenses. You could post up your big if you had a good center, you could have your PF attack on either side of the block, you could have your wings going one on one and your guards leading fast breaks or being actual point guards setting their teammates up. That's all been mostly lost these last 15 years.

[Bergmaniac]

I am convinced that the vast majority of the "offenses were so much more varied and defences way better back in the day" crowd haven't actually watched games from before 2010 in years, otherwise they wouldn't be saying such nonsense, it's just so blatantly false if you spent even a little bit of time watching older games.

[ScrantonBulls]

This thread should be stickied.

[tsherkin]

It's wild for Pierce to say that we don't have any creativity like Kidd's passing when we're watching Jokic, Luka, a young guy like LaMelo, Sengun, you have Trae Young, and Lebron, Paul and Harden are STILL playing along with these guys

Pierce is one of those guys who rarely has anything useful or accurate to say. He was a very good player in his day, but he is essentially just spewing BS the majority of the time.

It's that people's memories are not as good as they think.

Absolutely true.

The NBA today is not wildly different than the past NBA in the sense that "everyone plays the same". The NBA has always been a copycat league and then you have a few teams who do something different, many times because they might have some unique player who makes them have to, or have a coach who just doesn't want to follow the grain.

Again, absolutely true. There is only so much diversity in the league, and a lot of that is dictated by talent. The focus of your team, and the specific pieces around him, dictate what style of ball you can play, and there are only so many variations you can try with any success (or hope thereof).

[Yoshun]

This is all true, but I also want to add that "new" and "more complex" don't necessarily mean a more exciting game.

Honestly, when games turn into a 3-point fest, it can be hard to watch, just as hard to watch as when 90's games would turn into the WWE or grind to a halt in isolation.

[tsherkin]

This is all true, but I also want to add that "new" and "more complex" don't necessarily mean a more exciting game.

Honestly, when games turn into a 3-point fest, it can be hard to watch, just as hard to watch as when 90's games would turn into the WWE or grind to a halt in isolation.

That's sort of the point, though. Who you're watching matters. If you watch some random game between the expansion Raptors and the Clippers from that same year, you aren't going to have a good time. If you watched some of the Orlando-Chicago games that same season, you get a whole different situation.

[slick_watts]

i really believe that all the former players who have opinions like this do not watch much basketball. this includes shaq and barkley. don't think they watch more than highlights.

[tsherkin]

i really believe that all the former players who have opinions like this do not watch much basketball. this includes shaq and barkley. don't think they watch more than highlights.

100%.

They can't. There's no way they could watch certain teams and certain players and come away thinking the dumb crap that they say. It's just too flagrantly at odds with reality. But that isn't what they're paid for; they're paid to say random crap which will resonate with casual fans who don't know much about the sport. Bar rail type conversation.

[Big J]

Saying we don't see passes like JKidd did was wild when two of the greatest and most creative passers in league history play today.

Watch on YouTube

Because we don't.

[TheGeneral99]

Former players act like stars today would got stifled by 1980s and 1990s defenses...which is **** crazy.

Players today are so much more skilled in every facet...the game has evolved so much that teams want skill players at every position, with the ability to guard and switch multiple positions, and shoot at every position.

In 2016 when Curry and the Warriors started upping their 3 point volume and Curry started taking like 10+ threes a game, teams did not know how to combat it and were not build to do so...which is why they won 73 games and were routing teams by 30-40 every game with Curry sitting out most 4th quarters. If you put that Warriors team in the 1990s they would be absolutely decimating teams...imagine slow centers trying to guard Curry on pick and rolls...it would be a field day for him.

Now obviously there is a legitimate issues today with with how many 3s are taken, but that's a whole different argument.

[tsherkin]

Saying we don't see passes like JKidd did was wild when two of the greatest and most creative passers in league history play today.

Watch on YouTube

Because we don't.

Yeah, we haven't seen that specific pass. But we have some wonderful passers in the league right now doing all kinds of nutters things, so it's sort of odd to remark "oh no, we haven't seen a bowling ball pass in 20 years."

[Big J]

Watching old games on youtube and videos like this make me appreciate the scoring of yesteryears players even more tbh.

Like its amazing how much some players were able to score in the paint back then when both of their bigs were literally bringing their man into their way every possession.

"He shot too many long jumpers for my taste"

Yeah okay, some of that is explained by the paint looking like Beijing in rush hour. Teams these days are 5-out and the PF spot is basically manned by small forwards to help spacing, and the other team may not even be playing a center.

There's much more creativity these days in general and the players are ubiquitously more skilled imo, but its definitely easier to score now than it was then.

Definitely, sometimes looking at how crowded the paint is hurts, but when I watched at the time, there was no other way, so it just felt like how it was supposed to be.

Excellent video, nothing to add.

People like generalizations like that, but it's true that offensive schemes are more complex than ever before and defenses also have to adjust to that. It doesn't mean that the game was worse in different eras, it was just different and required different skills.

I love watching all eras and this era is very exciting.

Different eras had their own exciting thing and there's different players and strategies that are fun, interesting or just different that can be appreciated.

An argument that offensive and defenses are not more advanced though is just lazy, even simply from the reality that every generation is just learning and improving from the previous ones and then adding new things in terms of schemes.

We also have to account for the larger influence of international basketball expertise in the modern NBA. Yes, there are non US basketball minds who are amazing and came up with better strategies then Americans, and the exposure to, and ability to take that is much higher.

I think a big problem we have is also how basketball is presented. Too many of the former players who make up a lot of the analysts aren't too interested in analysis vs just talking. Now imagine a halftime show where they breakdown what's going on and why like Ben Taylor is doing (and many others are capable of), instead of just highlights (not no highlights), it's far more engaging, informative and interesting.

Also, the KG short little clips, you know he understands the trying to put players into a box when he tells about Wemby, because many tried to do the same to him. If you're tall, you MUST play a certain way kind of mentality.

Yea, but the people who want to watch guys like Ben Taylor actively go out of their way to find those videos. Casual fans would rather watch highlights than nuanced video breakdowns, so you can't really blame TV productions for catering to those people.

[tsherkin]

Yea, but the people who want to watch guys like Ben Taylor actively go out of their way to find those videos. Casual fans would rather watch highlights than nuanced video breakdowns, so you can't really blame TV productions for catering to those people.

Yes, not everyone is going to go chasing Ben's videos, sure. But they should know better than to run their mouths when all they know comes from tailored highlight packages and only a small selection of teams, because otherwise, what comes out of their mouths is ignorant tripe. That's the point. When people talk about something as if they have any clue about that subject but are actually massively ignorant on the subject, that's when we get the proliferation of these odd, incorrect ideas.

[TheGeneral99]

Saying we don't see passes like JKidd did was wild when two of the greatest and most creative passers in league history play today.

Watch on YouTube

Because we don't.

Yeah, we haven't seen that specific pass. But we have some wonderful passers in the league right now doing all kinds of nutters things, so it's sort of odd to remark "oh no, we haven't seen a bowling ball pass in 20 years."

Lol, yep.

Guys like Kidd, Nash, J-Will etc. were phenomenal passers...but guys like Jokic and Luka are already some of the greatest passers in NBA history and what's crazier is that Luka is 6'8 and Jokic is a 7 footer.

Watch on YouTube

Watch on YouTube

If I was to rate the 10 best passers I've ever seen it would be (since 1980):

1) Nash
2) Jokic
3) Magic
4) Lebron
5) Kidd
6) Paul
7) Luka
8) Bird
9) Stockton
10) Thomas

With shout-outs to J-Will, Rubio, Rondo etc.

[tsherkin]

Lol, yep.

Guys like Kidd, Nash, J-Will etc. were phenomenal passers...but guys like Jokic and Luka are already some of the greatest passers in NBA history.

Exactly. We need to get better about respecting what came before AND what's presently in the league.

[Big J]

Yea, but the people who want to watch guys like Ben Taylor actively go out of their way to find those videos. Casual fans would rather watch highlights than nuanced video breakdowns, so you can't really blame TV productions for catering to those people.

Yes, not everyone is going to go chasing Ben's videos, sure. But they should know better than to run their mouths when all they know comes from tailored highlight packages and only a small selection of teams, because otherwise, what comes out of their mouths is ignorant tripe. That's the point. When people talk about something as if they have any clue about that subject but are actually massively ignorant on the subject, that's when we get the proliferation of these odd, incorrect ideas.

True, people spread fake news all the time, and a lot of times they get huge ratings for doing it. At least in this case it's just basketball related. Nowadays it's up to the consumer to figure out what's real and what's not.