Heej wrote:Chicago76 wrote:Heej wrote:Makes you wonder how they would've been if Isiah stayed healthy and let this guy take over. Hell, could say the same thing about the Bird Celtics or even Magic by the time Shaq came over. Really cements how much of an outlier the 90s were as far as weakness and all time greats fading out of nowhere goes.
Would be like if the first half of the 2010s just didn't have Duncan, Garnett, or Kobe due to them getting some kind of weird career ending injuries during their late primes.
As far as transitional periods go with guys unexpectedly fading/retiring/developing issues, the late 70s takes the cake. Many of those guys are nowhere near the all time lists...but they could have been had their production not dropped off a cliff.
Willis Reed, Mel Daniels, George McGinnis, Spencer Haywood, Marvin Barnes, Bill Walton, Pete Maravich, David Thompson, Paul Westphal. Some fell away by 24-25 due to drugs/injuries. Some hit a wall at about 28. Cowend just quit. Even players like a Westphal who were effective a bit longer had a really strange career shape.
Oh absolutely that one definitelyyy takes the cake. Super weird decade for that stuff. The 70s are essentially the NBAs dark ages to me lmao. And i like to think of it as an interesting rabbit hole that I don't have much interest in exoring right now but absolutely should at some point.
The 90s to me were basically a lesser version of that except if you stacked the deck and put Elvin Hayes or Bob McAdoo on Kareem's team for the entire decade. Where if he lucked into a top 5ish player of that era as his running mate and every other top guy had to play by themselves he likely would've made the 70s a decade we remember that celebrated Kareem's dominance.
And that would mostly be due to the things you pointed out like weird career early career flameouts from all time players and him having a stacked deck.
The 90s weren’t really like that until you got toward the tail end. Magic and Bird exiting and Jordan’s first retirement hurt. But there were probably 25 guys in the mid 90s playing at a level only 7 or 8 guys from the mid 70s could match. 1997 or so was an inflection point the same way roughly 1971 was such that six years later 1978 and 2003 kinda became, “What the hell happened?” years.
There wasn’t enough of a quality infusion to replace retired or significantly diminished versions of DRob, Hakeem, Ewing, Stockton, Malone, Pippen, Mullin, Drexler, Miller, Barkley, Tim Hardaway, Rodman, etc. Most of those players (if not all) were still really strong through 96-99. A lot of potential lift lost to health: Penny, Hill, Mourning, Webber, etc. Mid 90s basketball was physical and often ugly but early 00s basketball was just bad.
That’s on the post DRob draft classes being underwhelming. Only guys with a chance of seeing the Hall as North American players:
Richmond, T Hardaway, Kemp, Payton, Mutombo, Shaq, Mourning, Webber, Penny, Kidd, Hill, Rasheed Wallace. The list seems long enough until you realize a) that’s 7 or 8 draft classes b) there are a lot more supporting guys on there than normal and c) almost half of them had their careers cut short. There were really only three completely obvious Hall of Famers in that draft era. This cohort was needed to bridge the gap between the 80s and guys like Kobe, Wade, Dirk, Duncan, Garnett, etc.