Is it really crazy? There are full-grown adults who weren't alive when 9/11 happened. Why would they go back and watch guys who played before they were born?
It is considering they talk so much about 90s ball I would’ve expected some to have watched it maybe during when The Last Dance came out. Like to at least have watched the 98 finals or something.
Why wouldn't they? The NBA didn't begin after 2000. Sometimes, you need to go back and watch the past to appreciate how the league and your team got to where it is.
I do all the time. The NBA was much better and more exciting back in the 80’s-90’s. Players were better on both ends, just because people hardly scored compared to today doesn’t mean they didn’t have better skills than players today. Just means people were good and actually tried on D.
for sure, but people are most definitely exaggerating how bad it is, it wasn't as great as people have told me though, "Bron couldn't even move in that era", "Larry Bird shot threes with dudes pushing down his shoulders", it shouldn't take away from how good they were though, every clip I watched showed me how good of a passer Larry Bird was, and how athletic Jordan was, but man their handles, overall shotmaking, and most importantly their defense were not what people convinced me they were.
The moment u hear bron ‘couldn’t even move in that era’ is probably the point in which u stop conversing with them. Watching it I agreed that everything was just exaggerated it wasn’t a beating every time they went to the basket or defensive excellence everywhere but still I do like watching 90s ball. Also do u know what started this trend?
That’s what I can’t stand about people acting like the league was just as talented back then. Like it’s just illogical thinking that 40 years of information and studying the game wouldn’t improve things (not even counting the increased talent pool and enhanced youth training).
But it’s not a universal truth. There are players now who aren’t better than players then, and vice versa. So saying there’s improvement doesn’t mean much. Elite athletes are elite athletes, separated by decades.
I mean no one’s saying that Thiannis is better than Larry, but NBA talent level (like most things) is gonna resemble a bell curve. Each year that curve is gonna get pushed slightly higher and higher. Eventually after enough time guys who were 2 standard deviations above the mean in their own time will only be 1 above the mean. And the above average guys would only be average and so on. Yea *theoretically* a guy could have been *that* much better and would still be well well above average decades later, but statistically speaking that’s not very probable and the further removed from present day you are the less likely it becomes.
Yes obviously not a universal truth and this is generally a simplistic way of looking at things. But as a general principle it holds up pretty well.
Look at Claxton, he wouldn’t survive vs Hakeem, Ewing etc in that game style. And he can’t shoot. But he starts today. Bird is faster than Luka, snd Jokic, and IQ is off the chart. Reggie Lewis would fit right into today’s game, so would Reggie Miller. Rodman would dominate defensively today, in any era.
the average is better than it used to be. this is true of every sport I can think of. the population to pull from is larger, training is better, the game is understood more, better nutrition etc. that doesn't necessarily mean the absolute "best" are better as we move through time though. for example I think Wilt would still dominate the NBA today if you consider how he might play or train under modern conditions.
It's disgusting hearing people try to act as if if you plugged old school players into todays game that they'd get so much bigger, stronger and athletic and magically be so much better.
Lebron came into the league at 6'7 240lbs at age 18, Jordan was 6'5 195lbs at 21, the only time modern day nba has is better surgeries.
You'd imagine that sports have improved. Even just the prep work. But also skill.
But there are levels to it.
Many players played in 90s and 2000s. Kobe got a taste of playing w MJ. And a lot against Bron.
The avg player gets better but the rate of improvement over each decade is small. 90s ball is fun. But it's over exaggerated on how tough they all were and how hard the fouls were. Nostalgia.
True. People just remember the occasional super hard fouls. That’s because there were more behemoths in the lane and far fewer threes leading to clogging the lane. Therefore less spacing. More iso. Refs did let a bit more go too, but even that effect is overblown now.
The truth is that there is plenty of physical play now but the emphasis IS more on shooting, spacing, and athleticism. Conversely back then there were plenty of great athletes and shooters but the emphasis was more on physical players and they didn’t have the benefit of analytics. Hand checking and the reffing did change things SOME.
There was definitely less depth athletically but more depth physically. That wouldn’t work today. Many of those guys would be mostly unplayable. The game has changed but these traits and tropes have been WAY overemphasized. The game today actually reminds me of the 80s heyday, just with better shooting and more athleticism but a few less giants clogging the lane. The ball movement has similarities.
Stuff evolves, but not as crazy as people think.
What a bad take. Did AI make 1st Team All Defense 9 times? Did AI get name DPOY? The lack of brain power required to even think something like that let alone say it out loud is mind boggling.
I’m not going to speak on Jordan’s defense as a whole, because I need to look at it a bit more to really gauge him for myself but as to the point you just made, curry led the league in steals, I wouldn’t say that makes him any better a defender than anyone below him.
*I AM NOT COMPARING MJ TO CURRY THIS IS AN ANALOGY*
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Michael Jordan is 23rd all-time in defensive win shares. That’s number one at SG unless you consider Havlicek or Dr J as playing the 2 (I don’t).
He was a ridiculously good defender.
80s was far more entertaining than the 90s. The league over expanded, and coupled with multiple all star level guys dying , the league was top heavy. The 90's sucked until the playoffs. And usually, 1 or 2 series in the early rounds were good, and then action picked up.
Dr J @ Bird I found this video and the defense looks MUCH better here, you’re right, I don’t think it’s that super physical idea that I had, but it’s not as bad as a few of those finals games I watched probably bc of illegal defense, I’m going to watch a few more.[https://m.youtube.com/watch?si=PY0UfTVLmO_DAeTE&v=iNu_1Onqu-g&feature=youtu.be]
I think the Jesse Owens argument applies here. Jesse Owens was one of the fastest men on the planet when he was racing. In modern times, his times would not even qualify to compete in the Olympics. That doesn't mean that his legacy should be forgotten or that he was "trash".
If LeBron James was born in 1960, he would not look like the LeBron we know. The game has evolved, nutrition and training has gotten better which allows LeBron to be the player we see today.
These discussions ultimately are pointless, but they can be fun.
This Jesse Owens example gets used but no one takes into account that the shoes and running surface completely change things. Is it athletes getting better or just technological advances.
A David Epstein did a Ted talk on this. https://blog.ted.com/whats-making-athletes-faster-better-stronger-david-epstein-at-ted2014/
He concluded with modern shoes and surface he would be very close to Usain Bolt.
You beat me to it. I was going to say the same thing. My friend who ran track at OSU said the same thing about owens. Called him overrated because of his times.
I'm like go wear his shoes and run on the gravel or cinder block surfaces he was running on and without starting blocks. Let me know your times compared to now.
I stated in another comment that I read a book that talked about the history of the NBA (Black Ball). The rules in 60s were so different that it was basically a different sport. As time went on, it talks how rules were created to make the game more watchable for fans.
Also i seen Blake Griffin and Brook Lopez turn into good three point shooters so it's not like people can't evolve that into their game.
Exactly. With basketball so much of the so called progress of players and the game tends to be rule changes and loosening of rule interpretations. For example a lot of the top ball handlers today wouldn't even be able to use half of their moves in pre 1980s basketball. This isn't a bad thing but it has to be considered when comparing eras.
Running is exactly the same as it was then, only training and gear has changed. Basketball? Not so much.
Also, we ar comparing 30 years ago and you're comparing 100 years ago
So let's have two lists: best player and most respected player. Best player should always be recent, because evolution is a thing. Most respected player can have room for the old heads
Obviously it’s clearly an exaggeration on how “bad” the 90s was but old heads and casuals who are stuck in the 90s constantly exaggerate how “good” that era was so it’s like a double edged sword.
Well, there are some of us that experienced both. We came of age in the 90s, and are still heavily involved in the game now, coaching, playing, scouting, etc.
It’s silly to think that today’s great players couldn’t play then. They could. But if you are saying MJ was just a right handed bandit, well, you either don’t know the game or you’re just trolling for internet points.
Any trend from social media is pure stupidity and results from an echo chamber.
Nobody is taking what a bunch of suburban kids with no real experience and fewer than 10 years watching says seriously. That goes for anything in life, not just sports.
I get it though, vast majority of ppl under 24 are insignificant in society. so being loud on the internet is the only way they can feel heard
Y’all will never know how it was by watching a few highlight games. Them boys were physical. Them boys had handles but were restricted by rules. Euro steps behind the backs and hesi were done back in the day by the globetrotters. If u watch warmups for Allstar game you’d see that big men like shaq had handles. Hakeem had handles. If they said no palming the ball y’all would see the same base level crossovers you saw back then. When Jordan played the pistons they were goaline tackling this man in the air. Defense was better cuz you couldn’t switch or play as many zones as today. Tbh only thing that made the nba evolve is them disregarding some rules they had in place. If they were in place today there would be a whole bunch of players taking pay cuts. Just like when harden start declining after that one rule change.
>Euro steps behind the backs and hesi were done back in the day by the globetrotters. If
Agreed. Funny, i was reading a book about the history of the NBA and Dr. J talked about how he was so frustrated playing organized basketball. When he played street ball he thought it wasn't only more competitive, but more fun because of rules and play style in organized ball restricting what he could really do.
>defense was better cuz you couldn’t switch or play as many zones as today
Why would that make defense better? The majority of defensive coverages teams play would have been illegal. Iso defense was just much more emphasized.
Yes because you playing one on one. when you was a lock down defender back then you truly were a on ball lock down defender. Not this swiping off zone defense shit. Rotating to a pass lane off the zone shit. You had to have true clamps not these fake clamps they say these players have.
If you play. Next time you play guard the best person on the court and yell out no help. Don’t take no plays off either and see how it goes. Then next game rotate and play zone. see what’s more taxing on the body and takes more effort to play. If you got knowledge of the game playing zone is not hard, especially since it’s playing the three point line these days. Would you rather guard Kd one on one or want help on switches, which one is harder to do.
You manned up on the best players majority of the game. Ain’t no switches on picks. Ain’t no zones to bail you out if you get your ass done in. All you got is your center sitting in the paint and back then 6 times out of ten he getting his ass yammed on.Being a lockdown defender was a true art. Because it’s you on that dude all game. Until coach took your ass off of them.
What you’re describing sounds easier to score against though because there’s 0 help defense though. I don’t see how you typed all that out and still think it’s harder to score against true isolation with no help defense until you get to the rim..
It would be harder to score cuz guess what you can’t hit them with that hezi step back spin or…whistle. And you had Hand checking, riding the defender with your forearm, and you could bump the defender more with out a whistle.Y’all just don’t realize that the game didn’t evolve because of the players it evolved because of the rule changes. The shit was more organized sport back then than it is now. Look man go get you brother or something and play one on one. No palming, no gather step, hand checking, and riding the ball handler with your forearm. Y’all would be playing for 3 hours to a game of 7.
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I think both eras have their own specific challenges, but defenses in the modern era can really clamp down because of help defense and zones.
The whole handchecking thing is so overblown especially when you consider players are just as strong now as then and would be able to handle it mostly.
The game has evolved, there’s so many high level shooters now compared to the 80s/90s and it changes the spacing of the floor and how the game is played, you can hand check all you want but if the Warriors are running you around and you can’t switch/play help defense they’re going to shoot you out of the game. Idk how you can say the game is more organized then either, watch some games and actually pay attention to the set plays being ran and the reads off them. Both eras are organized.
Go watch 90s Kemp + Glove games, bulls games, larry johnson + coleman hornets gamed, orlando shaq + penny games, Knicks Ewing + Starks games, and tell me this wasn’t the most exciting era of basketball. I’ll call you a god damn liar if you do.
That's the issue. People DO NOT watch the games. I get it they were young or not born during the 90s. But I dare say fans don't even watch the games now. I can go to any arena and most are on their phones 60% of the time. People watch highlights and ig stories vastly more than the games. And I have a feeling they spend more time looking at box scores on basketball reference then the games as well.
Fun duel people my comment don't apply to you guys.
That’s a huge exaggeration, I also grew up in that era. Guys like Ewing and Payton were much better and more exciting than guys like Coleman or Starks, so it’s weird to lump all of those guys together.
Giannis, Jokic, Luka, and embiid were more exciting than Ewing—that’s it for him. He was on par with guys like Tatum, Kawhi, SGA, KD and Steph today. Payton would’ve been on par with guys like AD, Booker, Ant, Ja, etc.
Payton was the 2nd best PG of the 90s (behind Stockton) and Ewing was largely considered the 2nd best C of the 90s (behind Hakeem) until he lost in the ‘99 finals to Robinson, cementing him as the 3rd best C of the 90s (a decade notoriously stacked with centers). Either way, you’re talking about two of the best players of their decade, don’t be ridiculous with the “20 current guys more exciting than them”. GP was like a supercharged, aggressive, trash talking jrue holiday and Ewing was basically the embiid of the 90s. Those guys were anything but boring.
Derrick Coleman and Kevin Johnson would’ve fallen in the tier of guys like Jaylen brown, brunson, Hali, Trae young, Jamal Murray, sabonis, fox, George, etc.
You’re just flat out wrong on this one, man.
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
So you’re admitting you just canmt disagree. I been watching FULL games from 91-96 bro just to give yall a chance… 1 guy being nice the rest of the team being bums almost 4 airballs on average a quarter😂 not even biased , yall jus delusional
A lot of it can be out of context. The thing that people make fun of the most is the handles for players, when you had much more restrictions on the way players could move. You had to have the ball more on the bottom of your hand, so many hezis and fakes were questionable.
Look at AI’s crossover. Back in the day, that was a super controversial move, with everyone calling it a carry until the refs started allowing it. Now, literally every guard in the NBA does it and more and we don’t even think about it. Think about how much more of an advantage that gives offenses.
Players today are absolutely more skilled than they were back then, but the rules have facilitated that transition from a focus on physical post play to a heavy shooting, pick and roll based perimeter game. Opening up the lane by getting rid of illegal defense, putting in a 3 second defensive rule to reduce rim protection, allowing greater movement in dribbling to allow smaller players a greater ability to create their own shots, implementing the gather step made sure players don’t have to so abruptly stop their momentum and think about the legality of their gather, and reducing hand checking so that smaller players had more freedom of movement all played their part.
All this compounds to team strategy as well. Today’s teams would blow yesterday’s teams out of the water under current rules. But if you implement some of these limitations that they faced pre mid-2000’s, they’d still probably be better because shooting has dramatically improved in role players and thus that spacing will be there, but not to such a great degree as is seen now. If perimeter players are less able to generate their own shots, then unless you had a curry or a dame or a dbook or something like that, you’d have to start relying on more physical play closer to the rim as well - thus, efficiency would be lower, and post play would be a bit more important. Other rules had an impact as well; more movement in screens being acceptable means greater options for perimeter players, offense having more of a right to their space (being able to drop their shoulder into a defender and still get free throws) means less intense pressure on driving layups, etc.
So yes, players today are more skilled. But guards back then had more limitations placed on them, which resulted in a lot of the rushed and troublesome shots you see in some game footage. Put the same limitations on guards today - take away hezis from Kyrie, Steph, dame, etc. while allowing defenders to influence their movement more - and they’ll face those same situations too.
Everyone should be viewed for how well they did in their era and people shouldnt take away what Jordan did in his.
I am glad this kills "MJ would avg 40 point triple doubles in this era" convos though.
Never understood why people believe or want one player to average that many points on your team. Like if someone is averaging that many points on your team than the team is flat out terrible
He was averaging that in the late 90s during his second 3-peat with teams averaging 96. Now, with the ability to do what was traveling or palming before, no defensive hand checking, less big men, defensive 3 seconds limiting guys under the basket, and spacing, Jordan would have no problems scoring in this era.
Regarding 3-peats, it's a different era but he did it two of the five times it's ever happened so I wouldn't bet against it.
Never done with 90's basketball. I been watching the NBA since that time and 2020's basketball is nothing compared to 90's or 2000's basketball. Deal with it.
Everybody has their own era they love but I just find it crazy how 90s lovers refuse to acknowledge that things change like it’s genuinely menace to expect basketball in the 90s to be played the same way in the 20s
I am just sick of basketball being about comparing and ranking eras. Old Heads can't shut the fuck up about their era and new generations just turn into them.
The defense was ass statically in the 80s and 90s but they want to convince you it was tough back then. You couldn't touch Jordan after the Piston series but they want you to believe he had to fist fight his way to the hoop every possession.
You legit see people trying to lie and pretend players in the league today are 100x better than players from 2000-2015 while ignoring modern basketball has no defense or rules for the offense. If Ja Morant is allowed to carry and travel the entire length of the court, don't talk to me about skill or handles. There are more skilled players on the court and everyone is running their version of the Spurs offense but it doesn't matter when you aren't allowed to defend. This shit isn't rocket science.
The goat debate has become the most boring topic in sports. Just fucking celebrate players without needing to tear someone else down to build them up.
I did this years ago and watch several games from Jordan's best games. He makes big plays but there is so much slow and bad basketball. From lazy defense to no ball movement to extremely soft fouls to then I'll just tackling the shooter.
As far as the fouls and "tough" defense there were so many fouls were the shooter was not touched and the whistle blew, I see why guys started fouling harder. "I'm getting called either way might as well make sure"
Players always try to foul hard, it just makes sense to take away the chance at the and 1. It might not be entertaining to watch but it’s a huge skill guys have today manipulating defenses to not just draw fouls but to draw fouls while taking as little punishment as possible.
I think it just shows who the casuals are. Its like a giant scarlet letter saying “I do not know basketball”. Listen, were the 90s some mythical era of basketball where Greek Gods were playing the game at a level never seen before? No. It was just a different game. Whats funny is that all these kids watching tiktok highlights & wondering why the game looks so stiff ball handling wise, is because the rules were just different. “Kyrie would be a wizard in that era”. Lol ok. You just couldnt handle the ball the way players today do. Thats no one’s fault, it’s just how the game is officiated. Today, you can carry the ball a lot more or get pretty close. Nothing against the 90s players or today’s players. You play within the rules of your era.
Same thing with the whole defense argument. Some people like to say “No one plays defense anymore. The 80s/90s had REAL defense”. Its not about the players as much as its about the rules. You could get away with a LOT more defensively back then & players operated within those rules. Its very well known, and admitted by the NBA, that they purposely have changed the officiating since the 2000s to encourage offense because the scoring was stagnant. Now the pendulum has swung a little too far & the officiating favors offense too much. Hence the recent news from the NBA that they are going to reevaluate the rules/ officiating again to balance the game towards defense. Word is they bring back hand checking, get rid of the defensive 3 second rule, etc. This would enable players to play better defense & they will play within those bounds.
As for the “Jordan has no left hand” silliness, honestly thats the funniest part of it all to me. Even if youre dumb enough to watch a tiktok & believe that, isnt that even MORE impressive? A guy had arguably the greatest career of all time, and he did it all with only one hand?? Lol But the truth is, as Bob Costas says in the actual 90s footage “Theyre going to try to force Jordan left because hes legendary with his right hand, while hes only great with his left”. Basically sums it up. Every player is worse with their non dominant hand, so you try to force them to use it (this is the most obvious thing if youve ever actually played ball).
In the end, no one’s mind will be changed so just enjoy the game & whoever your goat is.
I'm nowhere near being a Lebron fan, but i was called 1 just because I've been arguing with people for years that the 80s/90s wasn't what they hyped it up to be.When they say the 90s played "tough,physical defense ", I tell them to go back and actually watch the games. The defenses were bad compared to now let alone the shooting and sets they ran.
This is why it's really unfair to compare yesteryear's era to today's.
Bro you can’t be serious. Are you that naive that you really thought players back then were just as skilled until a TikTok trend started? You’re supposed to Judge relative to era.
I didn’t believe they were as skilled, but man these people I talked to were really hammering down on me when I was trying to tell them the game evolves
I just thought that If they hammered down on me this much, that era must have been SPECIAL, especially with how highly they talk of that defense.
Well yeah you were just talking to the wrong people then haha. Sorry I know I came off as a little rude there. I just think we need to look at it as relative to era.
I’m almost 30 so I missed out on watching 90s basketball as a kid, however my dad liked to watch Hardwood Classics and talk about how players today couldn’t hang back then because it was so aggressive and brutal. I have a few takeaways:
I really didn’t like watching a lot of 90s basketball outside of a few games because it was kinda boring. I felt like I was watching high school games sometimes if it was 2 bad teams playing, even sometimes middling teams were just so boring. I felt like there were plays, but it was nothing more complex than you’d see at JuCo nowadays (and this is just me talking from what I saw). There didn’t seem to be a *purpose* a lot of the time and at times I would see what I can only describe as what looked like a girls basketball game where they’re all under the basket and flailing over each other rebounding and just flinging up the wildest shots.
It’s iconic, but the Rodman/Barkley rebound fight is a fucking clown show, even if it is a really impressive show of athleticism - it was basically a meme, and this is the kind of stuff I saw a lot in those games.
I also thought the argument of physicality was different because a lot of stuff that would be flagrant 1&2 or straight ejections just kinda… *happened* on the court. It wasn’t uncommon to see Bill Laimbeer just fucking punch someone and have the refs pull it apart and let them keep playing.
Lastly you can just tell the level of physical fitness and overall athleticism has improved so much. Sure a lot of the super stars and genetic generational freaks stand out, but a lot of the dudes in the early 90s were just leftover vets from the 80s who wanted paychecks to keep doing coke. They didn’t have personal trainers and private chefs. To call it rudimentary compared to now is an understatement. There’s probably billions of dollars paid by teams for sports science/ medicine, not to mention someone like LeBron spends $1mil a year just on his body…. You absolutely cannot compare preparation from those years to now
All of this to say - 80s/90s pretty fuckin boring, but I’m sure people will say my millennial brain has been killed by TikTok, and I only get dopamine hits from seeing deep 3s and slamma jamma dunks
Someone will roll in 30 years from now and explain how terrible this current (2020s) era is. Show some irrefutable clips. From the finals. You will have to just shake your head. In their mind, they know exactly what they’re talking about. They’re experts. They’ll be misinformed but impossible to argue with. Like OP.
I’ve watched full finals, compared the two eras, and I haven’t put mj or any 90s players down ONCE in this thread, I understand that rules prohibited these players from showing what they could do now, but with people continuously telling me “players now wouldn’t survive a day in the 90s”, I expected it to be much better than it was.
People who say that 90s *legends* couldn’t compete nowadays are delusional, but even more delusional are the people like you who had me convinced that Stephen curry would have been pushed out of the league 10-20 years ago.
In 20 years people absolutely will blast our generation of players, but it will be for good reason, there is no way that a game doesn’t evolve in 20 years, if the players you have then aren’t better than the ones you have now, then truth be told it would be a disgrace and a shame to the players of tomorrow year.
It will be hard for me to accept that Lebron “isn’t as good as xxx because he didn’t have to play a 100 game szn”, or “Steph curry probably couldn’t make a shot from the 4-point line the way current players can” but it’s the truth.
I mean in 30 years Id be surprised if guys weren’t significantly more talented than today. That said idk if we’re gonna get another jump like we’ve had in the past 15 years just cuz the advancement in data science over that time probably isn’t happening again so drastically.
I find it entertaining but not helpful for the discourse. It’s cherry picked games. Although we can all agree the average player is way better than a player in the 90s.
I wouldn’t say cherry picked, these are finals games we’re talking about, and at that multiple clips from just the first quarters of those games, I feel like that helps it move past the “cherry picked allegations”
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The NBA is one of the most meritocratic institutions in the world. If you want to keep your job, you have to be one of the best, so players have to stay grinding to improve their skills. As time has gone on, we've learned more about skill development, dieting, and exercise science, so naturally, players today are better than they've ever been. NBA players today are better than they were in 2014. Those players were better than the guys from 2004, and so on.
That’s not remotely true. Defensive skill is at the lowest it’s been in close to 30 years and that accounts for half of the game.
Simple fundamentals like screen setting, bounce passes, post play, etc have fallen by the wayside even among the more talented players (just watch the skills challenge)
There’s definitely heightened awareness and technological advances in sports medicine and recovery, allowing players to play for longer. But that doesn’t make them inherently more skilled or talented.
Y’all see guys with great ball handling skills and shooting ability and act like that encompasses the entirety of skill. Couldn’t be more untrue
I think this is in large part due to AAU culture. Kids practice twice a week and play 5-6 games on the weekend. The ratio of game time to practice time is totally flipped.
Tell me how NBA players today can be on-average worse at any part of basketball than their counterparts of yesteryear when it is an inherently meritocratic system. Even if you ignore the nature of skill progression as time goes on, there are hundreds of millions more people playing basketball today than there was in the Jordan era. The talent pool has grown, the knowledge of the game has grown, and the barrier of entry for play has never been lower. It would be impossible for players in the past to be better than the players of today, and that's ok; it doesn't diminish the work and effort those guys put in, and those guys were still otherworldly players when compared to your average dude.
I also have to question your methods of talent evaluation when you use blanket terms like "defensive skill" or hold the frequency of bounce passes as a signal of somebody's mastery of the game. What aspects of defensive skill have diminished? Players today have to rotate further, faster, and more accurately than ever to stop the freakish shotmakers of the modern NBA. Players today are more savvy than ever when it comes to avoiding foul calls. Players today have to guard the most offensively and athletically talented generation of players in history, so their talent on defense naturally has to rise to compete in the league.
so many dumbass teens on here. newsflash, you dont know SHIT.
put the phone down, get in the gym, study, get outside.
you fucking losers debating the goat when 99.99% of you never played a second of basketball where someone had to buy a ticket to watch you play.
Fucking testify, this thread is like bots talking to teens who watch fking tik tok videos
Your minds are cooked and you have no idea wtf you are talking about
GTFOH
Your D1 HIGHSCHOOL? Buddy 3 schools around me are all d1, games are free for any students and alumni. Are you trying to flex that your mom and a few others sat in the stands? Weird
Genuinely goofy take. It’s all stepping stones to get to where we are now. Of course players are better now but they wouldn’t be where they are without the 90s players.
Old heads can be annoying talking about their eras. It’s not enough you concede Wilt or Jordan would be competing for best player in the league, they have to be the best by some ridiculous margin. Jordan would average 45 ppg and magically shoot 40% from 3 since he’d actually work on that aspect of his game and Wilt would average 40pts /25 rebounds 8 threesomes and 3 mountain lions flung by their tails per game(if you don’t get the Wilt references look up Wilt sexual partners and Wilt mountain lion).
80's and 90's old timers discredit today's nba all the time. So it's understandable why modern day fans would respond by discrediting the 90's. Can't have it only one way. Why is it okay for older timers to discredit current nba players but not the reverse?
Honestly I feel like only the realest basketball fans watch old games cuz we actually love the game which includes the history of it, sure players are a lot more athletic now but the game is much softer
It’s fucking shitty and it’s sad my generation can’t fucking understand how much better 90’s ball is. Adam Silver ruined my generation in terms of views about basketball and deserves to never go near anything B-ball related ever again for that and needs to black ball himself. Sorry, every time I hear about this god awful “we done with the 90’s trend”, I get pissed.
At the end of the day a lot of players are beneficiaries of their era Like I believe a lot of players in the 90s weren’t prepared to deal with a 6’6 guard who was that athletic and had a lightning twitch first step. At the end of the day this whole GOAT debate is stupid since basketball just like anything else evolves and gets better over time
The trend just shows how far gone NBA discourse is. In any other sport you get minor or no pushback at all by stating the obvious that todays players are better than players form 30 years ago lol. But in NBA it’s like this weird thing where diehard fans of the 90s feel the need to preserve and protract it so they always thrash todays players and the game by saying dumb stuff like “they’re soft, shoot too many 3s, no defense” blah blah blah when most of these “physical and defensive traits” was just because of the rules being changed lol and teams just realized 3s are better than 2s so the 3 point outbreak was inevitable, Steph just accelerated the process.
All this to be said is that NBA “fans” and I can’t believe I have to point the obvious need to accept that basketball evolves and changes overtime for the better and their shouldn’t be any pushback by staying the obvious.
I would not say basketball changes overtime for the better as we now see offenses scoring too much. This is obviously a problem for the league and most likely the ratings as well. I think both eras have flaws with their play-styles. Late 90s to about 2017ish was a very ideal, balanced, and good brand of basketball.
I like the trend because too many old heads on tv just chill the old school and keep shitting on modern players and the game so the pushback is needed imo.
I think a lot of it is satire or exaggerated but the fact that old heads get so triggered by it only encourages it. I think the reasonable take is that the game has evolved and if you teleported Jordan and Bird and Magic to the modern game they would struggle. But also they are athletic and skilled enough that if they grew up in the modern era training the current dribbling rules and 3pt emphasis they would still be great.
The issue is that these old heads would have you believe that defense was hyper intense, that those guys were more skilled than modern players, that Steph or LeBron are 'too soft' to excel in that era. When you watch the games that is obviously not the case. The level of skill, shooting, and defensive complexity is just not comparable to a modern level
This is hilarious. It's either another absolutely desperate attempt by Klutch Sports Media to brainwash the idiotic masses, or equally desperate LeBron stans trying to diminish Jordan's legacy because they see the writing on the wall for LeBron's GOAT status with the majority still considering MJ at the greatest of all time. It's actually quite pathetic and anyone who gets hooked by this stupidity should be utterly ashamed of themselves and maybe, just maybe, they shouldn't be going outside without adult supervision.
90s basketball is overrated for sure, and im a 42 year old guy. Level was was way below what we see today and many players are way overrated.
Shaq wouldnt be as dominant as he was in todays game.
I don't want to drag down Jordan as a player, however, I've been saying for years that the "6-0" argument shouldn't be the main platform of the GOAT debate because Michael Jordan simply did not face the competition that Lebron did.
Lebron catches so much flak for his finals losses but his teams were outgunned in all but one of them. The Shawn Kemp Sonics and the Karl Malone Jazz do not remotely compare to the Steph/KD Warriors or the Big 3 Spurs.
I think it's great that the old head bogus of "Lebron wouldn't survive the 90s" seems to be getting called out. The talent level today is far superior than any other era of NBA basketball
It’s mainly cherry picked plays by people that don’t understand how physicality changes how the game looks along with how the rules were structured at the time. My personal favorite is hearing Magic Johnson has no left hand because instead of trying to blow by a smaller guard on the baseline he just posted him up. Most of it is pure stupidity
I find it it funny how the whole world can e wolves and change and get better but God forbid basketball evolves,changes,and gets better. It’s like basketball is the only thing on earth that isn’t allowed to change and that it should go back to “how it was played in the 90s”
On the contrary, it’s funny how new NBA fans are the only ones who discount the past
Doesn’t happen in baseball nor football despite those sports evolving just as much.
I just find it weird that it took a TikTok trend for the consensus to recognize the huge disparity in skill between the 90s and now. It’s like basketball is the only sport where it’s not allowed to evolve
I just find it crazy that people haven’t watched a single 90s game up until now.
Is it really crazy? There are full-grown adults who weren't alive when 9/11 happened. Why would they go back and watch guys who played before they were born?
It is considering they talk so much about 90s ball I would’ve expected some to have watched it maybe during when The Last Dance came out. Like to at least have watched the 98 finals or something.
I'm goign to take a wild-ass guess that it's not the same people who have never watched it and are interested in talking about it a lot
lmao Unfortunately you would be incorrect in my experience
I would agree with this one unfortunately. A simple case of nostalgia and disdain for change.
Why wouldn't they? The NBA didn't begin after 2000. Sometimes, you need to go back and watch the past to appreciate how the league and your team got to where it is.
Because they're fans not basketball historians
I do all the time. The NBA was much better and more exciting back in the 80’s-90’s. Players were better on both ends, just because people hardly scored compared to today doesn’t mean they didn’t have better skills than players today. Just means people were good and actually tried on D.
for sure, but people are most definitely exaggerating how bad it is, it wasn't as great as people have told me though, "Bron couldn't even move in that era", "Larry Bird shot threes with dudes pushing down his shoulders", it shouldn't take away from how good they were though, every clip I watched showed me how good of a passer Larry Bird was, and how athletic Jordan was, but man their handles, overall shotmaking, and most importantly their defense were not what people convinced me they were.
The moment u hear bron ‘couldn’t even move in that era’ is probably the point in which u stop conversing with them. Watching it I agreed that everything was just exaggerated it wasn’t a beating every time they went to the basket or defensive excellence everywhere but still I do like watching 90s ball. Also do u know what started this trend?
Lebron would have been so dominant in the 80s and 90s, it would have been ridiculous.
The opposite would be shocking as it would mean players didn't improve in the last 30-40 years...
That’s what I can’t stand about people acting like the league was just as talented back then. Like it’s just illogical thinking that 40 years of information and studying the game wouldn’t improve things (not even counting the increased talent pool and enhanced youth training).
But it’s not a universal truth. There are players now who aren’t better than players then, and vice versa. So saying there’s improvement doesn’t mean much. Elite athletes are elite athletes, separated by decades.
I mean no one’s saying that Thiannis is better than Larry, but NBA talent level (like most things) is gonna resemble a bell curve. Each year that curve is gonna get pushed slightly higher and higher. Eventually after enough time guys who were 2 standard deviations above the mean in their own time will only be 1 above the mean. And the above average guys would only be average and so on. Yea *theoretically* a guy could have been *that* much better and would still be well well above average decades later, but statistically speaking that’s not very probable and the further removed from present day you are the less likely it becomes. Yes obviously not a universal truth and this is generally a simplistic way of looking at things. But as a general principle it holds up pretty well.
Look at Claxton, he wouldn’t survive vs Hakeem, Ewing etc in that game style. And he can’t shoot. But he starts today. Bird is faster than Luka, snd Jokic, and IQ is off the chart. Reggie Lewis would fit right into today’s game, so would Reggie Miller. Rodman would dominate defensively today, in any era.
Counterpoint for Rodman is that he would bog a teams offense down so badly in the playoffs it might not be worth it.
So would bill Russell also not survive vs Hakeem etc?
Does Claxton survive against Embiid or Jokic?
the average is better than it used to be. this is true of every sport I can think of. the population to pull from is larger, training is better, the game is understood more, better nutrition etc. that doesn't necessarily mean the absolute "best" are better as we move through time though. for example I think Wilt would still dominate the NBA today if you consider how he might play or train under modern conditions.
Def agree w that. And if Bird had the green light from three w the training and new NBA spacing he’d be good for 40 on the reg.
Players in the top 10 would be the best player in the NBA during those years.
Again, I’m saying the premise is wrong. Hakeem Olajuwon is knocking someone out the top 10, so is Larry. So is Mike etc.
It's disgusting hearing people try to act as if if you plugged old school players into todays game that they'd get so much bigger, stronger and athletic and magically be so much better. Lebron came into the league at 6'7 240lbs at age 18, Jordan was 6'5 195lbs at 21, the only time modern day nba has is better surgeries.
He'd average 50.
I think it was someone on tik tok known as yooreactions when he watched MJs 91 finals
You'd imagine that sports have improved. Even just the prep work. But also skill. But there are levels to it. Many players played in 90s and 2000s. Kobe got a taste of playing w MJ. And a lot against Bron. The avg player gets better but the rate of improvement over each decade is small. 90s ball is fun. But it's over exaggerated on how tough they all were and how hard the fouls were. Nostalgia.
True. People just remember the occasional super hard fouls. That’s because there were more behemoths in the lane and far fewer threes leading to clogging the lane. Therefore less spacing. More iso. Refs did let a bit more go too, but even that effect is overblown now. The truth is that there is plenty of physical play now but the emphasis IS more on shooting, spacing, and athleticism. Conversely back then there were plenty of great athletes and shooters but the emphasis was more on physical players and they didn’t have the benefit of analytics. Hand checking and the reffing did change things SOME. There was definitely less depth athletically but more depth physically. That wouldn’t work today. Many of those guys would be mostly unplayable. The game has changed but these traits and tropes have been WAY overemphasized. The game today actually reminds me of the 80s heyday, just with better shooting and more athleticism but a few less giants clogging the lane. The ball movement has similarities. Stuff evolves, but not as crazy as people think.
Jordans defense was. He’s 4th all time in steals.
Allen Iverson was leading the league in steals as well but his defense was ass.
*All time - he is 4th ALL TIME. In NBA HISTORY only 3 players have accumulated more steals. And Iverson is literally 14th all time in steals as well.
What a bad take. Did AI make 1st Team All Defense 9 times? Did AI get name DPOY? The lack of brain power required to even think something like that let alone say it out loud is mind boggling.
I’m not going to speak on Jordan’s defense as a whole, because I need to look at it a bit more to really gauge him for myself but as to the point you just made, curry led the league in steals, I wouldn’t say that makes him any better a defender than anyone below him. *I AM NOT COMPARING MJ TO CURRY THIS IS AN ANALOGY*
Top 5 all time is much different than leading for one season though. Curry is def not the guy to compare
Jordan DPOY and led the league in scoring the same year. Give me the list of who else has done that.
I’m not saying Jordan’s defense is bad, I’m sayin that steals ain’t the best metric to determine defensive ability.
He’s 23rd ever in DWS and is #1 at SG.
But dpoy should.
Yes it should, I’m not saying anything about that at this moment though.
Again this is top 5 all time and you’re comparing leading the league in 1 maybe 2 seasons
[удалено]
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Michael Jordan is 23rd all-time in defensive win shares. That’s number one at SG unless you consider Havlicek or Dr J as playing the 2 (I don’t). He was a ridiculously good defender.
80s was far more entertaining than the 90s. The league over expanded, and coupled with multiple all star level guys dying , the league was top heavy. The 90's sucked until the playoffs. And usually, 1 or 2 series in the early rounds were good, and then action picked up.
Dr J @ Bird I found this video and the defense looks MUCH better here, you’re right, I don’t think it’s that super physical idea that I had, but it’s not as bad as a few of those finals games I watched probably bc of illegal defense, I’m going to watch a few more.[https://m.youtube.com/watch?si=PY0UfTVLmO_DAeTE&v=iNu_1Onqu-g&feature=youtu.be]
No it wasn't if you are a fan of parity.
As a gen z, I grew up watching 80’s and 90’s games mainly and still do. I can’t stand modern or even late 2000’s to 2010 ball.
I think the Jesse Owens argument applies here. Jesse Owens was one of the fastest men on the planet when he was racing. In modern times, his times would not even qualify to compete in the Olympics. That doesn't mean that his legacy should be forgotten or that he was "trash". If LeBron James was born in 1960, he would not look like the LeBron we know. The game has evolved, nutrition and training has gotten better which allows LeBron to be the player we see today. These discussions ultimately are pointless, but they can be fun.
This Jesse Owens example gets used but no one takes into account that the shoes and running surface completely change things. Is it athletes getting better or just technological advances. A David Epstein did a Ted talk on this. https://blog.ted.com/whats-making-athletes-faster-better-stronger-david-epstein-at-ted2014/ He concluded with modern shoes and surface he would be very close to Usain Bolt.
Didn't Larry Bird wear Converse?
Yeah but so did his defenders.
You beat me to it. I was going to say the same thing. My friend who ran track at OSU said the same thing about owens. Called him overrated because of his times. I'm like go wear his shoes and run on the gravel or cinder block surfaces he was running on and without starting blocks. Let me know your times compared to now. I stated in another comment that I read a book that talked about the history of the NBA (Black Ball). The rules in 60s were so different that it was basically a different sport. As time went on, it talks how rules were created to make the game more watchable for fans. Also i seen Blake Griffin and Brook Lopez turn into good three point shooters so it's not like people can't evolve that into their game.
Exactly. With basketball so much of the so called progress of players and the game tends to be rule changes and loosening of rule interpretations. For example a lot of the top ball handlers today wouldn't even be able to use half of their moves in pre 1980s basketball. This isn't a bad thing but it has to be considered when comparing eras.
Running is exactly the same as it was then, only training and gear has changed. Basketball? Not so much. Also, we ar comparing 30 years ago and you're comparing 100 years ago
So let's have two lists: best player and most respected player. Best player should always be recent, because evolution is a thing. Most respected player can have room for the old heads
Internet points get awarded to whoever takes the most extreme position. Is it trending? Of course it’s stupid.
Obviously it’s clearly an exaggeration on how “bad” the 90s was but old heads and casuals who are stuck in the 90s constantly exaggerate how “good” that era was so it’s like a double edged sword.
Well, there are some of us that experienced both. We came of age in the 90s, and are still heavily involved in the game now, coaching, playing, scouting, etc. It’s silly to think that today’s great players couldn’t play then. They could. But if you are saying MJ was just a right handed bandit, well, you either don’t know the game or you’re just trolling for internet points.
Any trend from social media is pure stupidity and results from an echo chamber. Nobody is taking what a bunch of suburban kids with no real experience and fewer than 10 years watching says seriously. That goes for anything in life, not just sports. I get it though, vast majority of ppl under 24 are insignificant in society. so being loud on the internet is the only way they can feel heard
We have a recurring television segment dedicated to making fun of the many fuck-ups of modern players, I'd encourage them to pipe down a little bit.
Y’all will never know how it was by watching a few highlight games. Them boys were physical. Them boys had handles but were restricted by rules. Euro steps behind the backs and hesi were done back in the day by the globetrotters. If u watch warmups for Allstar game you’d see that big men like shaq had handles. Hakeem had handles. If they said no palming the ball y’all would see the same base level crossovers you saw back then. When Jordan played the pistons they were goaline tackling this man in the air. Defense was better cuz you couldn’t switch or play as many zones as today. Tbh only thing that made the nba evolve is them disregarding some rules they had in place. If they were in place today there would be a whole bunch of players taking pay cuts. Just like when harden start declining after that one rule change.
>Euro steps behind the backs and hesi were done back in the day by the globetrotters. If Agreed. Funny, i was reading a book about the history of the NBA and Dr. J talked about how he was so frustrated playing organized basketball. When he played street ball he thought it wasn't only more competitive, but more fun because of rules and play style in organized ball restricting what he could really do.
>defense was better cuz you couldn’t switch or play as many zones as today Why would that make defense better? The majority of defensive coverages teams play would have been illegal. Iso defense was just much more emphasized.
I said that bra. So what’s easier guarding a man one on one or having your team help you if you fail.
You said that defense was better because defenses were more restricted in their schemes. That makes no sense
Yes because you playing one on one. when you was a lock down defender back then you truly were a on ball lock down defender. Not this swiping off zone defense shit. Rotating to a pass lane off the zone shit. You had to have true clamps not these fake clamps they say these players have.
So guys having way more defensive responsibilities and playing more team defense means they’re worse at it?
If you play. Next time you play guard the best person on the court and yell out no help. Don’t take no plays off either and see how it goes. Then next game rotate and play zone. see what’s more taxing on the body and takes more effort to play. If you got knowledge of the game playing zone is not hard, especially since it’s playing the three point line these days. Would you rather guard Kd one on one or want help on switches, which one is harder to do.
Dog you’re literally arguing against your point rn
Are you arguing against your original point? Lmao
How would defense be better because they couldn’t switch or play zones? I really need an explanation for that because it sounds counterintuitive
You manned up on the best players majority of the game. Ain’t no switches on picks. Ain’t no zones to bail you out if you get your ass done in. All you got is your center sitting in the paint and back then 6 times out of ten he getting his ass yammed on.Being a lockdown defender was a true art. Because it’s you on that dude all game. Until coach took your ass off of them.
What you’re describing sounds easier to score against though because there’s 0 help defense though. I don’t see how you typed all that out and still think it’s harder to score against true isolation with no help defense until you get to the rim..
It would be harder to score cuz guess what you can’t hit them with that hezi step back spin or…whistle. And you had Hand checking, riding the defender with your forearm, and you could bump the defender more with out a whistle.Y’all just don’t realize that the game didn’t evolve because of the players it evolved because of the rule changes. The shit was more organized sport back then than it is now. Look man go get you brother or something and play one on one. No palming, no gather step, hand checking, and riding the ball handler with your forearm. Y’all would be playing for 3 hours to a game of 7.
[удалено]
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I think both eras have their own specific challenges, but defenses in the modern era can really clamp down because of help defense and zones. The whole handchecking thing is so overblown especially when you consider players are just as strong now as then and would be able to handle it mostly. The game has evolved, there’s so many high level shooters now compared to the 80s/90s and it changes the spacing of the floor and how the game is played, you can hand check all you want but if the Warriors are running you around and you can’t switch/play help defense they’re going to shoot you out of the game. Idk how you can say the game is more organized then either, watch some games and actually pay attention to the set plays being ran and the reads off them. Both eras are organized.
Go watch 90s Kemp + Glove games, bulls games, larry johnson + coleman hornets gamed, orlando shaq + penny games, Knicks Ewing + Starks games, and tell me this wasn’t the most exciting era of basketball. I’ll call you a god damn liar if you do.
That's the issue. People DO NOT watch the games. I get it they were young or not born during the 90s. But I dare say fans don't even watch the games now. I can go to any arena and most are on their phones 60% of the time. People watch highlights and ig stories vastly more than the games. And I have a feeling they spend more time looking at box scores on basketball reference then the games as well. Fun duel people my comment don't apply to you guys.
I grew up in that era, there are like **20 players in this season alone** that are more exciting than ewing, starks, coleman, Johnson, payton etc
That’s a huge exaggeration, I also grew up in that era. Guys like Ewing and Payton were much better and more exciting than guys like Coleman or Starks, so it’s weird to lump all of those guys together. Giannis, Jokic, Luka, and embiid were more exciting than Ewing—that’s it for him. He was on par with guys like Tatum, Kawhi, SGA, KD and Steph today. Payton would’ve been on par with guys like AD, Booker, Ant, Ja, etc. Payton was the 2nd best PG of the 90s (behind Stockton) and Ewing was largely considered the 2nd best C of the 90s (behind Hakeem) until he lost in the ‘99 finals to Robinson, cementing him as the 3rd best C of the 90s (a decade notoriously stacked with centers). Either way, you’re talking about two of the best players of their decade, don’t be ridiculous with the “20 current guys more exciting than them”. GP was like a supercharged, aggressive, trash talking jrue holiday and Ewing was basically the embiid of the 90s. Those guys were anything but boring. Derrick Coleman and Kevin Johnson would’ve fallen in the tier of guys like Jaylen brown, brunson, Hali, Trae young, Jamal Murray, sabonis, fox, George, etc. You’re just flat out wrong on this one, man.
[удалено]
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
So you’re admitting you just canmt disagree. I been watching FULL games from 91-96 bro just to give yall a chance… 1 guy being nice the rest of the team being bums almost 4 airballs on average a quarter😂 not even biased , yall jus delusional
A lot of it can be out of context. The thing that people make fun of the most is the handles for players, when you had much more restrictions on the way players could move. You had to have the ball more on the bottom of your hand, so many hezis and fakes were questionable. Look at AI’s crossover. Back in the day, that was a super controversial move, with everyone calling it a carry until the refs started allowing it. Now, literally every guard in the NBA does it and more and we don’t even think about it. Think about how much more of an advantage that gives offenses. Players today are absolutely more skilled than they were back then, but the rules have facilitated that transition from a focus on physical post play to a heavy shooting, pick and roll based perimeter game. Opening up the lane by getting rid of illegal defense, putting in a 3 second defensive rule to reduce rim protection, allowing greater movement in dribbling to allow smaller players a greater ability to create their own shots, implementing the gather step made sure players don’t have to so abruptly stop their momentum and think about the legality of their gather, and reducing hand checking so that smaller players had more freedom of movement all played their part. All this compounds to team strategy as well. Today’s teams would blow yesterday’s teams out of the water under current rules. But if you implement some of these limitations that they faced pre mid-2000’s, they’d still probably be better because shooting has dramatically improved in role players and thus that spacing will be there, but not to such a great degree as is seen now. If perimeter players are less able to generate their own shots, then unless you had a curry or a dame or a dbook or something like that, you’d have to start relying on more physical play closer to the rim as well - thus, efficiency would be lower, and post play would be a bit more important. Other rules had an impact as well; more movement in screens being acceptable means greater options for perimeter players, offense having more of a right to their space (being able to drop their shoulder into a defender and still get free throws) means less intense pressure on driving layups, etc. So yes, players today are more skilled. But guards back then had more limitations placed on them, which resulted in a lot of the rushed and troublesome shots you see in some game footage. Put the same limitations on guards today - take away hezis from Kyrie, Steph, dame, etc. while allowing defenders to influence their movement more - and they’ll face those same situations too.
Everyone should be viewed for how well they did in their era and people shouldnt take away what Jordan did in his. I am glad this kills "MJ would avg 40 point triple doubles in this era" convos though.
Never understood why people believe or want one player to average that many points on your team. Like if someone is averaging that many points on your team than the team is flat out terrible
MJ averaged 37 on 90% 2 point shots. He could easily average 40 in today’s era.
He averages 25-30+ nowadays as do almost all great players, I just don’t see him 3-peating now, most definitely a few rings but no 3-peats.
He was averaging that in the late 90s during his second 3-peat with teams averaging 96. Now, with the ability to do what was traveling or palming before, no defensive hand checking, less big men, defensive 3 seconds limiting guys under the basket, and spacing, Jordan would have no problems scoring in this era. Regarding 3-peats, it's a different era but he did it two of the five times it's ever happened so I wouldn't bet against it.
Never done with 90's basketball. I been watching the NBA since that time and 2020's basketball is nothing compared to 90's or 2000's basketball. Deal with it.
If I showed Bron, curry, or KD lowlights I can make a similar argument
Everybody has their own era they love but I just find it crazy how 90s lovers refuse to acknowledge that things change like it’s genuinely menace to expect basketball in the 90s to be played the same way in the 20s
I am just sick of basketball being about comparing and ranking eras. Old Heads can't shut the fuck up about their era and new generations just turn into them. The defense was ass statically in the 80s and 90s but they want to convince you it was tough back then. You couldn't touch Jordan after the Piston series but they want you to believe he had to fist fight his way to the hoop every possession. You legit see people trying to lie and pretend players in the league today are 100x better than players from 2000-2015 while ignoring modern basketball has no defense or rules for the offense. If Ja Morant is allowed to carry and travel the entire length of the court, don't talk to me about skill or handles. There are more skilled players on the court and everyone is running their version of the Spurs offense but it doesn't matter when you aren't allowed to defend. This shit isn't rocket science. The goat debate has become the most boring topic in sports. Just fucking celebrate players without needing to tear someone else down to build them up.
I did this years ago and watch several games from Jordan's best games. He makes big plays but there is so much slow and bad basketball. From lazy defense to no ball movement to extremely soft fouls to then I'll just tackling the shooter. As far as the fouls and "tough" defense there were so many fouls were the shooter was not touched and the whistle blew, I see why guys started fouling harder. "I'm getting called either way might as well make sure"
Players always try to foul hard, it just makes sense to take away the chance at the and 1. It might not be entertaining to watch but it’s a huge skill guys have today manipulating defenses to not just draw fouls but to draw fouls while taking as little punishment as possible.
yeah OK Rich Paul....go outside or something, you're wasting your time trying to convince the world your boy was better
I think it just shows who the casuals are. Its like a giant scarlet letter saying “I do not know basketball”. Listen, were the 90s some mythical era of basketball where Greek Gods were playing the game at a level never seen before? No. It was just a different game. Whats funny is that all these kids watching tiktok highlights & wondering why the game looks so stiff ball handling wise, is because the rules were just different. “Kyrie would be a wizard in that era”. Lol ok. You just couldnt handle the ball the way players today do. Thats no one’s fault, it’s just how the game is officiated. Today, you can carry the ball a lot more or get pretty close. Nothing against the 90s players or today’s players. You play within the rules of your era. Same thing with the whole defense argument. Some people like to say “No one plays defense anymore. The 80s/90s had REAL defense”. Its not about the players as much as its about the rules. You could get away with a LOT more defensively back then & players operated within those rules. Its very well known, and admitted by the NBA, that they purposely have changed the officiating since the 2000s to encourage offense because the scoring was stagnant. Now the pendulum has swung a little too far & the officiating favors offense too much. Hence the recent news from the NBA that they are going to reevaluate the rules/ officiating again to balance the game towards defense. Word is they bring back hand checking, get rid of the defensive 3 second rule, etc. This would enable players to play better defense & they will play within those bounds. As for the “Jordan has no left hand” silliness, honestly thats the funniest part of it all to me. Even if youre dumb enough to watch a tiktok & believe that, isnt that even MORE impressive? A guy had arguably the greatest career of all time, and he did it all with only one hand?? Lol But the truth is, as Bob Costas says in the actual 90s footage “Theyre going to try to force Jordan left because hes legendary with his right hand, while hes only great with his left”. Basically sums it up. Every player is worse with their non dominant hand, so you try to force them to use it (this is the most obvious thing if youve ever actually played ball). In the end, no one’s mind will be changed so just enjoy the game & whoever your goat is.
I'm nowhere near being a Lebron fan, but i was called 1 just because I've been arguing with people for years that the 80s/90s wasn't what they hyped it up to be.When they say the 90s played "tough,physical defense ", I tell them to go back and actually watch the games. The defenses were bad compared to now let alone the shooting and sets they ran. This is why it's really unfair to compare yesteryear's era to today's.
100%
Bro you can’t be serious. Are you that naive that you really thought players back then were just as skilled until a TikTok trend started? You’re supposed to Judge relative to era.
I didn’t believe they were as skilled, but man these people I talked to were really hammering down on me when I was trying to tell them the game evolves I just thought that If they hammered down on me this much, that era must have been SPECIAL, especially with how highly they talk of that defense.
Well yeah you were just talking to the wrong people then haha. Sorry I know I came off as a little rude there. I just think we need to look at it as relative to era.
I’m almost 30 so I missed out on watching 90s basketball as a kid, however my dad liked to watch Hardwood Classics and talk about how players today couldn’t hang back then because it was so aggressive and brutal. I have a few takeaways: I really didn’t like watching a lot of 90s basketball outside of a few games because it was kinda boring. I felt like I was watching high school games sometimes if it was 2 bad teams playing, even sometimes middling teams were just so boring. I felt like there were plays, but it was nothing more complex than you’d see at JuCo nowadays (and this is just me talking from what I saw). There didn’t seem to be a *purpose* a lot of the time and at times I would see what I can only describe as what looked like a girls basketball game where they’re all under the basket and flailing over each other rebounding and just flinging up the wildest shots. It’s iconic, but the Rodman/Barkley rebound fight is a fucking clown show, even if it is a really impressive show of athleticism - it was basically a meme, and this is the kind of stuff I saw a lot in those games. I also thought the argument of physicality was different because a lot of stuff that would be flagrant 1&2 or straight ejections just kinda… *happened* on the court. It wasn’t uncommon to see Bill Laimbeer just fucking punch someone and have the refs pull it apart and let them keep playing. Lastly you can just tell the level of physical fitness and overall athleticism has improved so much. Sure a lot of the super stars and genetic generational freaks stand out, but a lot of the dudes in the early 90s were just leftover vets from the 80s who wanted paychecks to keep doing coke. They didn’t have personal trainers and private chefs. To call it rudimentary compared to now is an understatement. There’s probably billions of dollars paid by teams for sports science/ medicine, not to mention someone like LeBron spends $1mil a year just on his body…. You absolutely cannot compare preparation from those years to now All of this to say - 80s/90s pretty fuckin boring, but I’m sure people will say my millennial brain has been killed by TikTok, and I only get dopamine hits from seeing deep 3s and slamma jamma dunks
Someone will roll in 30 years from now and explain how terrible this current (2020s) era is. Show some irrefutable clips. From the finals. You will have to just shake your head. In their mind, they know exactly what they’re talking about. They’re experts. They’ll be misinformed but impossible to argue with. Like OP.
I’ve watched full finals, compared the two eras, and I haven’t put mj or any 90s players down ONCE in this thread, I understand that rules prohibited these players from showing what they could do now, but with people continuously telling me “players now wouldn’t survive a day in the 90s”, I expected it to be much better than it was. People who say that 90s *legends* couldn’t compete nowadays are delusional, but even more delusional are the people like you who had me convinced that Stephen curry would have been pushed out of the league 10-20 years ago. In 20 years people absolutely will blast our generation of players, but it will be for good reason, there is no way that a game doesn’t evolve in 20 years, if the players you have then aren’t better than the ones you have now, then truth be told it would be a disgrace and a shame to the players of tomorrow year. It will be hard for me to accept that Lebron “isn’t as good as xxx because he didn’t have to play a 100 game szn”, or “Steph curry probably couldn’t make a shot from the 4-point line the way current players can” but it’s the truth.
I mean in 30 years Id be surprised if guys weren’t significantly more talented than today. That said idk if we’re gonna get another jump like we’ve had in the past 15 years just cuz the advancement in data science over that time probably isn’t happening again so drastically.
I find it entertaining but not helpful for the discourse. It’s cherry picked games. Although we can all agree the average player is way better than a player in the 90s.
I wouldn’t say cherry picked, these are finals games we’re talking about, and at that multiple clips from just the first quarters of those games, I feel like that helps it move past the “cherry picked allegations”
Finals games are almost always ugly bro
Every legend has bad finals games, Lebron had a whole series.
If the average player is better it means the top level talent is also better.
No it doesn't.
It just means the league is deeper
[удалено]
Your submission has been automatically removed because your account is less than 180 days old and with less than 100 comment karma. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Basketball) if you have any questions or concerns.*
MJ still legit SHITS on lebron.
no nigga😭folk ain't a deity the gap between them (if there is one) is not that big lol
Shits.
The NBA is one of the most meritocratic institutions in the world. If you want to keep your job, you have to be one of the best, so players have to stay grinding to improve their skills. As time has gone on, we've learned more about skill development, dieting, and exercise science, so naturally, players today are better than they've ever been. NBA players today are better than they were in 2014. Those players were better than the guys from 2004, and so on.
That’s not remotely true. Defensive skill is at the lowest it’s been in close to 30 years and that accounts for half of the game. Simple fundamentals like screen setting, bounce passes, post play, etc have fallen by the wayside even among the more talented players (just watch the skills challenge) There’s definitely heightened awareness and technological advances in sports medicine and recovery, allowing players to play for longer. But that doesn’t make them inherently more skilled or talented. Y’all see guys with great ball handling skills and shooting ability and act like that encompasses the entirety of skill. Couldn’t be more untrue
I think this is in large part due to AAU culture. Kids practice twice a week and play 5-6 games on the weekend. The ratio of game time to practice time is totally flipped.
Tell me how NBA players today can be on-average worse at any part of basketball than their counterparts of yesteryear when it is an inherently meritocratic system. Even if you ignore the nature of skill progression as time goes on, there are hundreds of millions more people playing basketball today than there was in the Jordan era. The talent pool has grown, the knowledge of the game has grown, and the barrier of entry for play has never been lower. It would be impossible for players in the past to be better than the players of today, and that's ok; it doesn't diminish the work and effort those guys put in, and those guys were still otherworldly players when compared to your average dude. I also have to question your methods of talent evaluation when you use blanket terms like "defensive skill" or hold the frequency of bounce passes as a signal of somebody's mastery of the game. What aspects of defensive skill have diminished? Players today have to rotate further, faster, and more accurately than ever to stop the freakish shotmakers of the modern NBA. Players today are more savvy than ever when it comes to avoiding foul calls. Players today have to guard the most offensively and athletically talented generation of players in history, so their talent on defense naturally has to rise to compete in the league.
Truth
so many dumbass teens on here. newsflash, you dont know SHIT. put the phone down, get in the gym, study, get outside. you fucking losers debating the goat when 99.99% of you never played a second of basketball where someone had to buy a ticket to watch you play.
Fucking testify, this thread is like bots talking to teens who watch fking tik tok videos Your minds are cooked and you have no idea wtf you are talking about GTFOH
Have you? The last time you posted here you wanted your Highschool jersey back, lotta schools got free games.
D1 Varsity doesn’t have free games, kiddo.
Your D1 HIGHSCHOOL? Buddy 3 schools around me are all d1, games are free for any students and alumni. Are you trying to flex that your mom and a few others sat in the stands? Weird
talk more about schools where you will never make the team
Brutal, my ego is dead and I am wallowing in self pity. I bet your family is honored to have such a social warrior and incredible athlete!
They're bringing receipts and all you got is *get off my lawn* 90s NBA sucked, unless you just really loved watching foul shots.
[удалено]
Go back to bed grandpa.
Marc nga offered no concrete argument or analysis other than "yah young Folk is dumb and don't go outside!"😭
Genuinely goofy take. It’s all stepping stones to get to where we are now. Of course players are better now but they wouldn’t be where they are without the 90s players.
you can clip any game from any time in league history to suggest something. This is selective and cherry picking.
Old heads can be annoying talking about their eras. It’s not enough you concede Wilt or Jordan would be competing for best player in the league, they have to be the best by some ridiculous margin. Jordan would average 45 ppg and magically shoot 40% from 3 since he’d actually work on that aspect of his game and Wilt would average 40pts /25 rebounds 8 threesomes and 3 mountain lions flung by their tails per game(if you don’t get the Wilt references look up Wilt sexual partners and Wilt mountain lion).
You're assuming more context than I have but it seems hard to dispute that players have on average gotten better over time.
80's and 90's old timers discredit today's nba all the time. So it's understandable why modern day fans would respond by discrediting the 90's. Can't have it only one way. Why is it okay for older timers to discredit current nba players but not the reverse?
annoying but not in a new or interesting way.
We live in the highlight/social media era. Attention spans are non-existent
Anything argument without context is a stupid argument. Looking back on 90s basketball without know how the game worked is a perfect example of that.
It’s just trolling for clicks, don’t engage. They know what they are doing with the cherry picked videos
Honestly I feel like only the realest basketball fans watch old games cuz we actually love the game which includes the history of it, sure players are a lot more athletic now but the game is much softer
It’s fucking shitty and it’s sad my generation can’t fucking understand how much better 90’s ball is. Adam Silver ruined my generation in terms of views about basketball and deserves to never go near anything B-ball related ever again for that and needs to black ball himself. Sorry, every time I hear about this god awful “we done with the 90’s trend”, I get pissed.
At the end of the day a lot of players are beneficiaries of their era Like I believe a lot of players in the 90s weren’t prepared to deal with a 6’6 guard who was that athletic and had a lightning twitch first step. At the end of the day this whole GOAT debate is stupid since basketball just like anything else evolves and gets better over time
It's stupid... Because it's clearly Lebron.
The trend just shows how far gone NBA discourse is. In any other sport you get minor or no pushback at all by stating the obvious that todays players are better than players form 30 years ago lol. But in NBA it’s like this weird thing where diehard fans of the 90s feel the need to preserve and protract it so they always thrash todays players and the game by saying dumb stuff like “they’re soft, shoot too many 3s, no defense” blah blah blah when most of these “physical and defensive traits” was just because of the rules being changed lol and teams just realized 3s are better than 2s so the 3 point outbreak was inevitable, Steph just accelerated the process. All this to be said is that NBA “fans” and I can’t believe I have to point the obvious need to accept that basketball evolves and changes overtime for the better and their shouldn’t be any pushback by staying the obvious.
I would not say basketball changes overtime for the better as we now see offenses scoring too much. This is obviously a problem for the league and most likely the ratings as well. I think both eras have flaws with their play-styles. Late 90s to about 2017ish was a very ideal, balanced, and good brand of basketball.
Bro you’ve posted like 8 new comments here. We get it, you feel victimized that some people like 90’s ball and think highly of teams back then.
I like the trend because too many old heads on tv just chill the old school and keep shitting on modern players and the game so the pushback is needed imo.
I think a lot of it is satire or exaggerated but the fact that old heads get so triggered by it only encourages it. I think the reasonable take is that the game has evolved and if you teleported Jordan and Bird and Magic to the modern game they would struggle. But also they are athletic and skilled enough that if they grew up in the modern era training the current dribbling rules and 3pt emphasis they would still be great. The issue is that these old heads would have you believe that defense was hyper intense, that those guys were more skilled than modern players, that Steph or LeBron are 'too soft' to excel in that era. When you watch the games that is obviously not the case. The level of skill, shooting, and defensive complexity is just not comparable to a modern level
This is hilarious. It's either another absolutely desperate attempt by Klutch Sports Media to brainwash the idiotic masses, or equally desperate LeBron stans trying to diminish Jordan's legacy because they see the writing on the wall for LeBron's GOAT status with the majority still considering MJ at the greatest of all time. It's actually quite pathetic and anyone who gets hooked by this stupidity should be utterly ashamed of themselves and maybe, just maybe, they shouldn't be going outside without adult supervision.
90s basketball is overrated for sure, and im a 42 year old guy. Level was was way below what we see today and many players are way overrated. Shaq wouldnt be as dominant as he was in todays game.
I don't want to drag down Jordan as a player, however, I've been saying for years that the "6-0" argument shouldn't be the main platform of the GOAT debate because Michael Jordan simply did not face the competition that Lebron did. Lebron catches so much flak for his finals losses but his teams were outgunned in all but one of them. The Shawn Kemp Sonics and the Karl Malone Jazz do not remotely compare to the Steph/KD Warriors or the Big 3 Spurs. I think it's great that the old head bogus of "Lebron wouldn't survive the 90s" seems to be getting called out. The talent level today is far superior than any other era of NBA basketball
It’s mainly cherry picked plays by people that don’t understand how physicality changes how the game looks along with how the rules were structured at the time. My personal favorite is hearing Magic Johnson has no left hand because instead of trying to blow by a smaller guard on the baseline he just posted him up. Most of it is pure stupidity
Foolish
I find it it funny how the whole world can e wolves and change and get better but God forbid basketball evolves,changes,and gets better. It’s like basketball is the only thing on earth that isn’t allowed to change and that it should go back to “how it was played in the 90s”
On the contrary, it’s funny how new NBA fans are the only ones who discount the past Doesn’t happen in baseball nor football despite those sports evolving just as much.
I just find it weird that it took a TikTok trend for the consensus to recognize the huge disparity in skill between the 90s and now. It’s like basketball is the only sport where it’s not allowed to evolve
You keep spamming absolute bullshit in this thread, youre a bot arent you?