2018 NBA FINALS - Cleveland Cavaliers vs Golden State Warriors IV - Preview + Predictions (spoilers)

[kingkingston]

That’s because they were allowed to play with instinct!

Teams are far more regimented today with schemes, etc. Individuals may not be smarter but teams as a unit are vastly superior in terms of acumen.

3 points is always more than 2 points.

that is true, but 2 point field goal percentages will always be better than 3 point percentage

Pippen and Jordan together are the greatest duo i have ever seen. When in full flight, they were devastating to watch.

 

[fidstar]

having smarts is like reading the play and playing off each other like the best players do when they click. Like Jordan and Pippen did, or reading the defence so you can do damage against them. Rodman was a very smart defender, he knew how to defend nearly everyone. Stockton and Malone were like chalk and cheese and played off each other beautifully. These days you just don't see that cohesion as much in the game play. It is a lot of ISO and pick and roll and a lot less of players actually moving without the ball.

If you think today's basketball is the best we have ever seen, you are sadly mistaken. So many bad defenders, so many mistakes, So many bad shots taken.

Problem is people like yourself think that players are just naturally smart basketball players.......unfortunately that isn't the case and the NBA went through a period of teams drafting athletic players who had no basketball smarts at all and it killed the brand for awhile. It has started to change though

Complaining there is too much iso today and then referring to the 90s is a bit odd. You do know that is what the 90s is famous for? It got so bad that the league introduced rules to try and cut down on the iso in the early 2000s.

Maybe you are being influenced by being a Houston fan and seeing such an isolation heavy offense. If you can't watch the Warriors offense and think it's beautiful, you should stop watching basketball. If you can't watch Boston or SAS take a bunch of role players and play great basketball that is competitive with the top teams, then I don't know what to say.

You've also bought up a bunch of players that are all time greats and basically said "look at their basketball smarts"... well, they are all time greats. Back to today's game... LeBron might just be the smartest basketball player of all time. You have what I think is a Top 5 point-guard of all time (in terms of basketball IQ) on your team in CP3. Draymond Green and Iggy are two of the smartest defensive players I've ever seen. There's just as much smarts today as there ever has been.

You also talk about "so many dumb shots taken". That's basketball, and has been forever. And if you want to talk about "dumb shots", the contested mid range 2 is probably the dumbest shot in basketball and the 90s was famous for them.

You are looking at the 80s/90s with rose-tinted glasses (much like a lot of people, or as you say "people like yourself"). Basketball wasn't seen like it is today. Generally you saw highlights and some big games. Games of the equivalent of today's Suns v Kings were never seen. That's why it looks good. If I just showed you highlights of today's game, it looks amazing. If you ask a lot of people the late 90s was a low point for watching basketball.

There was plenty of mistakes back in the day. You just didn't see them. I mean that clip I showed you of the Bulls. How many defensive mistakes did you see? I saw plenty. And that was by what many consider to be the best team of all time.

I'm not even saying today's basketball looks better than yesteryear btw. I don't even know how that came up tbh. I loved watching the games in the 90s. It was my favorite era. MJ is my favorite player and the 90s Bulls is my favorite team of all time. So, I'm not being bias.

 

[kingkingston]

Complaining there is too much iso today and then referring to the 90s is a bit odd. You do know that is what the 90s is famous for? It got so bad that the league introduced rules to try and cut down on the iso in the early 2000s.

Maybe you are being influenced by being a Houston fan and seeing such an isolation heavy offense. If you can't watch the Warriors offense and think it's beautiful, you should stop watching basketball. If you can't watch Boston or SAS take a bunch of role players and play great basketball that is competitive with the top teams, then I don't know what to say.

You've also bought up a bunch of players that are all time greats and basically said "look at their basketball smarts"... well, they are all time greats. Back to today's game... LeBron might just be the smartest basketball player of all time. You have what I think is a Top 5 point-guard of all time (in terms of basketball IQ) on your team in CP3. Draymond Green and Iggy are two of the smartest defensive players I've ever seen. There's just as much smarts today as there ever has been.

You also talk about "so many dumb shots taken". That's basketball, and has been forever. And if you want to talk about "dumb shots", the contested mid range 2 is probably the dumbest shot in basketball and the 90s was famous for them.

You are looking at the 80s/90s with rose-tinted glasses (much like a lot of people, or as you say "people like yourself"). Basketball wasn't seen like it is today. Generally you saw highlights and some big games. Games of the equivalent of today's Suns v Kings were never seen. That's why it looks good. If I just showed you highlights of today's game, it looks amazing. If you ask a lot of people the late 90s was a low point for watching basketball.

There was plenty of mistakes back in the day. You just didn't see them. I mean that clip I showed you of the Bulls. How many defensive mistakes did you see? I saw plenty. And that was by what many consider to be the best team of all time.

I'm not even saying today's basketball looks better than yesteryear btw. I don't even know how that came up tbh. I loved watching the games in the 90s. It was my favorite era. MJ is my favorite player and the 90s Bulls is my favorite team of all time. So, I'm not being bias.

you mean a bunch of high draft picks.......Celtics are full of young up and coming high draft picked players, they are not roleplayers.

There are probably more uncontested shots today than ever before, mainly because of the long threes teams take. You can't cover the shot. I would take 90's ball over today every time and even early 2000 was far more entertaining. The games from the 90's were great and you could even get in to watching 2 bad teams play each other because they usually had at least one gun player on that team. Today the bad teams are young and inexperienced. The stars were more spread out across the league in the 90's, there was none of this "stars in their prime joining up together" rubbish on 4-5 teams because the cap didn't allow it to happen. The luxury tax has really thrown open the doors to super teams

 

[fidstar]

you mean a bunch of high draft picks.......Celtics are full of young up and coming high draft picked players, they are not roleplayers.

What I meant was teams playing great basketball and being better than the sum of their parts. You don't think they play attractive basketball?

There are probably more uncontested shots today than ever before, mainly because of the long threes teams take. You can't cover the shot. I would take 90's ball over today every time and even early 2000 was far more entertaining. The games from the 90's were great and you could even get in to watching 2 bad teams play each other because they usually had at least one gun player on that team. Today the bad teams are young and inexperienced. The stars were more spread out across the league in the 90's, there was none of this "stars in their prime joining up together" rubbish on 4-5 teams because the cap didn't allow it to happen. The luxury tax has really thrown open the doors to super teams

I'm not disagreeing with you. I like 90s basketball. But you (and partly I) am in the minority thinking late 90s/early 00s was the peak of basketball watching. And I know it's rose colored glasses for me. It's when I wanted to make man love to MJ.

And, let's not go crazy. Pretty much every season since forever there are only 3-5 teams that can win a championship at the start of the season. Every now and then someone outside that group wins (e.g. Pistons in the 00s and even the Warriors in 15), and if anything it was worse in the 80s and 90s (which hardly ever had an upset).

There were s**t teams back in the 90s btw. Just like today.

Picking a random year (98), here are several teams with no one better on them than the shitty teams of today...

Dallas, Toronto, Bucks, Denver, Griz, LAC, Golden State, Kings (old Mitch was okay I guess) and the 76ers. Those teams are no different to today's shitty teams. Generally crap older players with a few young guys on rookie deals.

 

[fidstar]

I like this thread better...

 

[J Shuttlesworth]

I like this thread better...

Doesn't matter until we know what Drake thinks.

Surprised we don't know actually.

 

[fidstar]

Doesn't matter until we know what Drake thinks.

Surprised we don't know actually.

In 2018 he was standing in LeBron's shadow and very quiet.

 

[nahnah]

this was swift and painless