When he faced Jordan, he did not have sidekick Pippen yet or Grant: When he faced the Rockets, it was a second year Hakeem and a third year Sampson. They did not realize their potential as a duo. LA was the other team with multiple HOFers, so therefore they did share the rings between the two clubs. Lets not forget that Mchale, Parrish, Walton played for the C's at this time as well.
80s and 90s were the golden years of bball. Birds teams even though I hated them and that basterd Mcfail was one of the great teams of all time. He beat the lakers w/ Magic, Jordans Bulls and the twin tower rockets.....he was the main guy on that evil team......He was one of the all time greats which means he would be great in any era. I hated him, but as respect to myself and to my love of bball hes one of the few players I would say was better than the Dream.
This. They were not only really good basketball players, they were tough as nails compared to these sissies today. I don't think the toughness and no nonsense game and attitude of those former greats will ever be duplicated by these pampered softies today.
A skilled player will always be effective. A guy like Scola, who has zero athletic ability, would be and is as effective.
Walton was an aging bench player, effective for one year. And the only reason Parish is a HOFer is because he was on that team...besides you forget Dennis Johnson who Bird said was the best player he ever played with. The 76ers had multiple HOFers, too, and beat Bird twice. Pistons had multiple HOFers, too. Isiah, Dumars, Rodman and Dantley (who they traded for Aguirre). I don't think you know your history.
Yes, Walton had injury problems during his decline. and I know about Dennis Johnson, hes is a 6'3 guard, even another hall of famer although not at his peak. Ok so the 76ers had HOFers and the Detroit Bad Boys were in the mix, but the fact remains that Bird had arguably the best supporting cast of HOFers. Detroit had HOFers, but Dantley was on the decline of his career, Rodman could not score, Thomas and Joe Dumars peaked at different times in their career. I don't think you know your history :grin:
that video of bird scoring 60 certainly didn't make it look like it. except for a few bumps in the post at the beginning, he hardly got touched on those other shots. hell, his man was backing off and barely getting a hand up on some of those shots. the pickup game i played last sunday was worse than that. and for those who think he'd shoot a ton of free throws, considering this season currently has the lowest FTA to FGA ratio in nba history (or at least as far back as the mid-60's at which point i stopped looking) that seems unlikely. as for the question, bird was an extremely good player so he would be very good in today's nba. if he was just transported forward in time with the same body then of course there would be some fall off as he would simply be going against better players in absolute terms. if we're talking larry bird growing up in this era then he would presumably be about as relatively good as he was then. and looking at the bird/dirk comparisons, people should check out their playoff stats. you'd probably be shocked.
if you compare tapes of present day games and those in the past, you would realize like I did that defenses were not near as good in the past. people did not know how to contest shots, rotate correctly, etc.
a generalization of course, but nevertheless it was definitely a different style of play. and do not forget about "illegal defenses" hahaha
i remember someone posting a video of wilt and russell a few months ago. russell practically just stood there and let wilt catch the ball a few feet from the basket and then just put his hands up while wilt shot. the game was so different that the guy considered the best defender ever was playing defense that would be considered awful in today's game. now maybe that was just an aberration but i doubt it. and during the all-star break, bill simmons had dave cowens on for a podcast. i think they were talking about some fight and bill asked about how physical it was back then and cowens said he thought it was a lot more physical now because players are so much bigger and stronger and the collisions are just so much more violent. then he even mentioned the same thing about russell/wilt i was just talking about, that they didn't really battle for position like you would think. people take the fighting and occasional flagrants that happened back in the day and extrapolate it into crazy physical defense that simply didn't exist.
did not know how to contest shots?? that's not true. and as far as rotation is concerned...yes, most definitely Daly's Pistons invented rotation to stop the Celtics and Lakers. However, rotation doesn't stop the primary player like Bird and Magic,,,double teams do. Rotation prevents ball movement to the weakside from killing the double team. And the Pistons still couldn't beat Bird as a defensive team with legendary advancement in defensive strategy designed specifically to beat him until Bird and McHale were playing with lingering injuries. Double teams and contesting shots were in the 80s...but the big deal regarding Bird is low post defense was vastly more fierce and better in the 80s than now in these Center-less league.
Bird had the best hand-to-eye coordination I have ever seen by an NBA player and was deceptively quick once the ball was in his hands.
are you talking about a specific year? DJ was with Bird for several years. No, Magic did. And so you go from saying no teams to agreeing on three teams that Bird had to face...on a yearly playoff adventure...for many years. again, what year are you talking about? Dantley's last year with the Pistons?...their leading scorer who they upgrading by trading for Mark Aquirre and won the championship finally? He was the best non-center defender in league history at his peak defensive capabilities against Bird...later becoming a legendary rebounder as well. He was a laboratory mutation spawned specifically to stop Larry Bird and struggled with that. you do know Dumars won Finals MVP with Thomas, right.
really? people saying Bird would not be good in the NBA today?? Damn! I didnt see Bird in his prime, but I have watched vids, and damn, he could do anything (rebounding, passing, shooting, stealing, etc.) <iframe width="480" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/2kfYnqiVK34" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> <iframe width="480" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/n00xswse66c" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
He didnt defend? He was an exceptional help defender and team defender and made the NBA all defense team a number of times.
you are stupid. how does a bad defender make all nba defensive 2nd team THREE YEARS IN A ROW if he is a bad defender? stop being a jackass.
****mydadsays "Everyone thinks their opinion matters. Don't argue with a nobody. A farmer doesn't bother telling a pig his breath smells like ****."
not so different. <iframe src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/qRikrksH8es" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" width="420"></iframe>
Larry Bird had Michael's level balls and one of the highest basketball IQ's ever alongside his leadership, shooting and all-around skills. Of course he would be dominant is nowadays league, not even a question Say hello to Nique Wilkins
NO, Larry Bird would not be a scrub in today's NBA. Larry had that quality that Michael and Kobe have. He was not only elite in scoring, he wanted to kill everyone he faced, especially in the playoffs. For all the Lebron talk about how he would destroy Larry. It's quite the opposite. Larry would be hitting from anywhere on Lebron and talking crap the whole time. He would step out 30 feet if need be and hit every time and laugh while Lebron would shrink in the 4th.
