Channing Frye: “Nostalgia is killing the NBA. The ‘90s weren’t that great”

[L@CaT]

Over exposure due to Social Media is a big reason. We didnt have access to players like we do today, so players back in the day had a certain mystique about them. You had to be there but Magic and Showtime Era vs Bird was as Special as it Gets. Nothing has quite replicated that feeling I got from watching those games.

 

[NYC Rebel]

There was a game TONIGHT where two teams dropped 300 points in a game.

I’m not arguing the 90’s was beautiful/great basketball cuz it wasn’t ,but neither were the 80’s,70’s,60’s 50’s why is everyone focused on 1990’s basketball? cuz Michael jordan is considered the Greatest? At least back then you had different styles now everybody plays the same. High screens/jack 3’s no post game,no mid range ,no triangle, no nothin stop actin like this wakk current advanced era is good these dudes just been told to shoot more 3’s. The playing style wakk just like the 90’s it’s just more “efficient” and analytical.kareem would be a relic today that’s how trash present nba is

Im fine with that. Its better than those horrific scoring droughts which Marv Albert would famously call out with disgust when someone would finally make a shot.

It was sludge ball….watching paint dry NBA basketball. Stiff and watching teams forcefeed the ball into players who had no business taking shots but have to when the true stars were having a funky game.

Its as of you want me to Men In Black wipe away the obvious decline I saw in play from the decade prior while ignoring that today’s players are far more skilled and better at what they do compared to that long in the tooth play I saw in the 90s.

One thing about me is that I say shyt in real time before many of you in here catch on. Call it what you want. Laugh at it . I dont care. I thought the game was complete shyt during the 90s because I saw the decline. It was garbage. I dont miss slow lethargic ball. Neither did NBA fans who dropped off the face of the earth whenever MJ hung it up.

 

[NYC Rebel]

Over exposure due to Social Media is a big reason. We didnt have access to players like we do today, so players back in the day had a certain mystique about them. You had to be there but Magic and Showtime Era vs Bird was as Special as it Gets. Nothing has quite replicated that feeling I got from watching those games.

God came down and added Magic and Larry to one of the best rivalries on sports.

Opposite coasts
The quiet but loud racial dynamic of both teams.

God couldnt have written up a better situation for the league. The stars aligned for Stern.

 

[Po pimp]

Thats why hes the goat. Era was pure trash. Had John Starks viewed as a major star because “he played Jordan hard!”

John Starks was NEVER viewed as a major star

 

[FTBS]

There was a game TONIGHT where two teams dropped 300 points in a game.

I’m not arguing the 90’s was beautiful/great basketball cuz it wasn’t ,but neither were the 80’s,70’s,60’s 50’s why is everyone focused on 1990’s basketball? cuz Michael jordan is considered the Greatest? At least back then you had different styles now everybody plays the same. High screens/jack 3’s no post game,no mid range ,no triangle, no nothin stop actin like this wakk current advanced era is good these dudes just been told to shoot more 3’s. The playing style wakk just like the 90’s it’s just more “efficient” and analytical.kareem would be a relic today that’s how trash present nba is

Basketball is a high scoring game. The 90s and 00s are outliers. If you were introduced to the game during that time its easy to be mistaken.

Everyone absolutely does not play the same. The big game this weekend was Denver vs LA...they play the same? Even in the game you just mentioned...were PHX and MEM playing the same? Boston, Cleveland, OKC, MIL, NY, DET, HOU, GSW all play the same? Shooting more 3s =/= the same. And we gotta stop acting like 6-18 year olds were tripping off variance in the 90s or as if it was this super varied game to begin with. It was all about the post and isos.

 

[NYC Rebel]

John Starks was NEVER viewed as a major star

In New York he is

 

[Belize King]

I long for the days when players didn't have blogs and podcasts and the fukkery was during live interviews or sitdowns with Ahmad Rashad or Roy Firestone.

Everybody has a platform and you realize most people are Coli Brehs.

That’s why I respect people like Jordan and AI. I don’t know shyt about them.

What the fukk does Playoff P have to say nowadays? He lost to the Bulls who are actively trying to tank while Maxey and Embiid played.

O “defense is harder now than every before” ass person.

 

[Po pimp]

In New York he is

I remember Knicks fans on The Coli hyping up Chasson Randle and Ron Baker. They wanted them to get minutes over Derrick Rose

 

[Admiral Ackbar]

Everybody has a platform and you realize most people are Coli Brehs.

That’s why I respect people like Jordan and AI. I don’t know shyt about them.

What the fukk does Playoff P have to say nowadays? He lost to the Bulls who are actively trying to tank while Maxey and Embiid played.

O “defense is harder now than every before” ass person.

The worst is Fox News seeking Ja Rule for his take on the EU or some shyt

 

[Versa]

Selling stars over selling team is always going to be inconsistent because it depends on the quality - both talent and personality/star power - of the stars. The NBA had decades worth of good fortune when it comes to this. Back to back to back eras of superstars.

Selling the star over the team works when it's Jordan/Magic/Bird/Dream/Reggie/Pat/DRob

Selling the star over the team works when it's Kobe/KG/Shaq/T-Mac/AI/Duncan

Selling the star over the team works when its Lebron/KD/Curry/Harden/Dwight

We'll see how selling the star over the team works for Luka, Giannis, Joker, Tatum, Ja, Zion, etc. I don't feel great about it though. Either they're clearly not as good as the previous generation, often injured, international, boring, or playing for unpopular teams.

NBA is in a rough spot right now. LeBrons, Durants, Currys, Jordans, Kobes, and Shaqs don't fall off trees. It's just not the same, and the whack way the game is being played doesn't help either.


Zion and Ja were supposed to be the guys man. Sucks.

 

[Diondon]

Klutch operatives are all fed the same mission
Attack the 90's
I wonder why?

 

[wire28]

Teams going 11 for 51 from three and soft nikkas like Channing Frye is what’s killing the NBA.

 

[Rekkapryde]

Wilt literally shyts on everyone. Dude was always like this even when he was active lol.

Food for thought.

 

[mbewane]

Yall keep forgetting the amount of disdain directed towards NBA players on the early 00s. I will never forget the cac hate directed towards AI going INTO the 04’ Olympics. The dress code, jail blazers, you name it, NBA players following the 90s were not liked. Plus, this all coincided with the rise of social media, and its impact on how the game was being covered. I will never forget when Carmelo Anthony got into that fight vs the Knicks and dusty ass Tony Kormheiser in his horrible one year stint on MNF tried to say the fight reflected a decay in society. shyt that 10 years prior wouldnt have had none of that nonsense tied to it. Melo lost his deal with Southwest Airlines because of a fight Barkley and company had frequently in the 90s with nowhere near the same scrutiny.

Yall got short memories.

Oh no I totally remember, I just don't really care about what colonizer casuals think about the NBA tbh.

 

[mbewane]

90’s nostalgia began creeping into the presentation of the nba about 20 years ago. 10-15 years ago it went into overdrive. In regards to bad jersey design, every era has had some bad jersey designs. Nike does need to be let go as the outfitter though.

There wasn’t more defense played then either. Offenses were just as basic as can be so teams played slower since the offense was easier for defenses to blow up even with there being more fouls and free throws than nearly any other point in history. It’s not normal across league history to see teams playing 83-88 possessions per game like most of the league was 25-30 years ago on a 24 second shot clock and 4 12 minute quarters. It’s not normal to see teams come within 3-4 possessions of winning the title when their 2 best player shoot 36% and 36.4% on a 7 game series. It’s not normal to see a team come within 1 made shot of hosting game 7 of the finals with their 2nd and 3rd leading scorers on the series combining for less than 21 points per game. The period of the early/mid 90’s into the early 2000’s was an expansion era which was the oldest, slowest, and least efficient offensive era the league has ever had.


What was different is how it was covered and with the internet being a new thing that was mostly only running low dial-up speeds, there were way fewer outlets to watch something from so word of mouth and tuning in to see the coverage on sports center were almost the only ways you could see stuff so things didn’t really get overexposed like that. Everything is under a magnifying glass in the last 15 years in a way the pre internet era simply wasn’t.

It's not "normal"...according to what standard? Yours? Today's NBA? Anything can seem "not normal" before it happens or in retrospect.