Charles Barkley - "The NBA is the worst it's ever been"

[FTBS]

I listed a 6 year stretch and the point was that back then there were at least 4 teams that were all title contenders at the same time from one conference compared to now when there aren't even 4 legit title contenders in the whole league. There's never been a season in the last 7 years when there were 4 legit title contenders in one conference. Last year was the closest with 3, and the fall off after the top 3 last year was steep. That's why your comparison doesn't negate my point. If you look at the 96-97 season you had the Jazz, Rockets, Sonics who were all legit title contenders. Then you had the Shaq-Kobe Lakers and that Trailblazer squad on the come up. The West just isn't that deep right now. Even the east was deeper back then compared to now.

You don't have a point which is why you aren't even making an argument. You're just trolling. You had 6 teams win 50+ games in the east back in '96-97. There's 2 in the east on pace to win 50 as of now. What are you talking about?

92-93 through 98-99 is 7 seasons. You pointed directly to how many teams from the west made the finals during that time as proof of competitiveness. I did the same exact thing for the last 7 seasons and it's actually more competitive since most of those teams actually broke through and won the whole thing. You can't move the goalpost to "how many contenders" now. I don't give teams credit for being "contenders" after the fact....either you win or you don't. Depth means nothing when we already know the result. Teams actually breaking through and winning >>>>> "contenders" that never win shyt.

 

[Gravity]

Depth means nothing when we already know the result. Teams actually breaking through and winning >>>>> "contenders" that never win shyt.

Right here you concede the point

Thanks for playing.

 

[Illin Degenerate]

So while I see what you are saying about McHale and some others.

but why would mchale have struggled? 6'10, freakish long arms, very good jump shot and arguably the goat post game.

 

[Illuminatos]

no because jordan was facing GOOD teams... y'all missing the point

jordan was out there kicking ass, but the 90s knicks were not a cupcake team... neither were the 90s pacers.. or the 90s heat... or magic... or hawks


every single of those teams had hall of famers on the squad and a few all stars... what we got now?


what all time nba team did lebron go through? you think you gonna be playing 2k25 and they'll have the 16 raptors up in there

@ the 90s Pacers.

nikkas really hyping up the 90s Pacers.

 

[Mantis Toboggan M.D.]

@ the 90s Pacers.

nikkas really hyping up the 90s Pacers.

The 90's hawks . They never even reached the conference finals . The Magic had a 2 year window to compete for a title . The Knicks second best player was John fukking Starks . The pacers second best player averaged similar numbers on the career to Roy hibbert. Their best player never even made an all NBA second team and couldn't even create 20% of the shots he made on the career :lolsheed:

 

[Illuminatos]

The 90's hawks . They never even reached the conference finals . The Magic had a 2 year window to compete for a title . The Knicks second best player was John fukking Starks . The pacers second best player averaged similar numbers on the career to Roy hibbert. Their best player never even made an all
NBA second team and couldn't even create 20% of the shots he made on the career :lolsheed:

These fools are completely blinded by nostalgia. Those teams wouldn't even be touching the Cavs/Warriors in this era.

 

[Mantis Toboggan M.D.]

These fools are completely blinded by nostalgia. Those teams wouldn't even be touching the Cavs/Warriors in this era.

They said the same shyt about the Heat too. That they couldn't hang with teams that struggled to score or pass the ball that had no real notable success and starters who might struggle to crack the rotation against good teams in this era

 

[Gravity]

These fools are completely blinded by nostalgia. Those teams wouldn't even be touching the Cavs/Warriors in this era.

Says the clown who was part of the "GS/Steph is the greatest of all time" hype. The nerve of you. You've been wrong for the last year plus. You should be sitting down somewhere shutting the fukk up.

 

[Illuminatos]

Says the clown who was part of the "GS/Steph is the greatest of all time" hype. The nerve of you. You've been wrong for the last year plus. You should be sitting down somewhere shutting the fukk up.

Warriors were 1 minute away from a championship last year. Plus, they'd still stomp out 99 percent of those weak ass 90s teams.

 

[Gravity]

Warriors were 1 minute away from a championship last year. Plus, they'd still stomp out 99 percent of those weak ass 90s teams.

Nah, then one ring they got is suspect because Kyrie was hurt. They gave up 3-1 lead and you're talking about them being one min away

 

[Bilz]

The NBA is great. The NBA hot takes are at an all time low.

 

[The Devil's Advocate]

If that's all you are trying to prove, that was taken care of the first four pages. There have been LOTS of years where only 2-4 teams had a serious chance at the title, and some where there were more. That's always been true. Cherry-picking one year from the 1990s and comparing it to one year now is meaningless.

I'm not going to drown in low-quality arguments this year, so I'm done with this thread.

Bookmark and tag me when a fat 6'5" lazy player who doesn't try on D wins MVP on the strength of his post game. When a 210 lb White guy with suspect athleticism is a dominant post player on title teams. And when having two 6'2" 35-year-old White Americans as your clear #2 and #3 can get you to back-to-back Finals and threaten to go 7 games against four HOFers including the GOAT.

Until those unlikely things happen, I'll hold that there wasn't any magic dust floating around in the 1990s, and the huge increase in talent pool and improvement in talent development really does mean that the field is just too strong now to allow it.

Those teams weren't that good either. That's the issue. You got the Bulls with two superstars, nice players around the superstars. A bench stud in Toni and you expect anyone to beat them is insane. Especially with no zone defense, how do you stop Jordan or Pippen? Most contending teams in the 90s didn't have but one superstar and two stars. The bad and average ones didn't even have a star.

It was a weak era. The crack cocaine era of the mid to late 80 ruined the 90s and Jordan benefited from that. I mean, Vince Carter had a superior statistical career to Reggie Miller. This was a star of the 90s. Lowry is putting up better numbers than any PG in the 90s. shyt, this generation of front office and analytics guys have really changed what the NBA is and on top of that, this is by far the most work ethic the league has ever had.

It's usually a pretty lazy league where in the summer guys would play pick up and tournaments. Now everyone doing some crazy training and has personal coaches and team coaches developing them. To think this started in the early 2000s with Mark Cuban.

@ the 90s Pacers.

nikkas really hyping up the 90s Pacers.

Why are y'all comparing those teams to current teams


Let's looks at the quote for the 10th time

The NBA sucks cause it's only 3-4 good teams and the rest are trash


Did he say the 90s teams could beat these teams? Hell nah.


What he is saying is 26 teams in the league ain't worth shyt compared to the 3-4 good teams and it makes it completely trash to watch.


Now you might not think watching prime Jordan, Ewing, Olajuwon, Shaq, Miller, Malone, Barkley, Stockton, Payton.... to be followed by prime Kobe, Garnett, mutumbo, carter, iverson, Allen, etc was good competition.........

but to the rest of the basketball world. From the dudes playing now to the coaches to media to owners. It was fukking amazing


Now who we watching? The spurs, the warriors, the cavs and maybe the clippers


That's it. Ain't nobody tuning in to the sixers and the bucs like they would if it was Allen vs iverson. Nobody watching the nuggets vs the jazz like mutumbo vs Malone. Nobody is watching the fukking pacers.

Not only are they not watching it. They don't even care about the entire regular season anymore until the playoffs start. And even then they pretty much got the finals locked up.

And that's been the case since before the season started


That's a good league to you


In comparison look at the NFL. nikkas will literally watch ANY football game. Don't matter who playing. Don't matter where in the season. It will be watched by nikkas who don't even know who's playing the game.


NBA wishes it could have that. Soon as you hear. Oh it's the heat vs the nuggets. Channel changed

 

[Illuminatos]

Now you might not think watching prime Jordan, Ewing, Olajuwon, Shaq, Miller, Malone, Barkley, Stockton, Payton.... to be followed by prime Kobe, Garnett, mutumbo, carter, iverson, Allen, etc was good competition.........

but to the rest of the basketball world. From the dudes playing now to the coaches to media to owners. It was fukking amazing


Now who we watching? The spurs, the warriors, the cavs and maybe the clippers

Prime Bron, Prime Curry, Prime KD, Prime Harden and Prime Kawhi
Westbrook averaging a triple double
CP3, Lillard, Jimmy Butler, Paul George, AD, Cousins, Wall, Kemba, Hayward, and Kyrie.
Then you got the new guard coming up in Giannis, KAT, Embiid and KP.
The league is filled with talent now from top to bottom.

 

[The Devil's Advocate]

Prime Bron, Prime Curry, Prime KD, Prime Harden and Prime Kawhi
Westbrook averaging a triple double
CP3, Lillard, Jimmy Butler, Paul George, AD, Cousins, Wall, Kemba, Hayward, and Kyrie.
Then you got the new guard coming up in Giannis, KAT, Embiid and KP.
The league is filled with talent now from top to bottom.

You started off good. Ain't nobody watching no wizards, sac, damn sure not hornets, bucs, sixers or timberwolves games. And nobody sees them anywhere close to competitive to the top teams


Keep making my point tho

 

[Dilltastic VolWon(derful)]

But he's dead wrong about teams not shooting the 3-ball well outside of a few talented squads:

NBA League Averages | Basketball-Reference.com

Teams have literally never shot the ball better than they are this season, and this is only 2 months in. This is shaping up to be the most efficient scoring season in league history, but Chuck here talking about how nobody can shoot

Exactly! The players today are practicing this shot (NBA range 3 pointer) pretty much in high school, so the transition to shoot the 3 in the NBA isn't as drastic as it use to be.
The league likes it because it keeps the games close and makes them entertaining. You could argue that players are such good shooters and athletes today you could probably push the line back a bit more, but it wouldn't be in the leagues best interest