Quote:
Originally Posted by Inner Dirt
I don't understand people that say (any past era, any sport) "players from 70's would get smoked by modern players, the competition was terrible."
They act like the species of man has evolved genetically at some insane rate the last half century or so. Giving no thought to the fact if an athlete from the 60's grew up today with modern nutrition, training and medicine (legal or illegal) they would end up being able to perform like today's athletes.
Pretty sure most of us older guys realize that, go to a sports forum full of young people and most think 1955 was like the dark ages and the average man was 5'6". Another factor with modern technology colleges and pro sports are developing athletes that back in the day would not be discovered.
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I agree. I wouldn't be shocked to see some slight growth with humans, but 'performance' has been a much steeper significant curve.
In the 80s and 90s Basketball(and Baseball) was my horse racing. I was 6'8 1/2 tall and about 230lbs as a senior in '97.
We had athletes back then, but weight training has improved. In the 80s NBA players for the most part looked like regular tall men. Many more of today's NBA players look like olympic athletes.
Things like steroids and hgh and really scientific doctor-designed implementation has played some role. It's always going to be something that is publicly expressed as a non-existing factor, but privately it's been kind of accepted that if you use your body for a living, you should do everything that helps. I mean, you can't turn on netflix and watch a series without some actors that are using.
Basketball has changed a lot. It's a much more efficient game now. If I wanted to shoot a 3 back then, I would have needed to buy an airplane ticket to Europe. I remember hitting 20 in a row from behind the arc in a shoot around, and having students come up to me asking why I wasn't a 3-pt shooter.
Two funny things back then were carrying a coach/jockey on my shoulders when I went out to shoot 3s or decided to bring the ball up coast-to-coast (which was only surpassed by the effort required to carry a baseball coach and a pitching coach from the pitcher's mound over to the first-base bag). I was a stretch-4 and a first-baseman so it wasn't my era. (Not that baseball has a ton of tall hitters. Maybe that makes more sense.). I have a condition called 'Marfan Syndrome' and I had an aortic dissection and 3 open-heart surgeries, so a career playing ball wasn't meant to be. (btw; Jeff Green of the Cavs has come back from a surgery that was vaguely similar to one of mine(without the dissection) and he did a great job filling in for Kevin Love in game 7).
Another great game from Lebron. That blocked-dunk highlight was impressive. Lot of fans counted him out after Game 5.
Game 7 West tonight 9pm
