Reporters used to be much closer to previous generations of athletes before social media cut out the middle man and things became more adversarial in a 24/7 news cycle world. Was listening to a Bay Area writer last week who just wrote a memoir after 40 years of sports writing talk about how Bill Walsh would call him almost daily to talk about a variety of subjects including making fun of Al Davis.
Definitely this. I would also imagine the fact that Michael Jordan let Rashad hang out with him before games was Rashad’s major qualification for those jobs in the first place.
Modern players saying old guys can’t compete with young players today is the other side of the same dumb “Lebron wouldn’t have been tough enough to beat the Bad boys” coin. Professional athletes with big egos claiming their eras were the best. I mean just last night we had a story about Bryon Russell telling MJ he could guard him. Of course Gilbert Arenas and Lou Williams think they’re better than Scottie Pippen. Lots of really talented, athletic and skilled guys in the 80s and 90s. Rules and coaching styles made for a slower paced more physical game that got boring when Jordan retired. I think the rest of it is pretty dumb.
Wish they had a ring, but pretty happy how Reggie & the Pacers were portrayed. It was just about the only time MJ didn't roll his eyes & scoff off the competition... Sans ring, I'll take "toughest team since Detroit"
To be fair, Rashad was a sideline reporter on NBA games - including during the Finals. I’m not particularly bothered by Rashad or Windhorst or any of them being tight with the guys they cover but it isn’t accurate to say Rashad was just a host.
the nba is now like the wwe, playing defense is illegal in that joke of a league...but people like it so it is what it is.
maybe both but youdon’t see the difference between the game back then and now? It’s definitely easier to score now, don’t you think?
There was also less than 0% chance Pippen would agree to a 1 year deal, and about an equal chance that Krause would agree to pay Pippen the 5 year 80 mil ish type of deal that would get Pippen to re-sign.
Last season, the Houston Rockets led the league with 115.9 points per 100 possessions. In 1993, back when the league played defense, the league leading Phoenix Suns only scored 113.3 points per 100 possessions. A difference of about 2%.
Defensive schemes in the NBA are much, much better now. Partially due to rule changes, but if the Pistons or Bulls (who were both great defensive teams) tried to run their scheme in today's environment they would get annihilated by the Suns.
and by "see the difference between now and then" it means "I just watched this 10 part documentary everyone else has watched and some youtube clips of 90s basketball highlights so I'm now an expert"
Kind of like football coaches being way more aggressive with play calling now and also trying to score faster, I gotcha. i said it earlier, not a huge basketball fan so I don’t get the details easily
IHHH basically the rivals homeboard guy with 50k posts that tells you about how his team's 3 star TE is the next Gronk because he looked at a 2 min hudl highlight clip.
Dude, I asked a question. I am not here trying to tell you how I know so much about basketball. You guys are hard to talk to sometimes
You didn't start by asking a question. You started by declaring the NBA a joke where no one plays defense.
I am also aware that I came in a little too hot for my own good in a discussion that I am not equipped to carry all the way through
But it’s kind of clutch that I am now in the part of the doc where Rodman is making a run at pro wrestling, lol. What a guy
FWIW, the Jazz were at 113.6(2nd in the league) in 96-97 and 112.7(1st in the league) in 97-98 The Bulls held them to 58.8 in that blowout in 97-98.
Karl Malone going in the bulls bus and congratulating everybody is so incredible, I wish we could see more of this stuff. So classy
I didn't mean it like that. More like I don't think the backstory of how or why he got sick doesn't seem that important. Guy was obviously sick with something and still put up a great performance. Felt a little weird to spend so much time with Grover & MJ to really paint the story about food poisoning.
Wait til you shatter their SoPhIStiCaTeD DefENsE myth by telling them that zone defenses were only used 5% of the time on average this season, 3% in 2018, and >1% in 2017 per game. The echo chamber will rain down some serious e-thunder then.
The most famous athlete on the planet being poisoned prior to a playoff game is a pretty big story. If we take everything from the doc as being fact, that's the biggest new story from the doc. I want to hear more about it.
theoretically how would you intentionally poison someone with a pizza? it's cooked in like a 700 degree oven and i doubt a pizzeria is going to have rotten meat just sitting around
he clearly wasn't hungover. that "joke" is as funny as thinking his father was murdered over gambling debts. i can't imagine a scenario where he was intentionally poisoned, though. i'm sure pizza places have older meats and cheeses around but grover implied that these guys were giving him something to make him sick. five guys at a door just means they wanted to see MJ.
Yes, I don't think it was framed as intentional poisoning. They just ordered from some late night place and MJ rolled the dice on the quality of the food like many of us have at various points. The five guys showing up outside weren't intended to be a wetworks team. Not sure why people seem to be running with the "Grover says it was asset neutralization pizza poisoning". He just ate some bad shit or caught a norovirus from someone although those tend to be highly contagious, so probably just bad food.