IU Scott

It is so efficient that it knocked Houston and Boston out of the playoffs.

It comes from the decision announcement and his constant whining after every call that goes against him

Also if that is the case and according to you the pace is faster today then why is the scoring average down from the mid 80's. You would think that with the faster pace and shooting more 3's then teams would be scoring more. You have said that shooting 3's or layups are the efficient shots to shoot but it doe snot lead to more scoring.

Yes but I don't need stats to let me know that. I just don't need metrics to tell me what I already know by just watching the games. People are trying to make basketball harder than it needs to be. All you need to know is if your team scores more than your opponents and that is really the only thing that should matter.

I just have watched a lot of IU games form the 80's and 90's and those teams used the mid range game. They did shoot the 3's at a good percentage but it was not their main focus. The Cheany teams shot a great percentage on 2's and a lot of them were the 15 foot baseline shots. They also had Henderson and Anderson who was great at the mid range game. They averaged over 80 points a game even without relying on 3's. Like I said I just want the best open shot no matter where it comes from because you are going to hit a better percentage when they are open. Also especially in the NBA they seem to try to get their shot on their own and try to get space with the dribble it is harder to get those open shots.

I couldn't care less about any of those stats. All I care about is win/loss percentage, TO differential, Shooting percentages, defensive shooting percentages Usually if you score more points than you score you will win the game and I don't need all of these new metrics to tell me why you won. To me if you take good open looks I don't care if it is a layup, a 10 foot shot, a 15 foot shot or a 3. If you run your offense to get open looks you should hit a great percentage if you are a professional player. I just see to many teams trying to shoot only 3's or layups and taking bad and contested shots causing your percentage to go down

https://www.besttickets.com/blog/nba-shooting/ This is a good site to show how basketball stats has changed since 1980. The number of 3 point shots has went drastically up as well as the percentages. It also shows how the number of 2 point shots has went down as well as the number of free throw attempts. What is funny though is the number of points scored per game has went down about 10 points a game per team. I know my definition of efficiency is different than todays new metrics but to me scoring is the most important thing when looking at offensive output. All I hear is how inefficient taking two point shots are but when teams shot more two point shots they still scored more points per game. To me when you are hitting the 3's it makes your offense look good but like last night when you miss it looks terrible. If teams rely on just shooting 3's it will come back to bite you. Yes teams shot less 3's in the 80's but that did not mean they could not hit them when they shot them. What teams back then could do is have a back up plan if they were not falling. Some of the very best shooters came from the 80s when you look at total shooting percentage and not just base it on 3 point shooting.

Just saying teams need more balance and if you can score at all 3 levels you will be harder to guard.

I guess just shooting 3's is not always the most efficient way to run an offense with Boston going 7-39.

Yes he is and I would bet that the 76ers and Lakers might regret not picking him in the draft last year.

I guess today's players just have a different mentality than they did back in the day. Today it is more about playing with your friends and being buddies with everyone. You would have never seen Magic and Isiah getting together and saying why don't we go to Boston and team up with Bird even though they were best friends. With these guys playing summer ball together they become friends at an early age and you just don't have that hatred for your opponent. Even though before the game Magic and Isiah gave each other hugs and kisses, once the game started they wanted to tear each others head off.

Russel is in the top 10 and he is the best winner in basketball history. The last time I checked the reason you play is to win so I would take winning as a big part in determining who is the best. In the NFL Marino is the best pure passer I have every seen but that does not make him the best QB and one of the reasons is that Marino never won the championship.

Bulls had the Pacers, Knicks and at one time Charlotte with Johnson and Mourning which had a good team. After Riley went to the Heat they had a very competitive team as well.

I totally disagree about the NBA being less competitive back then because I think the NBA is not very competitive right now.

To me the Sonics team with Payton and Kemp was as good as any team that James has played in the finals except for the Warriors.

The only argument I would have is that I think the teams that Jordan had to go through were better than the teams Lebron had to go through until he had to play the Warriors the last few years. The eastern Conference was way better back in the 90's than it is today so the Bulls had a tougher route to get to the finals.

What a terrible IU fan I am because the one guy I forgot on my list was from IU in IT

Bird's back problem started around 91 season and it shortened his career. I hated Bird and the Celtics but they were such a great team and respected how hard they played. The best of 5 series against the Pacers in the early 90's where Bird went out after slamming his head on the floor and came back in to lead the to the series win was a great feat for Bird. As a Pacers fan I hated it but had to admire his guts for coming back like that.

My top 10 would be 1a) Jordan 1b) Lebron 3) Magic 4) Bird 5) Kareem 6) Russell 7) Wilt 8- Oscar 9) Duncan 10) Hakeem I am doing this off the top of my head so I am probably leaving some one obvious off but I think it is pretty close. To me the next tier would be Kobe, Karl Malone, Stockton, Iverson.

The last two years has changed my mind about Lebron for me because before I did not have him in the top 5. Today I have him and Jordan as 1a and 1b and what he has done this year is remarkable. I have watched many of the top players in person except for Jordan. I was able to watch Kareem and Magic as well as Bird and Dr. J and seeing Lebron in person really changed my view of him.

I was thinking the same way because they have to many players for the 1-3 spots. You have Irving, Smart and Rozier for the 1. You then will have Hayward, brown and Tatum at the 2-3 so they could make a move to get a big with one of those players. I am a Pacer fan and maybe we could trade Turner for some of those players where both teams could come out with a good trade. That way we could put Sabonis in as the 5 and maybe bring in a good stretch 4 to play with Sabonis.

He is in a category of his own

After every loss Labron usually comes out and drops 40+ but it will be more difficult against the Celtcis. The Pacers beat the Cavs pretty easily in the first game and then Labron came out and scored the first 16 points of the game for the Cavs.

How about Embid getting fouled at least once on one of those shots in the last 5 seconds.

Maybe I am now but in the past I loved the NBA. I remember the great game the Celtics and Hawks played where Bird and Wilkens went head to head in the 4th quarter of game 7. Remember Jordan scoring 63 against the Celtics but still lost the game and the series. Back then besides the Pavers I was a huge Lakers fan because of Magic and I stayed up and watched all of their playoff games. To me with all sports one thing I find is that for me there might be to much on TV and it makes it feel less special. When I was growing up and you only had 4 channels there were not that much sports on during the week. It made those Sunday afternoon NBA games on CBS feel like they were special and it was a treat to get to watch them. Back then you only got to watch the local teams most of the time and got very little national games especially during the regular season.