When did "modern basketball" start?

[LAZERUSS]

Btw, we do know that Wilt's imminent retirement was the reason the NBA didn't start officially recording blocked shots earlier. At least commissioner Walter Kennedy himself had admitted so, that the NBA waited till Wilt retired, out of respect, so that they wouldn't start recording his blocked shots in his "fading" seasons.

I have read posters who claimed that, but I honestly never knew about that fact. Interesting, too, because, as your research (and ThaRegul8r's) has shown, Chamberlain averaged 5.4 bpg in his very least season. And I believe you had numbers from the majority of his games in his 71-72 season, which were at around 6-7 per game (and of course, he averaged over 7 bpg in the playoffs.)

[Psileas]

I have read posters who claimed that, but I honestly never knew about that fact. Interesting, too, because, as your research (and ThaRegul8r's) has shown, Chamberlain averaged 5.4 bpg in his very least season. And I believe you had numbers from the majority of his games in his 71-72 season, which were at around 6-7 per game (and of course, he averaged over 7 bpg in the playoffs.)

Well, I had compiled his '72 totals for 27 regular season games, the majority of which (around 22) came in his first 50 games. In these 27 games, he had blocked 222 shots. Also, he had blocked 84 shots in 12 playoff games. So, yes, between 6 and 7 seems like a good guesstimation of both his 1972 r.s and p.o.

[jlip]

Btw, we do know that Wilt's imminent retirement was supposedly the reason the NBA didn't start officially recording blocked shots earlier. At least commissioner Walter Kennedy himself had admitted so, that the NBA waited till Wilt retired, out of respect, so that they wouldn't start recording his blocked shots in his "fading" seasons.

Interesting. I didn't know that. Do you have a link to this?

[Psileas]

Wrong post.

[jlip]

Wrong post.

I meant do you have a link to an article or interview with Walter Kennedy saying that.

[Psileas]

Interesting. I didn't know that. Do you have a link to this?

Look at the bottom of the page:
http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...=260635&page=2

(It was a wrong post on my part)

[LAZERUSS]

Look at the bottom of the page:
http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...=260635&page=2

http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...4&postcount=30

[fpliii]

You forgot one of the most popular: 1974, after Wilt retired.
Fwiw, I don't use this term. The only periods I fully recognise, in the change of which, the game changed totally, are pre- and after shot clock.

True.

[jlip]

Look at the bottom of the page:
http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/sho...=260635&page=2

(It was a wrong post on my part)

[ILLsmak]

Was it when the leagues merged? Or when Magic and Bird came into the league or when David stern and MJ Barkley came. I ask this cause I know some fans discredit a certain era saying it doesn't count

3 point line.

-Smak

[BoutPractice]

Post shot clock but it only became fully modern once the league was properly integrated, so somewhere in the 60s.

[Collie]

IMO it happened during the 70's, when guys like Dr.J, Earl Monroe, Bob McAdoo and other stars started defining the style of today's NBA. For all the flak that decade gets, it was really the time when basketball was modernized.

[215Philly]

2010

[LAZERUSS]

The game of basketball was invented in the 1890's. And by the late 1890's college's were already playing it. By the 1920's there were professional teams. The NBA, itself, began in 1946.

And the reality is, the game has changed very little since it's inception. It is still played with roughly the same size ball; with the same size basket, and at the same height; on courts with the same size dimensions; and with the same number of players.

True, there have been rule changes throughout the years, but the two main rule changes were the shot clock in the mid-50's, and the 3pt shot in the late 70's (although the ABA was playing it in the late 60's.)

Basketball was already integrated in the early 50's, but by the late 50's, the best basketball players were playing in the NBA, whether white, black, or any other color. I have read those that claimed that there was a "quota" but IMHO, it it existed at all, it certainly would not have involved high-level players.

And for those that claim that the players of the 50's couldn't dribble...how about this footage taken from 1962?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soLH6bau9uo

Here again, the Globetrotters had been performing those feats long before that footage was taken.

Shooting? The jump shot originated sometime in the early 40's. Granted, the NBA in the 50's and early 60's, shot poorly from the field. But, there were many reasons for that. The venues were often cold, and in some cases, even breezy. There is documentation of a Chicago Bulls game being played in FREEZING conditions in the late 60's. The ball, itself, did not become uniform until the late 60's. I personally remember playing in city leagues in the 60's in which none of the balls on a rack were identical. Some were heavier, some lighter, and some were even lopsided. There are photos of NBA players playing with bald basketballs. And perhaps the most significant reason for the relatively poor shooting, was the brutal scheduling. As an example, in Wilt's 61-62 season, he played a ton of B2B games; six separate stretches of three-in-a-row; another three separate stretches of four-in-a-row; and even one other separate stretch of five-in-a-row, and in which two of the games in the middle of that run were on the road.

The scheduling is really significant, too. A couple of years ago the NBA went on strike, and when the season started, they played a condensed schedule to squeeze in as many games as they could. The impact was immediate. Scoring and shooting dropped significantly, and only when the schedule returned to a more reasonable rate, did the numbers slowly rise.

In any case, there was no question that SOMETHING affected the shooting in the NBA in the early 60's (and before.) I have never had anyone come up with a reasonable explanation as to why, player after player, of those that played in the early 60's and into the late 60's, or beyond, shot better, to MUCH better, in the latter parts of those seasons. Take a look at the footage of the '62 NBA ASG. In it you will see Jerry West shooting his patented jump shot. the shot would be identical in his entire NBA career, and yet, in the early 60's he was shooting .419 and .445. By the late 60's he was shooting .514.

There were a ton of other examples, as well. Elgin Baylor would shoot as low as .401 in the early 60's, and as high as .486 in the late 60's. Johnny Green is a great example. In the early 60's he had seasons of .430 and .436. In that .436 season he averaged 15.9 ppg. In his 69-70 season he averaged 15.6 ppg on a league-leading .559 FG%. He would also have seasons after that of .587 and even .599. How about Darrall Imhoff? In the early 60's he had three straight seasons of .394, .386, and an unfathomable .314. By his 69-70 season he was shooting .540. And John Havlicek was perhaps the best example. He played 16 seasons in the NBA, evenly split between the decade of the 60's and the 70's. Guess what, he shot better every season in the 70's, than his best season in the 60's. In fact, in the mid-60's he even had a season as low as .399. Then, there was Wilt. Believe it, or not, in his rookie season he shot .461. It would be the only time in his career in which he would shoot less than .506. But as the decade went on, his FG%'s rose, and by the mid-60's he had dramatic increases. In 66-67 he averaged 24 ppg on a .683 FG%, and in a league that had an eFG% of .441.

And you can carry that argument for those players whose careers spanned the 60's into the 70's. Again, almost player-for-player, an increase. However, the next major jump, and again with no real explanation, occurred two years after the ABA merged, when the league eFG% rose from .469 to .485 in 78-79. Here again, FG%'s just went thru the roof.

Kareem played ten seasons in then decade of the 70's, and ten more in the decade of the 80's. In the 70's he had seasons of .539, .529, .518, and even .513 (and right in the middle of the decade of the 70's BTW.) And yet, and not including his last two years in the NBA (at ages 41 and 42), he shot .564, or higher, every single season in the 80's, including a career high of .604, and even .599 at age 37. Dantley's FG%s sky-rocketed. And how about Artis Gilmore? In the 70's, a 27 year old Gilmore averaged 18.6 ppg on a .522 FG%. At age 35 he averaged 19.1 ppg on a .623 FG%. In between, and from '81 thru '84, he put up seasons of .626, .631, .652, and even .670.

Then, in the late 80's, and into the 90's, FG%'s leveled off, and even declined. Granted, the 3pt shot affected the overall FG%'s, but how do explain the great centers of that period, whose careers spanned the 80's and into 90's, DECLINING? Hakeem had his FG% season of his entire career in his rookie season. Ewing had his three highest seasons in the 80's, with a career high .567 in '89, and then as low as .466 a few years later at age 33. David Robinson didn't come into the NBA until 89-90, but he had his career high of .551 in his third season, and after that, a steady decline.

And then, to make this shooting even more perplexing...in the 58-59 season, the NBA shot .756 from the FT line. Last year the NBA shot .753 from the line, and in fact, the current NBA is also shooting .753 from the line. Hell, in the 73-74 season the NBA was shooting as high as .771.

Take a look at the footage of Pistol Pete, who was scoring 44 ppg in college in the 60's...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfWkiO2Iz08

And how about this interesting fact...from a 6-4 white player who was playing in the 1940's...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Pollard

In the NBA, Pollard was considered one of the best forwards in the 1940s and 1950s, and was known for his leaping ability[1] (Pollard would occasionally dunk from the free throw line during warmups[2]) earning him the nickname "The Kangaroo Kid".

And players like Gus Johnson were shattering rims in the mid-60's with ferocious dunks. Dr. J, Dr. K, David Thompson, and many others were doing spectacular dunks in the late 60's and into the 70's. And how about this. from a 5-9 Calvin Murphy, who was playing college ball in the 60's?

http://www.syracuse.com/poliquin/ind...did_one_g.html

"He could run. He could dunk two-handed behind his head. He could shoot. And the fans would go absolutely wild. I mean, they were crazy for him."

In any case, the bottom line, is that the game has changed VERY LITTLE since the 1890's.

[ArbitraryWater]

Officially its 1976, merger.