You Don’t Understand… 

What is something in NBA History that people wouldn't fully understand unless they saw it???

Late 90s basketball was basically slow everything down and beat the other team with execution. Fewer possessions means that every possession matters more and mistakes are more costly. It punished younger teams and rewarded veteran experience.

Seeing a mad Hakeem demolish fools in the playoffs during his MVP loss to Robinson was a thing of beauty.

Casuals need to watch old players instead of dismissing opinions that favor them over their current players then calling people Oldheads without even watching them!!

‘98 Eastern Conference Finals game 7 was a game for the ages between the Bulls and Pacers. People don’t realize how close that series was, and how many big shots Reggie Miller made throughout that series. Flash forward to the ‘98 Finals between the Bulls and Jazz, and the iconic “shot” to close out the series and MJ’s second retirement. Seriously, don’t sleep on that ECF Game 7.

The brilliant post moves of Mchale and Olajuwon. Something you need to see a whole game of to fully appreciate

The Showtime Lakers were NEXT LEVEL and truly changed how the game was played. I also think they were a major reason the NBA became popular on TV. Yes, being in LA mattered as the hub of entertainment…but a huge part was that their games were rarely, if ever, boring. The athleticism, showmanship, and teamwork… Great call on that one.

9:50 the amount of absolutely crazy passes Magic made is just insane. Man o man can he deliver the ball.

Allen Iverson's greatness is something else that is lost on the younger generation. They see a guy who threw up a bunch of garbage on bad teams. However, those teams were usually more defensive oriented and he was the only real scorer on many of those teams in Philly. He wasn't inefficient he was just ball dominant.

I can understand watching low scoring games boring on video, but watching it live was a different experience. You were engaged and locked in watching and every point mattered. The intensity was just a different experience. I'd rather watch that than jacking up 3s, uncontested layups and the first to 140 wins arcade game, and the most memorable recent playoff games have been slower, grind it out games. Just my preference.

The one thing you left out is that the calls were a lot tighter in the 60's than they were in the 90's. Shaq just bowling over the defender was an offensive foul all day. And his sloppy footwork would have been called traveling as well.

A detailed breakdown of Hakeem in his prime would be great. For whatever reason this man seems to be kinda forgotten but he dominated on both ends of the court during the golden age of centers and it's hard to appreciate the skill unless you saw it at the time. No one was doing what Hakeem did in 1v1 situations, paired with his shot blocking and overall athleticism. Guy was a beast all around. I really enjoy your content!

We needed the averages of peak Shaq to understand how well Rodman and Wallace guarded him

MJ's dominance on both ends of the court, especially in his earlier years where he played at a much faster pace on both ends. Like, he would suffocate opposing guards and would break down his main defender on the other end and dunk on 2-3 defenders at the rim. The amount of posters he had against multiple defenders is insane!

You had to witness Hakeem...so many players in this league and still Hakeem is unique to this very day

The "slower" play of the 90's, the center lumbering around pitching tents under the hoop, defensive focus etc.. made a great offensive player look kinda magical to a kid

I love shaq and don’t downplay his dominance but that statistic you showed also doesn’t take into account how his career dipped off towards the end and most his number vs those two plays came in around his prime while he may have been averaging 26 agaisnt them he was basically averaging 30 against everyone else

I love the slow it down grind it out style of play in the '90s! It becomes a battle of psychological warfare and if you're a real basketball fan I think that's something you could appreciate...

Man thank you especially for the first segment about Shaq. I always get VERY annoyed when anyone says someone from todays game could give him problems or stop him. Ben Wallace was imo the greatest post defender of all time and not even he was ‘stopping’ Shaq. It’s just hilarious how recency bias takes hold of everyone’s opinions.

I don't find the 98 Finals boring to watch. I honestly really enjoyed the tug-of-war style of basketball - it made you really appreciate it a lot more when a player scored (relative to the hyperinflated scoring we see today) precisely because it was much more scarce/rare.

As someone who’s old and is older than Shaquille O’Neal and lived at the end of the aging Wilt Chamberlain, a player, who, by himself, defeated the showtime Lakers, starting five during a pick up game as witnessed by Larry Brown, prevented that entire squad from scoring… Wilt Chamberlain would’ve taken Shaquille O’Neal’s primary weapon away from him: his strength. There are too many people who swear by how strong will was in his playing days to t dismiss his ability to physically move Shaq. One thing about human nature with someone who’s as large as secure was, and who has never been challenged physically is that meeting someone who could not only not be budged, but likely could overpower him would have been a sight to see. This was during the day and prime Shaquille O’Neal wear. He was as bad a free-throw shooter as well. It was And equally can’t shoot.

Awesome video as always. I always considered the showtime lakers the fastest team I have ever seen. A lot of people told me that today's game is faster but I said it may be faster but none is faster than that team. Thank you for making that point clear to younger generations

That fear when MJ was heating up.. other players can heat up and completely take over games, but it's like here and there. Jordan would make sure of the W through sheer magical force of will so often it was just otherworldly. I saw Lebron in 2007 beat the Pistons and I was like "Wow" maybe he really can carry the torch..but he just wasn't able to (of course) put on nearly as many great playoff performances as Jordan.

How absolutely freaking dominant the 2004 Pistons were as a defensive team.

First comment is from Serbia to honor Nikola Jokic i dont know what this video is about but i am going to watch it anyway because i love Johnny and NBA! One love one game peace

The greatness of power forwards in the late 90s to 2000s. Almost every team had a allstar level power forward. Duncan Dirk and KG get most of the acclaim but there were so many more.Rasheed Wallace, Webber JO the Davis boys from Indiana Shawn KempVim Baker and the list goes on. You had to bring your A fame nightly if you were a 4

RE: Shaq’s dominance vs Wilt and Kareem’s finesse, it’s fair to note the rules didn’t allow Wilt and Kareem to play physical. The way Shaq played would have been nonstop offensive fouls for Wilt and Kareem, so they had to play with finesse instead of bully ball

And, with "news flash - Wilt Chamberlain once existed" I breathed a contented sigh of agreement.Thank you.

Rodman & Ben didn't put the clamps on him. They held their own & contained him. They allowed their team to focus & not have to double as often as the rest of the league because they were able to play him 1on1 for the most part, & that is why their teams were able to win. Sha1 against 1on1 in the NBA would average 40 & 20. He averaged 30 & 15 against double teams. So playing him 1on1 & holding him under 27 points is kind of "clamped"..

I dont think people remember exactly how dramatic the Duns turn around was with Nash and the impact he had on that team and the league that 1st season

You had to watch the way Kobe was scoring in 2003-2006 the defensive looks, shot selection, moves, everything he did was on the highest level of difficulty and he was still able to score at will. Truly some of the most relentless offensive showings i’ve ever seen.

And our hero came back when we needed him most. Its a huge undertaking, but have you ever thought about making a video about how the relationship between the NBA and NCAA has changed? Not really just the draft rules and obvious player empowerment but via atmosphere. Nobody really seems to care about Kareems collegiate career anymore, and I feel like its one of the biggest reasons he's so understated as a legend. Appreciate the quality content!

People don't seem to understand that Wilt had a 400lbs bench press and was a National High Jump Champion. This means that his athleticism would indeed translate to today's game.

Rodman and wallace not only show you that being a 7 foot big and number of 7 footers in your era means nothing when it comes to nba greats, but shows you that the 90s n 00s had the shortest but best big man defender and rebounder of any other era. Also as great as shaq was in his particular era, always know it’s a power based game and tho fun to watch, once you switch the rules to strictly skill first and treat backdown punishment as an offensive foul with the original rules, Shaqs dominance nosedives. Still an all time great but the casuals and those with untrained eyes will truly see how many more bigs were clearly overall greater than him

Yeah, your comment on shaq being the most dominate is interesting, since as you point out, Wilt existed, but so did Mikan. I guess I would say Shaq was the most physically dominating center ever. Because guys like Kareem, Wilt, Mikan could score whenever they wanted and were just as unstoppable, they just scored in different ways.

Thank you Jonny, appreciate you making this a series now!

I don’t think that people understand how athletic players where in the 60’s and 70’s. There’s a video of Bill Russell literally jumping over the head of an upright, ~6’7 defender, to make a dunk. Then you have Wilt, who could jump just as high or higher than him, based on the rebounding numbers when they played each other, except he had an array of shots and dunks on the offensive end of the court, and was so much stronger that Russell has said that he was by far the most imposing physical force to ever play in the league, including Shaq.

Thank you Magic Johnson for making basketball fast and more pace. I love run n gun basketball. Magic is one who changed the game for sure. You always talk about Curry and Iverson but Magic is one thay people doesn't mention in changing the game conversations.

Rod man didn’t regularly guard Shaq for the Bulls. The Bulls had 18 fouls to give against Shaq with three big centres. The legend of Rodman came from a few games where Rodman very successful guarded Shaq in important situations.

Thank goodness for this channel for giving viewers proper due on the history and context. Never stop uploading, Jonny.

In the dead part of the off season Jonny is making the most interest NBA content. I appreciate you

Great vid, as usual... younger fans don't realize that there was even a nickname for how teams tried to stop Shaq: Hack-a-Shaq... the only way teams could hope to contain him was to foul him and send him to the FT line.... Sounds pretty dominant to me...

Oscar Schmidt! The master of the corner three. There's a name I haven't heard in a long time. As one of the resident "old heads," I remember him in his prime. He was really good. Check out his Wikipedia page. He is probably the greatest scorer in Olympic and FIBA tournament history. I remember watching the 1987 Pan American Games final in which he led Brazil to a win over a US team that featured a bunch of future NBA players. (It foreshadowed the 1988 Olympic collapse which led to the creation of the "Dream Team.")

That '98 Jazz team were fresh off a 4-0 conference finals sweep against a 61-win Lakers team that had 4 all-stars in Shaq, Kobe, Eddie Jones, and Nick Van Exel.

Great video, Jonny! Given that the NBA is 77 years old, there is so much we can all learn. I mainly followed it during the 90s and the 2000s as I grew up during that time. I haven't had as much time in the last 10 years, but still try to keep up. I admit I have a lot to learn myself, and I like how your channel and others (like Thinking Basketball) have a lot great info about NBA history. I like the examples you shared too. I remember how dominant Shaq was. As a Kings fan, I recall how Vlade used to flop too lol. And, I remember how no one could stop Shaq. I remember how Mutombo was no match for him in the 01 finals. Great points also about the pacing of games. For a while I was used to seeing scores in the 80s, 90s, and low 100s (and occasional scores lower than that) and you are right that we need to factor in era differences, like with pacing. Thanks for the suggestions on games to watch to learn more. I would love to learn more about the Showtime Lakers. I will look up the games you mentioned. Have a great week!

Showtime Lakers is so crazy fast made me want to run 🔥

Western Conference teams in the early 2000s, such as Shaq and Kobe's Lakers and Duncan's Spurs, were very strong.

Great video! The kids need to watch this video. Then go watch all the games. A goat does not call himself a goat.

Jonny, brilliant video, every comment was on point. Regarding Sabonis, I was fortunate to watch him play for Real Madrid, already past his prime, and oh my lord!

Just imagining have to guard shaq scares me 😂

Good video. Shaq was a dominant force during his prime. I do agree there are aspects that one won't fully understand unless they watched it then. I also agree on the era thing. One has to consider the era to have the proper context. Yes the 90's was a slow era I like that style though as it did require better execution compared to today's game.

The transition of the Power Forward from the 90's into 2000. The talent was insane and never talked about enough.

awesome video bro ,,,ill always love my 90z nba, rose tinted glasses i guess but you hit the nail on the head with this one 💯🇳🇿👋🏽

I think you need to witness Larry Bird play. I mean sure highlights are great. But watch full games. Dude has zero flaws on offense. Dude is by far the greatest forward to ever play the game. The fact that people are dropping him out of their top 10 shows that they simply do not understand basketball and how it is supposed to be played. Bird is top 5 all time at worst. And I have him number 3 behind MJ and Kobe.

"because the game is played with a completely different style" it's much more than just style, its ruleset. Extra step (gather step), carries (hesitation moves), and no hand checking. It is impossible to compare modern nba to pre-2004 NBA.

I watched Oscar Schmidt torch defenders with his 3p game over and over again. About all other players I'm just starting to learn 😅

Prime sabonis was insane. The guy was deadly in the post, deadly from outside, and could take you off the dribble. He was one of the best passers I've seen. At 7'3", his team let him start a pg often, he was that good handling the ball. On defense, the opposing center didn't get many points. Go look at what he did to David Robinson in the 88 game against the USA. He destroyed him. Of course a year later the knee and foot injuries started so he was a shell of himself by the 92 Olympics. On the blazers he was just a shell of the 92 sabonis. Heard many NBA players who played against him talk about how he would have been in the conco of Wilt and Kareem had Russia let him come over when he was originally drafted. The guy was as good as advertised.

There was no one that Shaq could not play bully ball with and dunk over them, it was just a question of how much the refs let him get away with.

Great video. Keep them coming ❤

Correct j.a keep up the great work when it comes to the game u totally understand it

Great video, loved the Showtime Lakers stuff.

Hii jonny, keep up the good work man❤

The only other Point Guard I could see running that 80's Lakers offense was John Stockton. He was in impeccable shape, and always made the perfect pass.

I'm a pacers fan - watched almost every game back in the 90s to early 2000s. Those clips watching Shaq in the 2000 NBA finals still hurt. his dominance was no joke.

Thank you so much for speaking with logic instead of emotions.

I don't think I've ever heard someone bring up the Jazz's 54 points as a knock against Jordan's legacy. Maybe ever.

Great video! Would you ever do a video on the offenses of Bill Russell’s Celtics? We hear that they are all time great defensive teams, but I’ve hardly heard anything about their offenses and they’ve got over a decade of dominance, so there could be some interesting variation/growth offensively in that period.

More nuance on Shaq: His Orlando version was even better overall (defense and many aspects other than bullying his way to the rim), but because most his historically dominant big men peers either retired or were far past their prime (Dream, Admiral, Ewing, Zo, Mutombo), he had a field day in his years as a Laker with few remaining centers to defend him adequately.

I hate to say, I don't think it's fair to show Shaq's career stats vs his prime stats when comparing against Rodman & Big Ben because Shaq didn't do anything his last few years

Oww jonny being a teacher this video nice

Top notch piece. I appreciate the referrals!

what separates the casuals and the baller/fans is that casuals look for highlights, many dribbles for two points, flashy passes. what real fans look are smart plays, appreciate how a player scores with less movement ( the lesser the player does while scoring used to drop my jaw, guys like kobe,joe johnson, jordan, duncan, dirk, stockton and etc) needs a trained eye to see the actual wonders of the game

What I want to witness in 4k is how dominant wilt really is and is Bill really that great to win 11 chips

The 2nd half of the 90s were definitely different. You could routinely see teams run the shot clock down to less than 5 every possession. Multiple times putting up a shot to beat the buzzer. Not unlike an NFL team letting the play clock run down every play to run the clock out.

Yet another video you smashed bro 💪🏽

Jonny, the 90's as well as the 80's game was much slower than today's game because of their was (better post) play, along with better and more physical defense being played. In other words, more competitive basketball.

We’re currently witnessing the most overrated player in the history of the game continue to be praised, all while constantly falling short when it matters. Chris Paul being dubbed the “Point God,” despite not even being a Top 15 Point Guard of All-Time, is happening right before our eyes.

Shaq was such an imposing force. No one could stop him in the paint. His brute force down low was impressive. If you got him in a one on one matchup, there was absolutely no way you were stopping him.

When I was young we were taught to use as much of the shot clock as possible to get a good shot. I remember one year the Mavs scored 75 in one half. I was in highschool and that's all we talked about the next morning (pre social media).

I LOVE one of the highlights you picked for the Showtime Lakers because it showed that ever so often Kareem would surprise his defender and run the floor even as an older player just to make his guy have to work harder... plus he knew that if he did run on the break Magic would always look to pass him the ball first. On a completely different note... when did Dennis Rodman and Draymond Green become similar players? I mean I like Draymond as a player, but Rodman was an athletic freak of nature on a level that Draymond has never even been close to.

Curry's gravity (especially from KD era). So, so many casual fans really don't understand how much of an impact other teams' fear of him had on the game every single night.

Watching Draymond play is something people will take for granted in the future.

9:37 that fast break is art the pass from Magic to Silk Wilkes 🔥 Showtime Lakers will test you how much in shape you are and will run you to the ground and make you give up by 4th quarter game over !!!!!

NICE VIDEO man!! (uploaded 15 seconds ago) that is because i knew how objective Jonny is

If the rules allowed Wilt was to run ppl over like Shaq and he wasn't a gentlemen he would've avg 75pts per game instead of 50 and his career high wouldve been 125. Also Bill's 230 pounds would've given up an extra ring or two with how close those series were. People nowadays avg about the same amount of shots as a team and still no one has come close to 50 a night. Love Wilt.

If you saw Shaq play then you know he got away with offensive fouls pretty much every time he touched the ball. Was he a great athlete? yes. Was he a great basketball player? we'll never know, he only played indoor rugby. But my bet is that he would've been (at best) as good as Dwight Howard had he been officiated fairly, which is probably why he hates Dwight so much.

The 98 finals was more akin to a chess match than basketball, saying that to live through it was SO FREAKING COMPELLING. That Jazz team was good, but yeah, Michael faced better with the teams you mentioned, and had the Pacers beat the Bulls in the ECF, Indiana may have taken down Utah in the finals.

I actually enjoyed watching Denver this year. I’m an 80’s & 90’s guy but they played a style that I could appreciate. I do miss the low post focused era though.

I've been recently rewatching NBA games from the 90s and 2000s. I have to say your Shaq take is on the nose. Especially the one with how he gets other teams into foul trouble early forcing teams into heavier rotations and having to go to the bench earlier which leads to even more mismatches for Shaq's teammates to take advantage. I also think people don't understand the second 3-peat bulls. I think the classic image is of rockstars with arguably the greatest scorer of NBA history so people picture them putting up 120 every night but the truth is that second Bull's team was built on playing hardnosed defense not that different to both Bad Boy Pistons teams. Just look at their line up. Rodman was a defensive and rebounding specialist, who also was a Bad Boy Piston at one point lol. Pippen was the main facilitator and was asked to be a lockdown defender on the opposing teams best player. Harper was brought in to be a perimeter defensive specialist who could be a third scoring option when needed. That is three starting players whose primary duty was to lockdown opposing players while not being scoring machines. Most of the Bull's main secondary scoring options came off the bench with Kerr or Kukoc. They were designed to methodically grind down the opposing team and let MJ carry them offensively.

ngl u cant expect unbias opinions regarding the nba, be it nostalgia or something. Simillar to that, if u ask foreigners about a famous basketball-player from their country. Seriously, we germans talk about dirk like he was the second coming of Jesus

I’m so happy that I’m not the only one who’s irked when they hear the most dominant title go to Shaq so easily as if Wilt wasn’t a thing

Great list... I would include how great AI was. And just how crazy Vin-sanity, prime Vince Carter, was. That series when he and Iverson traded 40pt games back and forth was epic.

Shaq wasn’t just big but also had great footwork and a soft touch.

You had to be there to witness the 2017 Warriors. Literally unstoppable 😂

Good teaching video to people, this is why many times some like me say you can't compare eras 1:1 as they are played differently. At the same time you can't say a superstar from 90s couldn't play in the modern era's pace either, because ofc they can. They only played their own pace as that was what their coach wanted and how most teams played back then. Mid range 2 pointer is dead as our current basketball is run by analytics that say only good shots are close to the basket or trying for 3 point shot. Every shot between 3p and 3 second line is a bad shot in analytic perspective, but this really doesn't count fully how actual basketball is played and players are humans not robots that make everything the same, you find your open shot and you take it.

Great video! i'm now a life long fan!

Hello

I still insist that they way referees called the game in Shaq's era benefitted him greatly. He had the worst footwork of any of the great post players, and didn't really have a signature move other than his dunk. He shuffled his feet on almost every catch, which would have been called a travel in most other generations, and he usually went through the defender instead of by or around, which would have been a charge in other eras. The Wilt Chamberlain Archive has a really good video about how changes in the way referees called the game affected the way each could play. Things Shaq did routinely were clearly charging fouls in earlier generations (and should have been then - defending established defensive position should be one of referees primary responsibilities).For example, look at Darryl Dawkins - 6'11"/260 in the '70s and 80s, and probably more skilled than Shaq. He could't do in the late 70s and early 80s what Shaq did years later because the referees just wouldn't let him. Strength was less of an advantage at that time. Shaq is the player that it is most difficult to translate to another time to other standards of refereeing. If he couldn't just bull through defenders, what is his go-to offensive move? He would still have been a rebounding monster, and in spite of his lack of defensive discipline, he still would have been a great rim protector, but his offensive game suffers greatly in any other era. As for why smaller strong defenders gave him trouble, this is a phenomenon that any post player understands. Rodman and Wallace (and Barkley at times) could get under Shaq's center of gravity and put their pressure on Shaq's hips and thighs instead of his back. That takes away some of his leg force. They also could get lower so that when Shaq turned, his shoulder passed over their shoulders, so he couldn't get the shoulder to chest push that he got on bigger defenders. Even though they couldn't challenge Shaq's shot at the top, they could keep him farther away from the basket than taller defenders sometimes could (the Mutombo clip in the WCA video or Rik Smits, for example). Since he really didn't have any great go-to shot, that left Shaq flipping lower-percentage hooks at the basket.

Good vid pal thanks. What you are saying applies for all sports

The big thing about Shaq was that the referees didn't call offensive fouls on him. As you said, he threw elbows and shoulders without penalty. The NBA made him a superstar, genetics made him a star. He had no shot.