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NBA Season 2020 - RIP Mamba


Relic

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2 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:


Kerr probably came off better than anyone. And it's a good life lesson to see how Jordan respected him when he was willing to stand up for himself and fight.

 

He always came across really well on open court as well. It was clear he had a really good feel for the game.

And it was telling how much respect such a limited player used to get from the superstars on the panel. 

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Sad to see the news of Jerry Sloan's death, as he seemed like a good guy.

Who have you got for the Dream Team roster if the NBA had sent its best for the Olympics in 1984?  My own lineup would include the following.

Guards: Magic Johnson, Andrew Toney, Mo Cheeks, George Gervin

Forwards: Julius Erving, Adrian Dantley, Terry Cummings, Larry Bird, Alex English, Kevin McHale

Centers: Moses Malone, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Robert Parish (final cut to get to 12)

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4 hours ago, Wilbur said:

Sad to see the news of Jerry Sloan's death, as he seemed like a good guy.

Who have you got for the Dream Team roster if the NBA had sent its best for the Olympics in 1984?  My own lineup would include the following.

Guards: Magic Johnson, Andrew Toney, Mo Cheeks, George Gervin

Forwards: Julius Erving, Adrian Dantley, Terry Cummings, Larry Bird, Alex English, Kevin McHale

Centers: Moses Malone, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Robert Parish (final cut to get to 12)

You still banging on about mo cheeks? 

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14 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

You still banging on about mo cheeks? 

Well, I guess since he led his team to the NBA Finals for three of the past four years, and I have him as the back-up point guard on the proposed 1984 Olympic Dream Team, then yes.

If you want to consider Gerald Henderson or Sidney Moncrief as a better back-up to Magic Johnson, I guess that would be a discussion point, given that they also had a good runs in the tournaments leading up to this year.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Looks like they are going to attempt to resume the season with 22 teams, with 13 Western teams and 9 Eastern teams competing for 8 playoff spots each. There will also be a play in tournament between the 8th and 9th seeds for the last playoff spot. Seems like a decent compromise all things considered. The race for the last Western playoff spot could be pretty exciting by itself.

https://www.espn.com.sg/nba/story/_/id/29260860/sources-nba-approve-plan-22-team-return-eight-regular-season-games

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  • 2 weeks later...

I find myself very conflicted about the Kyrie thing. On one hand he's totally right, the lack of sports and entertainment distractions right now is one of the major reasons we have so many people taking to the streets for so long. Keeping up the pressure is essential and vital to forcing about the sort of social change we want to see. 

However....

I REALLY miss basketball.

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7 hours ago, Relic said:

I REALLY miss basketball.

As the resident Knicks fan, perhaps you are the best one to ask a question that I have long pondered.

Why does NYC produce so little talent these days?  As a college sports fan, I rarely hear of a recruit in football or basketball from the city.

 I sort of understand football, but why is there not a parade of five star basketball players from NYC?  Just in sheer population numbers alone, I feel like it should have a large representation.

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5 hours ago, Rhom said:

As the resident Knicks fan, perhaps you are the best one to ask a question that I have long pondered.

Why does NYC produce so little talent these days?  As a college sports fan, I rarely hear of a recruit in football or basketball from the city.

 I sort of understand football, but why is there not a parade of five star basketball players from NYC?  Just in sheer population numbers alone, I feel like it should have a large representation.

We call foul on everything. 

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@Rhom, I'd guess gentrification plays a huge role. And when I visited the city last summer, I didn't see any public courts despite walking all over three of the five boroughs (was only in Queens for a minute due to a train mix up and never went to SI, but everyone said that's the one of five you can just skip). 

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1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

@Rhom, I'd guess gentrification plays a huge role. And when I visited the city last summer, I didn't see any public courts despite walking all over three of the five boroughs (was only in Queens for a minute due to a train mix up and never went to SI, but everyone said that's the one of five you can just skip). 

nah, that's not it. the courts are till there, and there might even be more of them than back in the day in places like Brooklyn's water front. 

 

And queens has some great neighborhoods, like Jackson Heights, Flushing (around Main Street), Sunnyside, and so forth. 

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10 minutes ago, Relic said:

nah, that's not it. the courts are till there, and there might even be more of them than back in the day in places like Brooklyn's water front. 

 

And queens has some great neighborhoods, like Jackson Heights, Flushing (around Main Street), Sunnyside, and so forth. 

Is it private school poaching? I could be wrong, but it sounds like a lot of dudes come out of NJ now instead of NYC. 

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I had wondered about the private schools too.  Looking over the Rivals 150 rankings for 2020 there are only two kids listed from what I would think of as NYC.  There are a ton of kids from Virginia... but they mainly go to basketball factories.  Do several kids move out of NY to play ball?

It just seems odd to me that so little talent comes from the city.  I would think it would be a natural breeding ground.

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You have to consider the role of the AAU teams and coaches in the development of a lot of young players.  Given the incredible levels of self-interest or downright corruption among coaches and team owners in the AAU, and the fact that AAU coaches see a lot of talented players at very young ages, you absolutely do have an exodus from urban schools to suburban / private academies.

AAU coaches have now learned how to set up charter schools, and by placing them in NJ, the NY youth don't have too far to go.  (Not that they have to be in NJ, but the number of NJ "high school" teams seems to have grown.)  The athletes can "finish high school" at these charter schools, and the coaches have a lot more control over their careers, which helps the coaches/owners milk the players' future income streams.

Ten or fifteen years ago, having a basketball academy at a showcase tournament was notable.  These tended to have healthy, big benches full of talented players, and they often went to the final game.  Today, a showcase will have 40% of the boys' teams coming from these basketball factory schools.  Even in the girls' game we are starting to see this model, where the top players leave their local high schools and attend a charter school that plays a 45-50 game season, with a lot of out-of-state travel consuming the winter months.

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On 6/14/2020 at 9:21 AM, Rhom said:

It just seems odd to me that so little talent comes from the city.  I would think it would be a natural breeding ground.

It does seem odd from a population size point of view. I'd like to see a comparison of NYC vs Chicago or Atlanta to see if there's something specific to NYC or if it's an urban vs suburban thing. 

Growing up in Brooklyn, I don't recall a lot of structured basketball programs really. There might be some that you'd have to pay to get into but that would have screened out a lot of people in my neighborhood. I don't really see public basketball courts being a major gateway to D1 programs. Street ball doesn't really teach you fundamentals in shooting, passing, and various offense/defensive schemes. You need those fundamentals to succeed past high school. Anecdotally, there was only one set of courts near my house and the rims had been stolen for a few years before the Parks department put new ones back on. I'm guessing suburban communities have more reliable, year-round infrastructure and more routine, structured programming to teach proper basketball relative to inner-city districts. Just a guess though.

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On 6/14/2020 at 12:21 PM, Rhom said:

There are a ton of kids from Virginia... but they mainly go to basketball factories.  Do several kids move out of NY to play ball?

Oak Hill Academy, in Virginia, is indeed one of the main basketball factories and has been for as long as I can remember.  The players generated there come from all over the country - just look at the list.

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