/thread

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Cap was in place then. It is definitely due to expansion but whenever people i.e. Bernstein and Goff state that the game is better now because of some perceived improvement in athleticism I laugh. Kendrick Perkins and Thabo Sefalosho started on a team that participated in an NBA finals. That would never happen. The product has been diluted by expansion. But the fact remains that it still has been diluted.

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There is an undeniable increase in athleticism in all sports.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Yes. As far as I recall, the good old boys at Augusta decided to dig up their course and start over rather face the prospect of some foul-mouthed black kid hitting 320 yard drives and 200 yard 9 irons to 5 feet all day, not doffing his cap, and literally staring down other, more gentlemanly golfers. Didn't work anyways. He was the golf Dick Fosbury. Kind of.

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Soccer 1,2,3
Spanish Honor Society 1,2,3,4
Forensics 1,2,3,4

"Smiles with Nostrils"

"...no Hmong, go find some blacks"

I don't know about that. Guys in the NBA were just as athletic 25-30 yrs ago. Are James Harden and Steph Curry superior athletes. What about Chris Paul. Deron Williams. I give you Westbrook and Rose. Isaiah Thomas was a superior athlete as well as player. Kevin Johnson was a superior athlete as well as player. There are some freak of nature guys playing today but I could give you freak of nature guys back then also.

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They changed the course due to Nicklaus too, but with all of the new equipment it had to be lengthened even further with today's standards, all courses are. And they didn't dig up their course and start over.

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2018
#ExtendLafleur
10 More Wins

We have a lot of metrics in all the sports that show that players are faster, bigger, and stronger than they were. The NBA is no exception.

Isaiah Thomas and Kevin Johnson would likely be bigger and stronger too. It's just how players are different now.

Just look at 80s Jordan vs. 90s Jordan and how much different he looked.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

If by "offensive skill" you mean standing twenty feet from the basket and rendering yourself seven inches shorter than your actual height for all practical purposes, then yeah.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Are we talking about drugs now?

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Great advancement in equipment.

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

Among other things.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Just like golf, the equipment has gotten much better.

_________________
Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

So they really aren't better than they were when Tiger was dominating the tour.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I think the average PGA player is better these days versus the 70's. These guys play/practice much more. Many European players have moved to the warm parts of this country, so they can play all year. Guys today have strict workout regimens and diets, and many employ full time coaches and sports therapists. Golf is big money nowadays, so they can focus 100% of their time on their craft. Back in the day, golf didn't pay very well. I suspect many PGA players had offseason jobs, as baseball and football players did.

My wife's grandfather was good enough to be a PGA golfer, but he gave it up, because it didn't pay enough to support a family.

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

I get the feeling you're not looking for the real answer. You just want to beat us with your concept that everything is always on the improve- music, golfers, basketball players.

Try to be objective once in awhile. Put your biases aside. A few months ago we were talking about hockey goalies. It's really hard for me not to romanticize the Hall of Famers that minded nets for five of the Original Six. I had a difficult time saying Hasek was better than a bunch of guys he really was probably better than. shakes beat me over the head and I beat back, but I think we came to the correct answer. I was wrong. Hasek is one of the best three goalies ever and maybe the best of all-time.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Wilt Chamberlain is probably the most athletic center of all time. If not surely in the top five. i dont know the metrics as I haven't studied that sort of thing to any great degree but the eye test doesn't suggest much. I keep hearing about how they are superior athletes yet you have a number of guys sitting out because they have to rest. I remember watching the Celtics and the Lakers play in the finals and the temperature in the building was 90 plus Kareem an aging Kareem at that played about 40 min. if memory serves correct. A 40 yr old Jordan still participated in 82 games during his last yr in the league.

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Did I misunderstand you, or don't you think that golfers today are better than when Tiger was in his prime?

That is why I brought it up.

My opinion on sports improving is that the players get better as time goes on because of advanced training, nutrition, "other things", and more hours spent preparing and practicing in their lives(less of an issue after the early 80s). However, I believe that those same players would be the best players WITH those same advantages.

Magic and Bird would have been more athletic if they were playing today too.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

No he isn't. He may not have been more athletic than Bill Russell. I'd also say Hakeem was more athletic.

I think Wilt also would have had a really hard time with Shaq.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Actually, I take it back on Shaq. It would be a good matchup though.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

But now we're talking about two different things. You can't put guys in a time machine. You have to look at them in their time and the relative quality of their opponents. Just because guys eat better and take more performance enhancers and get paid enough to practice far more doesn't mean they are "better". You have to look at each guy within his own context.

Sometimes there is more talent in a given field. Sometime there is less. The factors causing such are myriad. I like to use horse racing as an example, because everyone is trying to do exactly the same thing and horses have been bred specifically and meticulously for a task. Yet evolution is not apparent even though a generation for a horse is about 1/8 of a human generation. Sometimes you have a crop with Secretariat, Sham, Forego, Our Native, and My Gallant. Sometimes fucking Giacomo wins the Kentucky Derby. And that was 30 years later.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Uh oh. You might want to look at some of his athletic accomplishments before making such statements.

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I believe that is what I've said all along.

My point has been how everything moves towards improvement. That doesn't mean that the previous guys wouldn't have also been good too. I believe I used Einstein as an answer. He was a great scientist. Compared to his peers, he may have been the best. There are a lot of people doing more advanced science than him today though. Part of that is because of him but it isn't like science hasn't improved. If you had a debate with Einstein and the best scientist alive today wouldn't the current scientist be better?

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

No. That's like saying you're a better economist than Adam Smith because you know how to work an Excel spreadsheet.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

Not a great example. Excel is a tool.

If I knew more advanced economic models(and I don't) then I would be a better economist.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

You mean the fact that he did well at the Big East track and field championships?

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

The guy ran track and field as a 7 footer. He is also listed by ESPN as the 13 ranked athlete of the 20th Century. The only basketball player listed higher was Jordan. Akeem was a great athlete but he really was only 6'9. If you match him up against other six nine guys he doesn't look all that impressive. Russell was only 6'9 also. Wilt was 7 feet and 300 pounds doing things guys that guys his size couldn't.

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I'm with you. No 21st century athlete can wield a mace like Wilt could some 30 years ago.

_________________
Soccer 1,2,3
Spanish Honor Society 1,2,3,4
Forensics 1,2,3,4

"Smiles with Nostrils"

"...no Hmong, go find some blacks"

He did jumping events, and only excelled in the conference championships. His 100 yard dash was 1.5 seconds slower than the high school record holder.
There are pictures of Hakeem only being a little shorter than Shaq.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!