Is it parity or the talent is so great?

[Da Stars.]

Top seeds in both the NBA and NHL, east and west. One is gone. One team has a chance to eliminate the team they are playing. The other two, on the brink of elimination.

[_Vcsgrizzfan_]

Hockey has always been more unpredictable because of the goaltending factor. There are always upsets in hockey.

Basketball, they happen, but not nearly as often. 67 win Mavs lost to a shitty Golden State team led by Baron Davis because Baron turned into a sharpshooter for a series. He went back to being Baron the next series and they shit the bed. We might have just "kind of" witnessed something similar with Haliburton and Indiana.

Historically, basketball hasn't had many true contenders. I think a big part of that was that there was far less talent to spread around, so there were just a few really good teams. That just isn't the case now. There are tons of good teams and it has become way less predictable.

[Bush4Ever.]

It's simply how talent is distributed. It doesn't imply automatically anything about the average quality of play, although in a game like basketball with the cap and draft and random bounces of life...more high end talent will generally lead to more parity because the talent has to go somewhere (OKC isn't going to have 12 HOFers on one team, even with great drafting, Boston will probably have to split up their talent soon, etc...).

Right now it's much more spread amongst the 30 teams than in the 80s where top end talent was much more concentrated in the top four teams or so.

Another small factor is the three. While it is (with great shooting blah blah blah) more optimal than the old style per-possession, it almost certainly admits of more variance, which puts you in more danger of playing deeper beneath your baseline compared to the old ways. I also suspect there are more blowouts these days for that reason (i.e.--more variance shots), but I don't know that for sure.

[CleveTown™]

we're approaching parity now. The game is full of so many talented players you dont have to be on an LA or NY to win anymore.

[Shill Jackson]

we're approaching parity now. The game is full of so many talented players you dont have to be on an LA or NY to win anymore.

but you DO have to not be on CLEV….

[kobeunderbite]

More talent than ever, more parity than ever.

[thedangerouskitchen]

To a man (on the average) today's players are more athletic AND the rules in the Modern Era heavily favor Offense... but that doesn't = "great" talent.

"Iindividually" speaking 90% of today's players either have no College experience or 1 year max... which means as Rookies they are faaaaaaaar less NBA-ready than the players from past Eras. Yes, many of these youngsters can get away with being servicable NBA players from the outset (based on their athletic ability and the favorable rules for Offense), and many develop into good/great players once they've been in the league for a few years... BUT when you're talking in terms of TEAM "greatness" there's not a single team in the league today that would stand a chance against any of the great teams from the 80's - 00's because of the aforementioned reasons, coupled with sooooo many quality players jumping around from team to team chasing the money; therefore Modern Era teams lack the chemistry and cohesion needed to develop into "great" teams, like they did in the past.

So what you end up with is mediocre-to-good "teams" battling each other, giving us the parity we see in today's Modern Era.

[Bush4Ever.]

More talent than ever, more parity than ever.

Completely obvious to anyone who played basketball and has a happy life in the present.

Not so obvious to boomer brains who pretend to be basketball studs online (even though they didn't even play HS ball) while working out their real life emotional issues through basketball fandom.

[thedangerouskitchen]

There seems to be a poster ITT who is obviously shook up AF because TDK completely exposed and embarrassed his foolish attempts in the past to give +/- legit credibility.

I won't disclose his name, but I'll give you a hint: He's a bush-league troll who thinks "greatness" should be measured by made-up stats.

[kobeunderbite]

More talent than ever, more parity than ever.

Completely obvious to anyone who played basketball and has a happy life in the present.

Not so obvious to boomer brains who pretend to be basketball studs online (even though they didn't even play HS ball) while working out their real life emotional issues through basketball fandom.

Plus the boomer fan has a small penis

[Da Stars.]

Not going to get into an opinionated pissing contest with TDK on this topic. But if and when the Stars get eliminated I will most likely stop switching over to watching 100% NHL and start watching both sport more. NBA has been fun to watch, NHL will always be my first love, sports wise.

[_Vcsgrizzfan_]

More talent than ever, more parity than ever.

Completely obvious to anyone who played basketball and has a happy life in the present.

Not so obvious to boomer brains who pretend to be basketball studs online (even though they didn't even play HS ball) while working out their real life emotional issues through basketball fandom.

Plus the boomer fan has a small penis

And a smaller brain.

[lettherebehouse]

I completely disagree… tdk does not have a small wang.

[Da Stars.]

LOL. at the Toronto saps. I mean Maple Leafs. God they suck.

[Titan18]

Toddy’s nba is filled with and1 level of talent players playing an open court glorified ymca rec game. Therefore more “parity”

These were the players making mix tapes in the 90s and 00s but couldn’t hack it in the league. Of course in todays nba they are “superstars”

It’s the weakest era ever by far