Long Gone Glory Days

by Moritz Wollert

As posted on: http://mos-basketball.blogspot.com

The days for basketball fans in the summer are long. No games and excitement about the summer league and the NBA Draft are already gone. Here we are in August, waiting through the days of the long and dreadful NBA offseason. Sure, there's baseball and all that other stuff you can watch or do in the summer. But as a true basketball fan, there's always something missing deep in your heart. The wait for the game to start, the up and down reading and analyzing of hundreds of box scores, the hate or admiration of your heroes' performances.

[1] What can you do as a true NBA fan to survive the hoopless summer?!? I for myself always try to remember. I think of the great games in the past, about the moments I had with my favorite team, how I went through up and downs with every basket and stood in awe of the very best players' talents.

Sadly, this summer I have a hard time remembering. One part is of course, me being a Knicks fan and the good old days seem further away with every year passing in the mecca of basketball. Names like Ewing, Frazier and Reed are in the rafters now and today's Knickerbockers are struggling for years to get the ship into winning waters again. But the other big part of myself having a problem with loving the game in the offseason is that the game has changed so much over the recent years.

And not for the better...

I think of today's league and I see all the big headlines, the highlight reels and David Stern's propaganda of a product not worthy of loving it with every nerve of your sports heart. Long gone are the heroes of the past, the new and shiny stars have arrived. LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Dwyane Wade... whatever name you want to mention. The NBA does everything in their power to push the league to new limits, riding the backs of these young guys. You always hear about the struggle of the league to regain the excitement again and how a San Antonio Spurs sweep in the Finals is killing the league and it's ratings. The NBA might be making more money than Dagobert Duck could ever dream of, but in the process Stern and his company of henchmen have betrayed the game of basketball and it's fans.

[2] Let's go back about 15 years into the late eighties and early nineties and take a look at what the league used to be. Growing up with New York basketball and loving the Knicks, of course I think of the great battles the Ewing Knicks had with the Chicago Bulls. Did these games need any marketing maschinery to be exciting?! Did you need storylines about single players or did you need to worry about officiating scandals?! Hype?

In case nobody knows the answer... no you didn't.

Back during those times and also in the eighties, when the NBA rose to fame again, all you needed to worry about was the game itself, which was propelled by hated rivalries, incredible play and epic battles between legendary teams and it's players. Just watch some of the old Celtics Lakers matchups, with all these great players performing at their best, with their tough nosed defense and their all out play. You know the names, I don't have to hammer them into your head like David Stern and the league does with the new primadonnas. Back in the days, the game was always bigger than the stars even though we witnessed some of the greatest of all time during those years. Sure, the "stars" did their part in making the game special but it was always about the game of basketball and the purest way how it should be played. Physical, dramatic, tough... this is a men's game and back in the day men played this game.

It was Celtics against Lakers, it was Bulls against Pistons, Knicks versus Bulls...

Today, it's big news that Shaq and Kobe meet on Christmas Day. What in goddamn hell do I care...

Back then the players didn't need twenty free throws a game. Back then players could handcheck, play hard and physical. Yes, it sometimes crossed the line, like when Knicks players like Charles Oakley or Pistons roughnecks like Bill Laimbeer just closelined people in the lane, but did it hurt the game?! Did it stop a great player like Michael Jordan for example?! No it didn't and that's what makes great players who they are. It was before the NBA changed all the rules to pamper the offensive player, the guy who will host the ESPY awards or make the news (no knock on LeBron, it's not all his fault). Players in the past didn't need that and it was for the good of the game. That's why we remember the legendary battles between all those great teams in the past.

Atleast I do and I almost have to shed a tear thinking of the last NBA playoffs and all that crap I heard about LeBron during the Finals, who seemed to be the biggest story despite looking like an overmatched high school player. Sure, that's a bit harsh but I just don't feel the need to praise LeBron even a little bit around here since that job is already handled by Stern and the media. Thank god an "old, traditional and boring" team like the Spurs prevailed in the end to put the onslaught of the high flying, self driven new millenium show on hold for another year. [3] The ref scandal these days pushes a dark shadow over the association but in my opinion that shadow has been present for years now. The game itself is struggling gaining back the quality and the excitement of the old days. This has nothing to do with boring teams or anything. The league in it's self understanding is as the official people in the front office of the NBA wanted it - a league that is centered around a handful of easy marketable youngsters that try to propel the game with their show and their names. The individual counts more than the game and the teams.

But basketball isn't about written names and storylines. Storylines and greatness develop themselves and have done so in the past. The unending attempt of the NBA to push it's product onto stages they just won't achieve anymore because of a number of reasons, is more than pathetic.

With all my rant I forgot so many points and I could have thrown out so many more examples of great games, stories and rivalries in the past plus I could have named so many more things that are wrong with the league today. Yet I grew a little tired to talk about it. I rather just remember how I spent my nights watching great teams go at it and play the game that I love so much. And I know that somewhere deep down in your hearts, there's also that feeling and a dreadful cry for those days to relive again.

Hopefully our memories keep us up through the following summers and hopefully we can continue to love the game of basketball as much as we did... it's gonna be hard with the game and it's surroundings changing so much...

RomiezzoLegend

836 days ago

Score 1

I couldn't agree more. Somehow, it's just weirder since the new milennium started. I think it is because people are going more into the personal lives of basketball players. Like the Kobe Bryant case, and the Tim Donaghy case. Also, whatever happened to all the legends that everyone loved in the '80s to late '90s? Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman, David Robinson, Patrick Ewing, Hakeem Olajuwan. They used to make the game very exciting. Now that they've all retired, people consider the game boring. Sure, guys like Iverson, Shaq, etc. are still there, which is why the 1999-2001 seasons were so good, but it's all about the media now, and the NBA has lost its flavor, so to speak.

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