But I hate that it's not basketball anymore. It's too violent. The word they use now is "physical," but that's just doubletalk. I don't like the idea of "letting them play" when that involves beating the snot out of each other in the post and grabbing jerseys at the top of the key. As far as I know (and I could be wrong), they didn't re-write the rule book to change what constitutes a "foul."
When this is a player quote that describes an explicit game plan:
we started bumping them off their cuts and making them work harder
then I have a real problem with the way things are going. It's just not as much fun to watch. It's not elegant. If I want to watch football, or hockey, or rugby, I'll watch one of those. I watch basketball for the style, not to see people take a hit.
I realize a lot of people, college students especially, only know this style of play. Maybe I sound like the old man yelling at the kids to get off his lawn. Fine, then. Get off my lawn.
But here's a video of a 1982 game between Wichita State and LSU. If you have 90 minutes, you can watch the entire game. At least for as long as it's up there before some media outlet comes calling with copyright lawsuits. But you can see how much things have changed. Watching this 27-year-old game, it looks strange. Because guys aren't rabbit punching each other and crowd surfing.
It comes with the evolution of the game. Players are bigger, faster, stronger now. I watch games all the time from the 70s and 80s on ESPN Classic and I've seen the changes. This era of basketball isn't necessarily as elegant as year's past, but there's also unbelievable athletes playing the game in this age. Today's game of basketball might ruffle some basketball purist's feathers, but the game is evolving and the style of the play is what it is. Players today make more highlight-reel play that puts fans in the seats, and that's what matters today: $$$.
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