Great longevity is more common going forward

[StrongLurk]

All time greats aren't retiring or getting washed in their early thirties anymore.

Lebron deserves praise for his great longevity playing at a high level, but I wouldn't be surprised if guys like Durant and Curry are still all-star level players in their late thirties.

Curry is going to be thirty five near the end of this season. Durant is still killing it and he's thirty four years old still off a torn achilles from a few years ago.

Also the offensive friendly league that has existed over the last few years is helping.

[John8204]

Curry might be able to make it to 40 as a spot up shooter but he's going to have to take a huge paycut. Durant I don't see it those injuries are going to pile up every season and once Durant's numbers go it's highly unlikely any team is going to deal with that headcase.

[Full Court]

38 year old Jordan was better than 37 year old Lebron though. :confusedshrug:

And if they do shorten the season, you'll see career longevity stats going down from then on due to less time to accumulate them.

[kawhileonard2]

Longevity is due to rule changes as well.

[TheGoatest]

Injuries are more common as well, due to the game being more intense and athletically demanding. Today it is pretty rare for any superstar to play all 82 games. In the 90s it was relatively common. In the 60s there were even superstars who played all games while also playing 44-48 minutes per game.

As for Curry and Durant, we'll see how they'll do once they hit their late 30s. Reminder: LeBron was #2 in MVP voting (probably would've won MVP if the bubble didn't mess him up) and won the championship as the Finals MVP at over a year older than Curry or Durant are now.
Also, LeBron never took a season off to extend his mileage like Curry and Durant. That's why he's about to break the all-time scoring record, and the best other two can hope for is the #4 and #5 all-time spots, if everything goes really well for them for the remainder of their careers. And that's why breaking the all-time scoring record in today's era is actually an even bigger deal than it is given credit.

[Lebron23]

38 year old Jordan was better than 37 year old Lebron though. :confusedshrug:

And if they do shorten the season, you'll see career longevity stats going down from then on due to less time to accumulate them.


Huh??? Jordan wasn't even an All NBA team when he was 38. You ain't smart.

[ArbitraryWater]

No shit

[Full Court]

Huh??? Jordan wasn't even an All NBA team when he was 38. You ain't smart.

He was injured. He wasn't leading super teams to the lottery though, that's for sure. He also wasn't standing like a statue on defense.

The truth always hurts morons.

:lebroncry:

[TheGoatest]

LMAO!
Foolish jordon actually played more games in 2001-02 (60) than LeBron last year (56), and LeBron still was All-NBA. In fact, an extra 4 games might've pushed LeBron past DeRozan for a spot on the All-NBA 2nd team, who barely beat him. Meanwhile, Wizards Foolish jordon wouldn't have made the All-NBA 4th team, if there was such a thing. :oldlol:

[iamgine]

All time greats aren't retiring or getting washed in their early thirties anymore

Who are these ATGs who were washed in their early 30s? :lol

[WhiteKyrie]

38 year old Jordan was better than 37 year old Lebron though. :confusedshrug:

And if they do shorten the season, you'll see career longevity stats going down from then on due to less time to accumulate them.
And that’s with taking three years off from professional basketball in his mid to late 30s. Where he got pretty fat and out of shape, for a while people were making jokes about it.

Then he was forced to lose weight quickly, apparently he was in near 1998 condition before Ron Artest broke his ribs in pick up games at hoops gym due to frustration of getting torched by old Yoda Mike. Which then set back his wizard come back even more. Plus was still carrying probably around 15 pounds of extra weight in that 2001- 2002 season, helped contribute along with age and atrophy to his knee injury which basically limited his effectiveness from about the midway point of that season going forward. And robbed him of whatever quickness and athleticism he had left.

From that point on he was just pure IQ, skill and craftiness. Yet still played 82 games and competed against guys almost half his age in their prime/peak coming at him.

Your age matters more than number of games or seasons played. This is why I always find this funny when LeBron Tards want to dramatize and embellish longevity.

Not playing and then coming back is far worse for you in combination with advanced age, then continually keeping your body in requisite shape and the proper muscle memory to play the game.

Michael Jordan retiring two times and then coming back at the pro level and either becoming the best player in the league again as he did from 1996 to 1998, or one of the best players, and before his catastrophic knee injury, he was putting up prime 23 year-old Kobe Bryant numbers as a 38 year old, which meant he was in the top five players in the league, given Kobe was top three to top-five in those seasons.

Now, those seasons dragged his reputation down a little bit and definitely his career averages, it is however a testament to his goat status of how he played during those years at those ages with the injuries he suffered and having been gone for as long as he was.

[WhiteKyrie]

He was injured. He wasn't leading super teams to the lottery though, that's for sure. He also wasn't standing like a statue on defense.

The truth always hurts morons.

:lebroncry:
Mike was still a beast on defense, because he still had a little bit of his lateral quickness, his instincts and anticipation, his quick hands and his long arms.

He also just simply was a winner, so he tried to play defense unlike LeBron. He wasn’t just conserving energy to put up more hollow offensive statistical numbers that look good on paper.

Yoda Mike also doubled Washington’s record from the previous season, and had them on pace to easily be in the playoffs as a top five seed in the east before his knee injury. That’s with sophomore RIP Hamilton being his next best player.

As opposed to Anthony Davis and Russell Westbrook. :roll: :roll:

His next best player? Chris Whitney? Jahidi White? Courtney Alexander? He had nothing but bums.

[Shooter]

7,631

LeBar has been set

[Street Hunger]

This thread makes interesting points. We used to think that players were probably past their prime around maybe 33 or 34 but now plenty of them can still be good around 34 35 36 or maybe 37

[John8204]

The other thing that will affect longevity is the rise of international players which means you have more competition for fewer roster spots we don't know what the market is going to be for the Harden's, Durant's and Westbrooks in their 30's when the contracts are up.

[TheGoatest]

This thread makes interesting points. We used to think that players were probably past their prime around maybe 33 or 34 but now plenty of them can still be good around 34 35 36 or maybe 37

Nah, you had players who played well in their late 30s in the older days (Kareem, Malone), and you have modern era players who used to be superstars becoming either role players or bench warming scrubs as soon as they hit their 30s or even earlier (McGrady, Vince Carter, Blake Griffin, Amare, Derrick Rose, Deron Williams).

In fact, aside from LeBron there are no modern era players who were as good at 37 as Kareem or Malone.

[HoopsNY]

There are a bunch of contributing factors to this. Players don't play a demanding schedule anymore. In addition, they have the best care, technology, and modern medicine that they've ever had. The league also isn't as physical and players generally don't play as many minutes as they once did.

I think it will allow a lot more guys to play into their late 30s than before, but also the ability to play at a high level. Paul at 37 is still leading the league in assists. LeBron is still playing at a high level at 38. KD is 34 and has been playing at his peak form. Steph won FMVP in his sixth finals appearance at the age of 33.

[HoopsNY]

Injuries are more common as well, due to the game being more intense and athletically demanding. Today it is pretty rare for any superstar to play all 82 games. In the 90s it was relatively common. In the 60s there were even superstars who played all games while also playing 44-48 minutes per game.

As for Curry and Durant, we'll see how they'll do once they hit their late 30s. Reminder: LeBron was #2 in MVP voting (probably would've won MVP if the bubble didn't mess him up) and won the championship as the Finals MVP at over a year older than Curry or Durant are now.
Also, LeBron never took a season off to extend his mileage like Curry and Durant. That's why he's about to break the all-time scoring record, and the best other two can hope for is the #4 and #5 all-time spots, if everything goes really well for them for the remainder of their careers. And that's why breaking the all-time scoring record in today's era is actually an even bigger deal than it is given credit.

More athletically demanding? A lack of physicality and shooting the three pointer at record numbers isn't "more athletically" demanding. If anything, far less athleticism is required.

I think you're forgetting that teams are much more cautious with their stars and load management has become the norm in today's game. Player empowerment has given players the ability to make decisions with regards to themselves and also claim mental health. We've seen this attitude with so many players (Kawhi, AD, Simmons, etc).

IIRC, KD and Kyrie could have come back in 2020 in the playoffs but they chose to sit them out. Players just have that much more say and that much less desire to play than the guys that preceded them.

[majari1234]

Sports Science

[Round Mound]

Players like Kareem, Parish, Stockton and Malone where ahead of their time in terms of conditioning. They lasted at all star level lwell into their mid-late 30s.