Little bit of 38 year old Kareem headed to a finals mvp.

[Kblaze8855]

[GimmeThat]

how bitter would the Lakers organization had been, had the 16-17 Spurs avoided the Warriors and won one with Gasol.

[Kblaze8855]

42 year old Kareem in the finals. Second to last game of his career.

In a recent interview he had this to say:

“I could have played 25 to 30 years with load management,” Abdul-Jabbar said. “I sit home and think about that. I made a commitment to stay in shape. [After] the season was over, I took off two weeks … I worked on my stamina, worked on my footwork. It was just a challenge every year to try to be the best guy at my position.” .

Considering a player of his caliber would never have finished school in this era coming in after a freshman I’m playing to 42 gets him to 23 seasons right there. He was only out for 2 stretches of his career and one of them was breaking his hand punching a guy who elbowed him.

But of course, people are now starting to think the constant wear and tear and playing through small injuries made those guys bodies tougher so he might not have lasted as long resting and playing low minutes these days. It certainly isn’t settled science but more people are discussing it as a possible reason players fall apart so easily these days.

Plus, of course he would have made a lot more money and been less susceptible to the fraud of the people around him forcing him to need money. That is much of the reason he kept playing but that’s a whole other issue.

[StrongLurk]

There is a reason why sane NBA fans have Kareem in the top 2-4 all time. He dominated the basketball world his whole career - high school, college, NBA, and he did it for a long time with a high peak. If Kareem grew up in a more modern era and was drafted in...say 2003, there is a real chance he would've overshadowed Lebron.

[Kblaze8855]

[Kblaze8855]

[AlternativeAcc.]

There have been injury prone players all throughout history. The idea that playing less makes you break down more is preposterous.

Just in the last couple decades we've seen Oden, Roy, Rose, Bynum, Hill all go away and it had nothing to do with load management. Some guys are just injury prone.

[elementally morale]

The most interesting part of this for me today is this: Everything was down to Earth in comparison with today. People played. There was some (not insane) physicality (insane would be the 90s) but complaining to the refs was rare. The crowd was there for basketball. The commentators didn't use hyperbole every other second and they didn't start screaming when someone made a shot. It was a totally different experience than it is today when everything is out of proportion.

[Full Court]

The most interesting part of this for me today is this: Everything was down to Earth in comparison with today. People played. There was some (not insane) physicality (insane would be the 90s) but complaining to the refs was rare. The crowd was there for basketball. The commentators didn't use hyperbole every other second and they didn't start screaming when someone made a shot. It was a totally different experience than it is today when everything is out of proportion.

Spot on.