[net.sport.hoops] NBA sans BIRD & MAGIC

tbg@apollo.uucp (Tom Gross) (03/04/86)

    Before I make any further comment in net.sport.hoops, 
    I would like to simply point out that I am a FORMER 
    employee of GENRAD,  a fact which entitles me to post 
    articles to this newsgroup, as you all know.  (Indeed,
    if any of you should run into R. Wade Williams No. 2,
    Software Engineer at General Radio Company you might let
    him know that I still have and use his copy of K&R, 
    and no, he can't have it back.)

    Anyway (sorry), I have some followup thoughts to my
    previous posting about "green smugness" and how BORING
    the NBA is these days.  It occurred to me since then
    that if you took away Larry Bird and Magic Johnson the
    league might actually have that "exciting parity" of only
    about 6 years ago.  I wonder how many people out there
    agree with this thought, that take away Bird and the only
    good team is LA, now take away Magic and all of a sudden
    you've got fascinating matchups.  This also raises the
    standard question, how would today's Celtics matchup 
    against yesteryear's Celtics, and so on.  I'll let some
    current Genrad employee start up that discussion.

    Trivia question:  when I myself was a current GENRAD
    employee, the burning question of the day was "were the
    Celts right to trade their No. 1 pick (and another first
    round pick) for Parish and a chance to pick Mchale at No. 3?".
    I remember at the time Scott Stewart thought it was a shame 
    to pass up Darrell Griffith but I was excited because for the 
    first time in their history the Celts were going to have
    a TALL team.  Nobody expected Parish and Mchale to be superstars,
    just BIG (Luke Jackson types perhaps) and create matchup
    problems for the opposition.  My question is: at that time,
    Bill Fitch said that if they hadn't made the trade they
    probably would have drafted Griffith Number 1 and then
    another player No. 11 or 13 (I forget).  Who was that
    other player?  I forget.  Was it Rick Mahorn?  It was
    some player LIKE Rick Mahorn but I can't recall who and
    whether he ever made it.  I don't remember how the
    Warriors used that pick either...


    Tom Gross
    Apollo Computer, INC.
    Chelmsford, MA

nielsen@hplabsc.UUCP (Walter Nielsen) (03/06/86)

> 
>     ..............Nobody expected Parish and Mchale to be superstars,
> 
>     Tom Gross
>     Apollo Computer, INC.
>     Chelmsford, MA

Does anybody really think that Parish is a superstar ?  I for one am
never impressed by him.  Especially this year, every time I've watched
the Celtics, they seem to make their big run with Walton subbing.  

 

Walter Nielsen
ARPAnet: nielsen%hplabs@csnet-relay.ARPA
USEnet:  {ihnp4,sdcrdcf,ucbvax}!hplabs!hplabsc!nielsen

afb@pucc-i (Michael Lewis) (03/06/86)

In article <2c475be0.2a75@apollo.uucp>, tbg@apollo.uucp (Tom Gross) writes:
>     that if you took away Larry Bird and Magic Johnson the
>     league might actually have that "exciting parity" of only
>     about 6 years ago... 

     One need only look at the NBA championships since Larry and Magic came
around to confirm your theory...

     Year
     1980     LA over Philly.........4-2
     1981     Boston over Houston....4-2(?)
     1982     LA over Philly.........4-0(?)
     1983     Philly over LA.........4-0
     1984     Boston over LA.........4-3
     1985     LA over Boston.........4-2

     The only correction I would make is to take into account Moses Malone's
initial impact at Philadelphia, when, with everyone healthy and Julius in his
last great year, they totally dominated the league, especially the Championship.

    Michael Lewis @ Purdue University