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yeah, i think the 80's and 90's are the golden age of nba. jordan popularized the sports (with 2 threepeats), the magic and bird rivalry (lakers and celtics too), the bad boys of detroit, hakeem's houston rockets and many great players such as charles barkley, karl malone, john stockton, dominique wilkins, isiah thomas, glenn rice, mitch richmond, reggie miller, tim hardaway, patrick ewing, gary payton, david robinson, clyde drexler, chris mullin, joe dumars, young shaq, scottie pippen and alonzo mourning to name a few.the level of play is not as high as it used to be, and i know that a lot of people in the league might be surprised to hear such comments coming from fans because they really did everything they could to make fans believe that the game became better by changing the rules to allow players to put huge numbers and break records, they marketed (and still do it) the idea of a "next michael jordan", try to make the public believe they found him in so many players,they use slogan like "players are bigger, faster, stronger" or "the game evolved" but the truth is players are not as good as their peers from the 80's and 90's. when you look at those games you just see it how players were skilled, a lot more fundamentally sound. seems like everybody knows how to shoot the ball,the intensity (level of effort) is incredible (specially in the playoffs), the level of the defense is a lot higher, the game is so much more physical and you have a lot more centers,the game is more collective etc. so after the departure of a figure like jordan in 98, the downfall of an incredible generation of players (age), the permission for players to come directly from high school without solid fundamentals, the money they are given at such young age, the hype they enjoy, the change of rules to help offensive players to put big numbers, the lock out in 99, the disapearance of the physical aspect of the game...all those factors contributed to the game that is played today.
plus there is a lot less flopping during the 80s/90s than today lol.