to be fair Oscar Robertson is a legendary hater by any standard. during Steph’s unanimous MVP season, O was giving interviews saying his teammate Adrian Smith from the 60s was a better shooter than Steph

This isnt just a basketball or sports thing and it’s as old as man itself, it’s just the natural circle of life every generation deals with before turning around and doing the same as the generation before then.

Back in my day….

It’s just old vs young, then young become old, rinse, wash, repeat.

Learning that defensive schemes today would be considered illegal back then makes it hilarious

Defense has never been better than it is right now… but at the same time the rules and the way the game is reffed greatly favors offense.

I personally think the hardest thing to break in any lifetime is tradition.

In 2026, a player hating on the expansion from 14 to 23 obviously sounds ridiculous but I also lost my train of thought trying to finish this sentence

Assuming we find a way to not have the Resource Wars

Eventually the league come to a point where legends like LeBron, Steph, Lowry, etc, will be shamed for playing against streamers & podcasters.

Al Cervi (superstar in the late 40s) said the same in the early 60s, Harry Hough (superstar in the 00s and early 10s) said the same in the mid 30s.

People always complain about what’s new or modern because people are convinced they were always part of or in the moment of things at their apex. You can apply it to basically anything.

Every older generation complains about the current across all facets of life

It will never change

Gives off, “men are no longer men anymore” vibes. Not insulting the Big O, but this was during the 80’s and now you have players from that time complaining about how soft everyone is.

If (Bill) Russell couldn’t stop Wilt

Yeah O, that’s why Russell was something like 10-1 against Wilt in the playoffs. Because he couldn’t stop him.

Shoutout Crispus Attucks High School.

Back then, defense was an euphemism for punching someone in the face

The older I get the better I was.

There are examples going back to Ancient Greek times of people complaining about the youth.

It’s just old man talk and cringy. People get old and think their generation was tuff. My dad would talk like that

I’m pretty sure the 83 sixers could compete with the 67 warriors.

robertson may have a point about defense—the 80s were a peak scoring era that started to slow down when the Pistons made hard defense a specialty.

Dunks became a thing because Dr J made kids wanna do them.

Oscar was a crummy color commentator going back to the 1975 Finals. Kept glazing the Bullets as the Warriors swept them. We went to the airport to greet the new champion Warriors and everyone was chanting, “Oscar sucks!”

It’s not even unique to basketball. Older generations always complain about younger generations. Deep down they’re just envious of youth that they don’t have anymore.

That doesn’t make them wrong.

Lack of defense was a legit complaint in the 80s. Game became more freewheeling with less emphasis on defense. That started to change by the end of the decade and in the 90s defensive systems started to dominate (similar to what happened to hockey as the science of coaching took a leap ahead in that decade.)

To be fair, the pace in the 80s led to a lot of just back and forth chucking. Things swung the other way in the 90s, sure, but he wouldn’t be entirely wrong about this in 1985.

That said, Oscar literally complains about everything. So he’s not a great example of older players hating on younger players. He hates everyone/thing so he’d qualify as more of an extremist than anything else.

it’s all the same everywhere–old heads always bitching that things are easier now than when they did whatever it is they’re talking about, be it sports, careers, school, etc

Big O’s era had changed. You are right that this has always been a thing, as the older guys age out they see how things have change and will critique.

But it’s a bit different now because the scale to which the offensive game has changed so much that it’s completely altered defense. AND at the same time many players are saving way more for offense and slacking on defense compared to other eras. Even superstars weren’t allowed to be a one sided player, effort and putting your body on the line as a defender was way more expected.

It’s human nature to complain of the new, as it’s unknown, and therefore, dangerous. The ol’ “back in my days”, and people are doing it now in the NBA and will continue to do it.

This idea of newer generations being soft goes alllllll the way back:

In the early 1900s basketball was played in wire mesh cages, and due to the physicality of the game at the time you could tell veteran players, often called Cagers, by the gridmarks of scars on their bodies from being driven into the wires

-Then Mikan came along and defensive goaltending and the width of the key was changed

-Wilt lead to even more rules changes

-The Kermit Washington punch lead to the first crackdowns on fighting

-The 80s brought the 3pt line and the first Flagrant foul rules

-the 90s saw the change to how Backing Down was officiated and the Bad Boy Pistons lead to greater scrutiny on Flagrants

-00s eliminates hand checking and creates the 3 second rules

-10s saw the gather and carrying rules be clarified to allow more leeway for ballhandlers to create space for themselves

Basically every era of the sport has seen a concerted effort to move the game out of the trenches and to the perimeter, there’s some very good reasons for this, there are just more 6’3-6’6” guys on Earth than there are 6’10”+ guys, which allows the League to pull talent from a much broader pool

i mean the mid to late 80s were super run and gun

So…the league has gotten progressively softer? No way! Most of today’s ‘stars’ wouldn’t score 10 points in the 70’s and 80’s.

Excuse my ignorance, he was a philosopher correct? Why did he not write anything down? Do we know?

Big O has been notoriously cranky about every era after his. He’s one of the worst offenders

It happens in every sport. The sport evolves, some of the old heads don’t like the changes and criticize them. Some more than others.

I see it in other sports I follow such as gymnastics and figure skating. The culture of some sports also may make it hard to make progress and evolve.

It’s just the way it is. But it would be super boring if things never changed or evolved.

idk why people always say players don’t play defense like they don’t think every possession in the NBA finals both teams are trying to play the best defense of their lives

It’s the “all eyes on me” syndrome. The urge to stay relevant. Shaq did it all the time on “inside the NBA ‘ and it was embarrassing and cringey to watch. Gotta stay relevant, even when you no longer are. Some of these legends can’t stand that someone’s could be as good as, if not better than them. Not to mention that the NBA as a sports product has changed. Instead of lifting up the newer players, they have to tear them down. It’s an immediate turn off for me.

Nice

… one.

And this is why it’s pretty cool that KD, Lebron and Steph already said they weren’t gonna be bitter oldheads.