Clay Moyle and son Caleb
In late November, Bill Bumerton wrote an article in which he shared an opinion that today’s high school game is much more developed than it was back in the 1970s when (Les) Eathorne’s East High School team’s finished second in state in 1972, and then won back-to-back state championships the next two years.
“Kids are stronger, quicker, faster, have more and better ball skills, shoot the ball better, rebound it better, and have a better concept of the game thanks to the growing select basketball programs that dot the landscape” he wrote.
I’m not sure if those were Bill’s thoughts, Terry Mosher’s, or both.
When I read that, I figured Bumerton was implying those East high teams of the early 1970s would have a tough time competing with the high school area players in the region today. I noted on the Sports Paper’s Facebook page that one individual took exception to that view, and stated his belief that players from the 70s in their prime would compete equally well with today’s players.
It’s an interesting topic and certainly not new regardless of the sport. Just this past summer, Kobe Bryant voiced the opinion his Olympic team, including Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Durant, Kevin Love, Chris Paul, LeBron James and himself among others, was superior to the original dream team of 1992 led by Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Charles Barkley.
It didn’t take Michael Jordan long to respond. He immediately disagreed and said Kobe’s team didn’t measure up with the 1992 dream team.
I don’t know who would win that matchup, but I’d certainly take my chances with that 1992 team.
But, what if we went back even further, and matched Kobe’s 2012 Olympic team with the NBA’s best from 1975?
Well, a review of top NBA players from that year include the likes of guards Walt Frazier, John Havlicek, and Nate Archibald, forwards Rick Barry, Elvin Hayes, Spencer Haywood and a fellow by the name of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the post. That group might not be as impressive as the 1992 dream team, but anybody who remembers watching those players in their prime will tell you that group wasn’t too shabby. I have a hard time believing they wouldn’t be able to give a good account of themselves against the players of today.
I remember a couple of years ago my good friend and former teammate Dave Campbell told me he thought we’d have a difficult time competing with the high school ballplayers of today. I took exception to the remark at the time because I still play ball every weekend, and I’d been competing against some of the local high school ballplayers in Fife and held my own despite the fact I was 55-years-old at the time.
Obviously, I’ve lost more than a few steps over all these years, so the fact that I could still do a decent job of guarding a kid on the local varsity and didn’t have any problem scoring myself convinced me that if I could magically peel away the years and have the same kind of speed and jumping ability at my disposal that I did 37 years ago I would still enjoy a lot of success competing with these kids today.
I expect the kids who played at East and experienced so much success back in the 1970s would find it no different.
That said, I think the real question any time this sort of subject is raised is how one is going to base a comparison between teams from two different eras.
For example, if you took a group of ballplayers from the 1970s, like East High’s 1972-73 state championship team and magically transported them for one day and asked them to compete against another top high school team from the current date I suppose it’s true they could face some disadvantages .
In the first place, it’s true players today are bigger and stronger. When I played in the 1970s Bainbridge Island High didn’t have a weight room and nobody lifted weights. I suspect the same was true of most areas high schools.
Now Bainbridge has a facility that rivals any local health club.
I quickly put on 10-15 pounds of muscle once I finished college and started regularly lifting weights. Instead of playing at 165 pounds as a five-foot-11 senior as I did in 1975, I’m sure I would have been lifting weights and played at 175 to 180 pounds if I were a senior in high school today.
So, clearly there are many stronger players today as a result of the practice of weight lifting. The question in my mind is whether or not we are going to compare a team from the 70s to one today based on the physiques those kids had back in the 70s, or are we going to take into consideration how much bigger those kids would be in the current era?
Either way, I’m not sure the strength advantage is as big a deal when it comes to playing basketball, as long as the referee’s don’t let it get really physical out there.
When it comes to height, I think it’s true kids today are a bit taller in general, but I’m not so sure I’d agree they are enough taller on average for that to represent a significant advantage.
I also don’t believe kids today are really that much faster or quicker, if at all, than they were back in the 1970s, at least not to an appreciable degree, not based on what I’ve experienced or witnessed anyway.
But, I will say once you’re in your 50s they all seem fast. In fact, maybe that’s one of the reasons so many folks believe it would be difficult for kids of 20-40 years ago to compete today; they’ve lost so much speed themselves over the years that all the kids today look extremely fast to them.
But, I have a very hard time believing humans have evolved that much physically in the past 40 years and have really gained enough more speed to make an appreciable difference.
I also wonder whether it’s fair to say kids today really are better shooters. But, I suppose that could be true. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn kids in general are better shooters. It would be pretty sad if they weren’t, especially with all the resources they have at their disposal today to learn how to become better shooters in comparison to what we had 40 years ago.
That said, I see an awful lot of young kids playing basketball today with terrible shooting form. I played ball with 16-17 other individuals this past weekend, including a number of players from their early 20s to 30s and the two best outside shooters on the court that day were myself and a 58-year-old.
I’m also not sure I would agree kids today have a better concept of the game than we did back in the 70s. Sometimes, I don’t think it’s as good, and that fundamentals today are weaker. I think that’s still a function of the kind of coaching kids today receive.
From what I have witnessed, there are good coaches today and there are others that aren’t so good, just as there were back in the 70s. There’s a lot of high school and select team coaches out there today that I don’t believe are any better than those who were coaching more than 40 years ago, and in some cases are worse.
To my way of thinking, other than the additional strength kids benefit from today as a result of weight lifting, the only clear advantages kids playing today enjoy over those of us from the 1970s really come down to two things.
First, the fact it’s possible for so many kids to receive instruction and compete against one another in a competitive structured environment almost year-round as a result of travel or select-teams that are available to play on in addition to school teams. Back in the 1970s, kids didn’t specialize in one sport as much as they do today. Many kids played basketball during basketball season, baseball when spring and summer rolled around, and football in the fall.
There were some exceptions, kids who would work on their basketball skills during the offseason, but those kids typically did so more on their own and didn’t have the advantage of playing year-round on other teams and benefitting from as much competition and instruction as they do today.
Now, more so than ever it seems, greater numbers of kids are specializing in specific sports and playing a single sport year-round.
Secondly, kids today have an unbelievable amount of instructional tools at their fingertips as a result of the Internet. If they want to learn how to improve upon their shooting all they have to do is log into a site like Youtube.com and they can find all kinds of instructional videos to watch concerning the art of shooting a basketball.
Or, you can study the shooting form of some of the best shooters in the world like Stephen Curry, Ray Allen and a host of others over and over. The same is true of all other basketball skills.
Boy, would I have loved to have had access to all of these instructional tools kids today have back in the 70s. There isn’t a doubt in my mind I would have benefited immensely from the wealth of instructional materials available to kids today had those tools been available to me back in my youth.
Still, despite the obvious advantages kids today enjoy, I can’t help but think the East Knights of 1972-73 or 1973-74 wouldn’t make out just fine, and do a lot better than many think in today’s environment.
Am I delusional when it comes to this topic?
After writing this article I spent a couple of days dwelling on the subject. When I went to play ball with the group I join every Saturday and watched the younger players, I tried to be objective.
The 58-year-old that joined us that day played ball at TacomaCommunity College and WesternWashingtonUniversity in the early 1970s. His son is playing at Pacific Lutheran this year. They are of a similar height and build. I’ve played with and against both on more than one occasion and based on what I’ve seen and experienced of their respective games there is absolutely no doubt in my mind whatsoever which of the two I’d want on my team as an 18-year-old.
I’d take the old man. He’s a better ball handler, passer and all around player in my opinion, and he’s just as good a shooter and defender.
At the end of the day, I remain unconvinced it would be difficult for the average area high school basketball players of the 1970s to effectively compete against the average hoopsters of today.
I suppose it’s possible that the games of myself and the 58-year-old I mentioned above have evolved over time since neither of us have ever quit playing ball, but I just don’t know if that’s true.
As I said near the beginning of this piece, it’s an interesting topic. Unfortunately, it will remain an endless debate because there’s no way for us to find out what would really happen.
Personally, I’d love the opportunity to transport that 18-year-old version of myself to the future and compete against the high school kids of today to find out one way or another. I believe I’d do just fine. I suspect there may be many others near my age who played ball in the 1970s who feel the same way.