Windsor: If you liked '80s NBA, you'll love this new golden age
The players are better, we have two super teams, the Pistons on the come ... this game has everything and more
Shawn Windsor
This may come as a shock, but Michael Jordan didn't make every shot he took.
He did, however, win every NBA Finals in which he played. That perfection shaped his legend.
It also comes with a price that we have to keep paying, because Jordan's record diminishes our view of greatness now.
Nothing is ever good enough anymore in professional basketball. Which is too bad — because the game has never been better.
It's easy to forget, but Jordan's title teams were expected to win. And that was just fine with us. We watched in record numbers to see him meet our expectation.
Just as we will watch next winter and spring when Kevin Durant suits up with the Golden State Warriors. Just as we watched last month when LeBron James and his Cleveland Cavaliers knocked off those Warriors.
We say we want everyone to have a chance. And somewhere in our hearts, that may be true. But a league in which everyone truly has a shot from year to year would be boring.
We already have that. It's called hockey.
(We kid. We kid.)
Hockey is a fine and wondrous sport ... that no one outside of Michigan, Minnesota or the northeast really plays.
Look, the NBA thrives when it has at least one team fans both love and hate. When it has two such teams, the sport becomes a sort of cultural touchstone, as it was in the '80s.
Back in those days, the country wasn't divided between blue states and red states — it was split between gold states and green states. You were either a Lakers fan or a Celtics fan and that said something about you.
Sure, the beginning of the decade gave us a great 76ers squad and the end of the decade gave us the Bad Boy Pistons. But the 1980s were essentially about two teams, and we couldn't get enough.
We are in the middle of a similar basketball revolution.
Last month's Game 7 between the Warriors and the Cavaliers was the highest-rated NBA game since Jordan won his sixth and final championship with the Bulls. If those two teams meet again next spring, the ratings will be even higher.
NBA free agency tracker: Players still on the move
This isn't surprising. Greatness is fun.
Something many of us who romanticize the '80s era seem to have forgotten. Since Durant announced he was joining the Warriors, we've heard countless get-off-my-lawn diatribes about the way things used to be.
As if the '80s were when the peak of human evolution produced the greatest and most sublimely skilled athletes in the history of mankind. You know, back when point guards couldn't shoot, small forwards couldn't dribble and power forwards just flexed their biceps and grunted. Back when teams coalesced organically, by trades, or through drafts, when superstars weren't drifters looking to ride on the back of someone else's train.
They were mortal enemies. Cut from stone. And never had coaches fired or threatened to quit or forced their general managers to trade them to teams that might give them a better shot at winning a title.
They cared about winning. They made the swing pass. It was pure.
Actually, teams came together like the Pistons are doing now.
Uncover a future star or two in the draft. Mine others' benches for a second star. Trade for depth and use free agency dollars for more modest signings.
Like Boban Marjanovic, a 7-foot-3 Serbian center who can dunk while sitting in a chair from the bench.
His presence will make the Pistons a bit more consistent. Certainly make them deeper. But mostly it reminds us that there are several ways to build a team.
One isn't inherently better than another. What matters is how transcendent they become in the end. That's what's always mattered.
Even if we want to believe otherwise.
Contact Shawn Windsor: 313-222-6487 or swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @shawnwindsor. Download our Tigers Xtra app for free on Apple and Android devices!