Speaking on his “7PM In Brooklyn” podcast, Knicks legend Carmelo Anthony gave his stake on why the NBA today is such a high-scoring league. According to Anthony, the skill level of players has never seen such heights and the level of talent across the board has made it impossible for defenses to keep up.
“I think the skillset today is so much higher,” said Anthony. “It’s at it’s all-time high. It went from jabstep to hesi-pull and then it goes to James [Harden] mastering that pick and roll and mastering how to get fouled. That is a skill. So in order to play against that, you gotta learn that too. Like Stephen Curry, that dude is a skilled motherf*cker, probably one of the most skilled players in the game.”
Today, players in every position need to be able to do multiple things on the court. Instead of having a “specialist” who excels in one specific area of the game, teams only play guys who are multi-faceted with their skills, whether it’s shooting, scoring, playmaking, or defending the other team’s top players. The result has been one of the highest-scoring periods in NBA history, complete with some of the top offenses in NBA history. While more scoring isn’t necessarily a bad thing, the topic has become highly controversial of late as the league shifts further and further away from defensive-oriented basketball. In fact, according to some critics, the lack of defense has hurt the overall product and it’s tainting the game in a way we haven’t seen before. Regardless of its impact, the league itself is leaning into this trend as a way to increase fan interest and viewership across the world.
Scoring Is Out Of Control In The Modern NBA
We’ve seen offense take a heavy emphasis over the past few seasons, and that’s been by design. After many years of tweaking the hand-checking rules, the NBA finally did away with the practice in 2004, outlawing pretty much all contact and hand-fighting on the perimeter. The rule change made it a lot tougher to contest shots cleanly and as the league began to develop over time, it slowly began to resemble more of the product we see today. With an offensive rating of over 115 across the entire NBA, the league is on pace to once again break the all-time record and all the signs point to this trend continuing for the foreseeable future.
Through the first month of this season, we’ve already seen multiple 70-point games, including a 73-point masterpiece from Mavericks star Luka Doncic. This season, there are 16 players who are averaging 25 points or more and four who are averaging at least 30. With higher-scoring games than ever before, and a shocking lack of defense for even the really good teams, not everyone is a fan of the modern game and there are those who are calling on the league to take action and implement some rules to strengthen the defensive end of the floor. For now, though, the NBA is going to keep the status quo, and they will be watching the numbers to see how the ratings respond to the record-breaking offensive display.
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