1 hour ago, RememberTheKoy said:

Athleticism doesn't make the NBA more boring. It's the shift to being more reliant and focused on 3 point shooting.

Are you saying that good analytics are boring?

1 hour ago, mattwill said:

You wouldn’t say that Steph Curry is the best shooter of all time?

You wouldn’t say that Tom Brady is the GOAT?

You wouldn’t say that Simone Biles is the greatest gymnast of all time?

You wouldn’t say that the big three of Djokovic, Nadal, and Federer are three of the four greatest men’s tennis players ever … with Rod Laver being the fourth.

A whole swath of Olympic sports have never been better.

Sports all across the spectrum have never been played a as consistently high a level.

JMO

I'm not a big Biles guy.

29 minutes ago, HazletonEagle said:

I'm not a big Biles guy.

What gymnast was/is better?

Joker is the goat pretty easily as well.

9 minutes ago, WentzFan11 said:

Joker is the goat pretty easily as well.

It’s also a function of how deep (or not) the field is in men’s tennis. Between Djokovic, Nadal and Federer they combined to win 66 majors in a 20-year span. That’s 3 guys winning more than 80% of the grand slam tournaments. Were the three of them that great or did it speak to a rather dead era in overall talent? Djokovic and Federer also won all their titles in a 15 year span, so that 80% number is actually understated.

In a few hours Sinner and Alcaraz will play for the French Open title. No matter which one wins, it will be the 6th consecutive grand slam victory between the two, and 7th in the last 8. If the two of them dominate for the next 8-10 years, they’ll be right up there with the previous 3 in all-time grand slam titles.

Schedule quirk from 1985 - The 1985 season review popped up in my YouTube feed and after watching a bit of it I looked at the '85 schedule and results. This was the year before Buddy's first year as coach. To my surprise we played the Vikings twice during that year both in the regular season. Does anyone remember why that happened? I don't ever remember playing a non division team twice in the same year. I can understand maybe that happened way back when but very weird for 1985.

2 hours ago, WentzFan11 said:

Joker is the goat pretty easily as well.

Chamberlain vs. Joker would be epic.

1 hour ago, DrPhilly said:

Schedule quirk from 1985 - The 1985 season review popped up in my YouTube feed and after watching a bit of it I looked at the '85 schedule and results. This was Buddy's first year as coach. To my surprise we played the Vikings twice during that year both in the regular season. Does anyone remember why that happened? I don't ever remember playing a non division team twice in the same year. I can understand maybe that happened way back when but very weird for 1985.

From the LA Times game report of the first game, "Eagle Coach Marion Campbell said his team played for 30 minutes and did nothing in the second half. "We should have gone for 60 minutes,” he said. "We blew it, and it boggles the mind.”

And from the second game report, "The Vikings finished the season with a record of 7-9-0, while the Eagles finished the season at 7-9-0.

---

Philadelphia Eagles offense

Total yards	Pass yards	Rush yards	Turnovers	First downs
390	266	124	3	23

Coaches

Interim Head Coach: Fred Bruney Offensive Coordinator: Ted Marchibroda Wide Receivers Coach: Tom Coughlin Offensive Line Coach: Ken Iman Running Backs Coach: Milt JacksonTight Ends Coach: Frank Gansz Defensive Line Coach: Tommy Brasher, Chuck Clausen Special Teams Coach: Frank Gansz Assistant Strength and Conditioning Coach: Tim Jorgensen

57 minutes ago, mattwill said:

From the LA Times game report of the first game, "Eagle Coach Marion Campbell said his team played for 30 minutes and did nothing in the second half. "We should have gone for 60 minutes,” he said. "We blew it, and it boggles the mind.”

Yeah, that was the first game that we blew essentially removing our shot at a wild card. So why were we playing the Vikings twice in the regular season?

Also, I should have said, this was the year BEFORE Buddy. I'll correct that.

9 hours ago, mattwill said:

You wouldn’t say that Steph Curry is the best shooter of all time?

You wouldn’t say that Tom Brady is the GOAT?

You wouldn’t say that Simone Biles is the greatest gymnast of all time?

You wouldn’t say that the big three of Djokovic, Nadal, and Federer are three of the four greatest men’s tennis players ever … with Rod Laver being the fourth.

A whole swath of Olympic sports have never been better.

Sports all across the spectrum have never been played a as consistently high a level.

JMO

No.

You are falling for recency bias.

Curry has a very high shooting percentage, but that alone doesn't mean he's the best shooter of all time. Curry's game is centered around shooting from extreme distance. Frankly, that bores me. When I played, the goal was to get the ball closer to the basketball to get easier shots, and there was no reward for not trying to get the ball closer and getting an easier shot.. the 3 point shot had been one of the worst things to happen to basketball since its inception.

Tom Brady had a lot of protections that QBs from previous generations never had. You couldn't hit him in the head, hit him below the waist, land with your weight on top of him, say mean words, or call him names. Meanwhile, he was throwing to relievers that were allowed to run free through the secondary without being touched without massive penalties as well.

And I couldn't care less about gymnastics or tennis, so I can't speak to that, other than to say that with tennis, the equipment has gotten so much better that I don't think its fair to compare to previous generations. But the mens game is basically all about serving at extreme speeds, and most of the rest of the game has fallen by the wayside. And why can they serve so fast? Mostly because of the advances in the rackets.

And you didn't bring it up, so I will... I'm not as impressed with the new baseball stuff either. They have new rules in place to try to make small ball a part of the game again, but that's become all about home runs and strikeouts. Pitchers throw harder than ever, but I'd say that the vast majority of them have lost the ability to actually "pitch", they just mostly "throw".

I miss the days of baseball being about skills other than mashing the ball as hard as you can or throwing it as hard as you can. The game has lost a lot of entertainment value in that.

What I see in today's sports is that analytics have homogenized it so that there are no longer multiple strands of styles of play. Everyone plays the game the same way, with limited space for individual variations. Basketball is 3s and dunks. Baseball is home runs and strikeouts. And the universal DH still makes me sick. 9 men play the field, the same 9 men bat.

This overspecialization is disgusting. That's not as interesting to me. And fans have shown that they want more. Ohtani stands alone in baseball because ehs shown himself to be good at many things. Home runs, stolen bases, and pitching. But even his 50-50 season loses its luster, because it happened while he had the advantages of the new throw over rule, and while primarily playing as a DH. The fact that he doesn’t suffer from the fatigue of having to play the field gives him an unfair advantage over previous generations.

In other words, all the rule changes, equipment changes, etc. make identifying a "GOAT" impossible.

5 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Schedule quirk from 1985 - The 1985 season review popped up in my YouTube feed and after watching a bit of it I looked at the '85 schedule and results. This was the year before Buddy's first year as coach. To my surprise we played the Vikings twice during that year both in the regular season. Does anyone remember why that happened? I don't ever remember playing a non division team twice in the same year. I can understand maybe that happened way back when but very weird for 1985.

It's strange. I can't find an explanation. Did find that Buffalp and the Chargers also played 2x in 1985

6 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Schedule quirk from 1985 - The 1985 season review popped up in my YouTube feed and after watching a bit of it I looked at the '85 schedule and results. This was the year before Buddy's first year as coach. To my surprise we played the Vikings twice during that year both in the regular season. Does anyone remember why that happened? I don't ever remember playing a non division team twice in the same year. I can understand maybe that happened way back when but very weird for 1985.

https://www.profootballresearchers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3192

Might be a fun rabbit hole.

46 minutes ago, Iggles_Phan said:

https://www.profootballresearchers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3192

Might be a fun rabbit hole.

Without looking there I'm wondering if it was a period where the divisions were a 5-5-4 setup and maybe there was no way to avoid it for two teams on each side.

9 hours ago, mattwill said:

What gymnast was/is better?

I prefer the technicians that do their stunts perfectly rather than allowing her mistakes and scoring high just because she went fast and high.

It would be too many to list.

I think that cheapens the work that everyone else has put in over their careers and rewards her just for being an incredible athlete.

48 minutes ago, HazletonEagle said:

I prefer the technicians that do their stunts perfectly rather than allowing her mistakes and scoring high just because she went fast and high.

It would be too many to list.

I think that cheapens the work that everyone else has put in over their careers and rewards her just for being an incredible athlete.

Fair enough. I like both. I don’t think it cheapens anything. She literally has pushed the envelope of the sport more than anyone in my memory.

4 minutes ago, mattwill said:

Fair enough. I like both. I don’t think it cheapens anything. She literally has pushed the envelope of the sport more than anyone in my memory.

If you try a trick thats a little outside of your ability and you dont stick the landing, yeah it looks cool and its never been attempted before... but Im less impressed if you cant actually land it. Other sports dont give you such high points for "almost". All those other girls are working their entire life so far trying to achieve perfection. They also do amazing things, and do them perfectly. And lose to someone who didnt stick her landing. I dont like that.

Thats like awarding Saquon Barkley a TD for some of his runs that ended at the 1 yard line just because it was awesome to watch him run, and he almost made it.

I just learned about " Jeffing"

9 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Schedule quirk from 1985 - The 1985 season review popped up in my YouTube feed and after watching a bit of it I looked at the '85 schedule and results. This was the year before Buddy's first year as coach. To my surprise we played the Vikings twice during that year both in the regular season. Does anyone remember why that happened? I don't ever remember playing a non division team twice in the same year. I can understand maybe that happened way back when but very weird for 1985.

IIRC, something called a "Flux Capacitor" was responsible.

1 hour ago, HazletonEagle said:

If you try a trick thats a little outside of your ability and you dont stick the landing, yeah it looks cool and its never been attempted before... but Im less impressed if you cant actually land it. Other sports dont give you such high points for "almost". All those other girls are working their entire life so far trying to achieve perfection. They also do amazing things, and do them perfectly. And lose to someone who didnt stick her landing. I dont like that.

Thats like awarding Saquon Barkley a TD for some of his runs that ended at the 1 yard line just because it was awesome to watch him run, and he almost made it.

That is your opinion. I respect that. Most endeavors are judged on a combination of quality and quantity. That is why "degree of difficulty” is part of the scoring system in many sports. My personal opinion is that we all should push ourselves beyond our known capabilities. That is how we grow and learn.

9 minutes ago, mattwill said:

Johnny Wilson!

4 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Without looking there I'm wondering if it was a period where the divisions were a 5-5-4 setup and maybe there was no way to avoid it for two teams on each side.

There was a time with 5-5-4. But why not have that issue every year during that span?

2 minutes ago, Iggles_Phan said:

There was a time with 5-5-4. But why not have that issue every year during that span?

Yeah, I'm thinking maybe that happened every year for two teams. I thought I would have remembered it but then I was out of the country for several of those years and it was pre internet so not as easy to follow everything.

1 hour ago, mattwill said:

That is your opinion. I respect that. Most endeavors are judged on a combination of quality and quantity. That is why "degree of difficulty” is part of the scoring system in many sports. My personal opinion is that we all should push ourselves beyond our known capabilities. That is how we grow and learn.

Any "Sport" that relies on a subjective score rather than an objective one, isn't really a sport. It's a subjective competition.

Do kickers get more than 3 points when they kick a Fg in high cross winds or directly into the wind? Or if the kick is from 50+ yards?

Is a home run worth more when you hit it to the opposite field?

Is an 80 yard Td run worth more than a 1 yard TD run, or are they both worth 6?