This ladies and gentlemen is the results of an iso offense in the playoffs

Thats a good question - let me try to answer it, albeit in layman's terms.

The truism is that the old NBA was a run-n-gun league that played no defense. That is overly simplistic. There were many teams in the late 60s and 70s that played very good half-court defense - which is *why* teams ran when the chance was there. The best teams also knew how to quickly shift gears and run an efficient half-court attack. Attacking off the dribble was not the norm. The best teams attacked off the pass. (and that required constant motion by the guys without the ball)

Case in point: if you ask younger fans who the best PGs of all time were, many will name Oscar Robertson. Almost nobody names Jerry West or Walt Frazier - but in current terms, they played more of a "PG" role than Robertson did (until latein his career). The reason, is that Oscar had impressive APG numbers, and the other 2 look very pedestrian. That was because *everyone* on those Knicks and Laker teams was expected to move the ball, and hit the open man. The same was true of the Celtics, post Cousy. Heck, did you know that WILT had a couple seasons where he averages around 8 APG?

Why did it change?

1) Expansion. Everybody points to how it diluted the talent pool for players - but it did the same for coaches and refs. On top of that, the increased number of teams made in season scouting less feasible. Teams no longer game planned for a specific opponent, until the play-offs.

2) The league got younger. As players started leaving college sooner, the emphasis shifted from skill to physical talent. Gameplans became less sophisticated.

3) Marketing changed. "Lakers vs Celtics!" became "Bird vs Magic!" There had always been a "star" system, but it became the tail wagging the dog.

4) Officiating changed. Some teams (Daley's Pistons, Riley's Knicks, Jordan's Bulls) were suddenly playing with private rulebooks.

5) The 3 point shot. What used to be considered a bad shot from the perimeter suddenly became more valuable than working for a high percentage shot. Teams feel less pressure to work for a good shot, knowing they can always just throw the Hail-Mary....and get on Sportscenter as a reward.

I'm sure that barely scratches the surface of the subject, but take it FWIW.

 

Maybe we can hire the Mormon Tabernacle?

 

Lakers ISO the anal-raper all night every night, and call it "the triangle".

Nate doesn't run more ISO's than most teams with a star do, but he does like to either score early or score late in the clock which makes the ISO more obvious to spectators.

 

I shoud clarify what I wrote. Dallas is the team that runs it about 1/3 of the time. The rest all run it much more

 

Very good point.

The Triangle Offense is a way to get ball and player movement to keep the defense honest enough to where it is difficult to defend the teams desired isolation matchup. I have a rough idea of how the triangle works, and I've actually been blessed to talk to Tex Winter at the barbershop a few times about the triangle offense, but it's so freaking complicated at the level they run it, I shouldn't even pretend to know the details.

 

Not to nit-pick (well, maybe a little), but I wonder what percentage of Laker ISOs are called by the coach, and what percenatge are Kobe abandoning the triangle to go freelance?

 

Just to add to this post, I recall Neil Paine (basketball-reference) saying that the league was over 65% white in the 1960's. I'm sure that has had an effect as well. The league has a much more athletic pool of talent, including Europeans, South Americans, etc. of course.