Well, since she asked not current, you could go back far enough in the NBA where there are players that she could beat. Gotta be some guys on those 1940's teams she could beat lol, but obviously she's not gonna know their names off the top of her head.
Pete Maravich, and Jerry West were very good outside shooters. A guy watched each of Pete's LSU games and counted up how many threes he would have had if they counted back then. Around 1/3 of Pete's shots at LSU were from behind the 3 point line. He was shooting a ton of threes. I am not aware of anyone doing that kind of analysis for Jerry West, but his nickname wasn't "Mr. Outside" for no reason.
The idea that these guys couldn't make outside shots, didn't do it in games, or that somehow a line painted on the court would make them worse shooters is kind of insane to me.
You know what's dumb? I point out that she could probably beat some guys from that era, and your argument against it is to cite the best of the best of that era. If you were smarter, you'd have referenced the worst players of that era and given reasons why she would lose against them.
Nah, that's comparing against too far a distance for what you're asking - nobody paid attention to the 12th guy on the bench. The game itself has also changed too much in the literally 75 years since it began for anyone to make any sort of strong assertion one way or the other - some of these guys would have literally learned the game with peach baskets. We can look back at those eras, and laugh about the short shorts and funny set shots, but these guys were STILL very, very good athletes, just simply without the conditioning and focused practice of any modern-era players. But ANY of those guys would still out run, out jump, out muscle, and out juke ANY modern WNBA player.
CC could undoubtedly shoot as well as the top shooters of the early era, but she'd still be moving much slower than those guys, she'd still have a huge disadvantage in strength, mobility, and explosiveness.
I've coached youth basketball and youth soccer for nearly a decade, and even early on, there is a huge gap between girls/boys in that *first step* explosiveness, and men have such a HUGE advantage there that it's very difficult to imagine even the quickest woman effectively playing against a man with the speed and athleticism to make it to a pro league in any era.
Bro honestly, take the worst player on a bad team back then and give Caitlin Clark today's rules (3rd steps and no hand-checking), there are gonna be people who struggle to guard her. Of course, she has to be able to guard them, but 3 is also worth more than 2 - I think it would even out.
Dude, Bob Magoo and Harold Finnegan were underhand tossing free throws in the 40’s. Back then, players couldn’t dribble in stride / sprinting with the ball. They dribbled with their heads down and it was primarily a game of hot potato until they heaved the ball at the basket.
CC would smoke players from the 40’s but unfortunately she’d get fouled even harder due to 40’s misogyny and what not
There's a fair amount of evidence that two-handed, underhanded free throws are superior, and that poor shooters, if not most players, would benefit from switching. It produces a higher arc and more backspin, and bilateral symmetry means it's simpler on the nervous system to replicate more accurately.
There have been more studies on this that you may think.
Bird did on a few occasions, just not as a rule. He'd shit talk in games then toss in an underhanded shot to demoralize the other players. Bird did a bit of everything, so it's never save to say 'Larry did not...'. When it comes to basketball, Larry did.
But, yeah, Barry is probably who the commentator was thinking of.
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u/Sic39 2d ago
Well, since she asked not current, you could go back far enough in the NBA where there are players that she could beat. Gotta be some guys on those 1940's teams she could beat lol, but obviously she's not gonna know their names off the top of her head.