this is what basketball looked like a century ago and here's what it looks like now so how did we get here well it all started when a teacher named James Naismith wanted to make a fun game for his students and boom just like that we got basketball but at first the game was complete garbage I mean they played with soccer balls and used wooden baskets as Hoops yeah it was literally basketball man they couldn't even trip on the game quickly evolved and by 1906 Metal rims were introduced they finally allowed dribbling thank God and the very first professional basketball league was formed the NBL but 12 years later another League was created called the baa creating teams like the Celtics the Lakers the Knicks and the Warriors and by 1949 basketball was getting so popular at the baa and the NBL were like let's do it so they merged creating the MBA but despite being the number one basketball league in the world most players in the NBA still had day jobs like Norman Glick who worked as a plumber I'm not a kid but in 1956 one of the greatest players of all time made his NBA debut Celtics Legend Bill Russell I mean he was so good that he won a championship in his first season and 10 more throughout his career yeah 11 championships the Celtics dominated the league for 13 years straight but in 1959 Bill's biggest rival joined the league Wilt Chamberlain a man who could bench 500 pounds sleep with 20 000 women and score 100 points in a single game a record he still holds to this day uh by the way none of those things were ever recorded on camera so there's a bit of debate on whether any of it happened the next 20 years were a dark error for the NBA in fact it was almost the death of it in 1967 a rival League was formed called the ABA creating teams like the Spurs nuggets Nets and Pacers two different Leagues with over 200 players completely splitting the basketball fan base not only that but 70 of NBA players were addicted to drugs which was a big No-No and by 1978 the NBA was down so bad even most of the finals weren't aired on tv nobody cared about the NBA but right before officially going bankrupt the league was saved by two unlikely Stars this is Larry Bird and Magic Johnson and in 1978 they were the two greatest players in college basketball Hester that just so happened to be playing at the exact same time leading to one of the greatest rivalries ever they talked smack got physical all will dropping 20 points on each other it became the hottest thing on TV I'm talking 40 million viewers for a single college game between 1978 and 1979 bird and Magic officially declared for the leap with bird going to the Boston Celtics and Magic to the Lakers meanwhile the NBA absorbed the four remaining ABA teams making the NBA the only professional basketball league and oh yeah in 1979 they finally added the iconic three-point line the NBA was suddenly bigger than ever well the league even started selling players jerseys for the first time and it was all led by bird and magic fun despite all that the NBA had no clue what was about to hit him cause there was a kid from North Carolina about to change not only basketball but the world forever in 1982 a 19 year old college player was averaging 13 points and four rebounds nothing special but it was enough to help bring his team the North Carolina Tar Heels to the NCAA Championship and it was during that game and he made a name for himself guys in the final seconds with his team down one he did this 18. [Applause] North Carolina has won the 1982 NCAA Championship Michael Jordan was ready to take over the basketball world and in 1984 when Jordan was drafted by the Chicago Bulls he instantly became a star winning Rookie of the Year and looking like he'd be the face of the game for years to come but at the start of his sophomore season Jordan shattered his foot meanwhile there was another player coming out of college ready to take MJ's spot foreign [Music] y for sure be better than MJ he was bigger stronger and a better rebound and in 1986 he was drafted by the Boston Celtics a team that still had Legends Like Larry Bird Bill Walton and Danny Ainge but just two days later the NBA was hit with one of their worst tragedies local success story took a tragic turn this morning Len Bias the Maryland University basketball star on his way to becoming a world champion Boston Celtic died of an apparent heart attack today at Leland Memorial Hospital in Prince George's County he died of heart failure because he used cocaine the medical examiners had the cocaine and bias's body was virtually pure While most found in Maryland is 60 percent diluted he said bias inhaled the powder within seconds it was absorbed into the blood and quickly interrupted the electrical activity in his brain and that produced an irregular heartbeat Len Bias tragically passed away and with that brought an end of the Celtics Dynasty but there was another Dynasty right around the corner okay now a few months later Michael Jordan returned from injury and literally became the most famous person in the world he won three championships in a row with the bulls released the most iconic shoes of all time the Jordan Ones and he was so famous you could recognize an outline of him everyone wanted to be like Mike and it brought worldwide attention by 1992 the NBA started playing games in countries like China Germany and Russia and for the first time ever we've got Legends like Bird magic and Jordan all playing for the USA olympic team forming the Dram Team aka the greatest sports team ever assembled at this point basketball and the NBA was at its peak it was so big the league even added two teams to Canada but it was all short-lived last night we began the show with The Disappearance of Michael Jordan's father the worst fears have come true James Jordan was found dead victim of an apparent burden Jordan was devastated and being unable to cope with game he officially retired from the NBA in 1993. it has left a massive hole in the league and the Houston Rockets tried to fill it even winning back-to-back championships but it just wasn't MJ so only two years after retired MJ shocked the world with two of the most iconic words in NBA history I'm back but when Jordan returned he would meet the Black Mamba for the first time and that's only one of the eight sections coming up after aware from our sponsor Morgan and Morgan see when you're as good at basketball as I am you become a Target on the court so after I drop my 69th point in the game this dude that was guarding me got mad blindsided me and broke my ankle and I didn't know what to do I couldn't afford the cost of fixing my broken ankle but after doing some digging I found something that saved my life an injury Law Firm that'll fight your case for completely free unless you win yeah Morgan and Morgan will fight to give you the best results so if you ever have an injury you can go to forthepeople.
com sign up for a free case evaluation to get started trust me dog you won't regret it well look we gotta get back to MJ because with the words I'm bad he made his return to the NBA where he and the Bulls went on to dominate The League again winning three more championships in a row including one on Father's Day where MJ dedicated the win to his dad and it was truly beautiful but as Jordan's career came to an end a new era of players are ready to take over players like Kobe Bryant Shaquille O'Neal and Allen Iverson they all brought some to the league and never seen before AI redefined how you could dribble and move with the ball Kobe brought his Mamba mentality while no one could contain Shaq's size but the changes went beyond just the court by the early 2000s we saw more players with tattoos they were wearing chains and jewelry the league had gotten a complete makeover by the year 2003 Shaq and Kobe were dominating the lead they teamed up on the Lakers and it won three championships in a row it was a thing of beauty I was until the relationship fell apart Kobe thought Shaq was being a lazy fat ass and Shaq thought Kobe was mean so the two ended up hating each other but all eyes were on a much bigger story see there was a player in high school that was more famous than any NBA player a player that was part Magic Johnson part MJ and part superhuman I'm talking about Ron James the most exciting prospect basketball had ever seen I mean if the league accepted high schoolers he would have been playing in the NBA as 16. he was that good and in the 2003 draft he was selected by his hometown team the Cleveland Cavaliers ready to claim his crown as the king of the NBA but while everyone had their eyes on LeBron something sinister was going on in the background a referee by the name of Tim Donahue was rigging games for the mafia telling them which teams to put money on and it wasn't just a single game or even one series he was rigging gains for four years straight Tim was literally changing the history of the NBA with each game you rap but eventually the FBI got involved a two-year investigation was conducted and Tim went to jail for 11 months but the 2000s weren't all bad and I was seven the league saw the beginning of the super team era and the Boston Celtics made up of three NBA legends Ray Allen Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce and I know there were other super teams over the years the 82 Sixers the 96 Bulls well even the 2003 Lakers but for the first time in NBA history teams were intentionally trading for three Superstars to try and win it all and in 2010 Miami Heat pulled off the greatest super team the NBA had ever seen Chris Bosh Dwyane Wade and LeBron I mean they were so good they made it all the way to the finals in their first year by 2011 the league had hit one of his lowest points going into a complete lockout basically team owners wanted to pay their players less players said Helena and the NBA shut down so with nothing to do all day stars like LeBron and KD when it dominated in local gyms some players like J. R Smith went overseas the Play While others were forced to literally find a normal job no one knew if this was the end of the NBA but finally after 161 days everyone came to a new agreement and this marked the beginning of the absolutely ridiculous NBA contracts we see today I mean dudes like Timothy mozgov who averaged six points a Game signed a 65 million dollar contract while stars like Kevin Durant were signing contracts for over 160 million to put that into perspective the most Bill Russell got paid at the height of his career was a hundred grand per year that there's only 975 000 in today's money [Music] with the NBA finally back LeBron lived it up in Miami going to four straight finals winning two of them basketball was witnessing a new go to merge and the NBA was in the midst of its Lebron Air by 2014 LeBron returned to Cleveland ready to win his hometown a ring thinking it was going to be an endless flow of championships but uh there was a team in the Bay Area with a player named Steph Kirk who was about to change the NBA forever Steph Curry could shoot the ball from anywhere and I mean anywhere League had never seen anything like it three point shots used to just be you know a normal part of the game but now we saw Steph Curry making it the number one option from hitting more threes than any player in NBA Hester to take in home the MVP award that year and winning the 2015 NBA Finals he broke boundaries and changed the way the league you'd shoot it so other teams started shooting threes like crazy trying to find their own Steph Curry but there was a problem the dude was one of a kind so from 2015 to 2018 it was the King of The League versus the greatest shooter of all time and it made for some of the most memorable playoff series ever playing in 2016 when LeBron and the Cavs were down 3-1 to the Warriors in the finals but somehow they came back and won it all making it LeBron's greatest accomplishment meanwhile International Players started invading the lead playing Joel embiid giannisate decompo and Nicola jokic who account for the last five MVPs from 29 to 2023 suddenly the League's best players weren't even American it was like nothing the league had ever seen before but when nobody saw coming was a worldwide pandemic a dangerous virus is spreading rapidly in China and U.
S officials are very worried that it could come here now to Growing concerns about the deadly coronavirus officially hitting the U. S if I show up to Arena I ain't playing the NBA is suspending the season scene the NBA was forced to completely shut down for four months luckily though the league was trying to cook up a plan to bring basketball back and what they came up with seemed insane at first because the NBA invited teams to Disney World where they would come and play out the rest of the season while being stuck inside a bubble for three months they couldn't leave they couldn't bring anyone in they couldn't even order food from outside restaurants it was rough well LeBron got his fourth ring out of it and nobody got sick by 2021 kovit was still around but the fans were back and we got to see one of the weirdest seasons ever the Nets lost in the playoffs because Katie's foot was too big LeBron got eliminated in the first round for the first time in his career and the Bucks won their first championship since 1971 and the 2022-23 season we got to see a legendary Celtics vs Warriors finals where Steph took home his fourth ring but I think it's more important to talk about where we are today see I feel like there's a problem that no one seems to be mentioning the NBA's most popular players are getting really old and I think we're about to witness the end of an error I mean the typical retirement age for an NBA player is 35. meanwhile Jimmy Butler James Harden D Rose and Westbrook are all 34.
