Well...those mid 2000s days were pretty rough to watch, ain't gonna lie.
They were.
Illegal Offense and general rule tolerances are one thing, just remember, we saw ball material changes, the finishes on the flooring, shoe-tops going from above the ankle to below, and the stupid sponsorships that forced the best players to wear new shoes every game, sometimes multiple pairs.
Tim Donaghy did his whole expose, the refs started to exacerbate make-up calls and go blind both-ways when they were too late. The NBRA went through a whole shockwave that forced more inexperienced refs into the mix and pushed more experienced refs to work more than they should have. That's also partially while teams started poaching refs, ala Mark Cuban and Dan Gilbert to exploit the rules. Because the NBA or RA couldn't protect them.
Injury spikes are bothersome, but the rule changes claimed to protect them are not as big of a factor. It's the same arguments.
Crawford helicoptering over Hoiberg, that was a foul in any era.
Made-of-Glass player lists, the rules didn't hurt them. T-Mac, Greg Oden, Grant Hill, etc.
DRose Adidas vs Thibs vs landing on two feet argument all over again for most.
Bogut was due to his own teammate going over-the back which pushed JR Smith forward and out of control... so rules were there, Refs didn't call them. Not the one where Stat runs into Bogut while hanging on the rim.
Now there are a few rule changes(interpretations and call frequency/tollerance) to reduce injuries that I agree with.
-Stockton trips aren't tollerated AT ALL now. Try to Stockton trip a player, you're going to get suspended if your acting skills arent A++++.
-Fingernail codes and pre-game inspections.
-Blindly calling charges. The league had to go through a few updates before getting this righhhhh, erm----miles better.
-2 step in and outs. Skirting 3-seconds. That's one PART of the 3 second that is called right now, sadly that's only because they allow so many set-players to live by the arc.
-Zone. Zone. Zone. The old zone rules mean you have to switch in traffic, so many stupid injuries. Although I would like to see *some* more zone restrictions, because that's contributing to players having a shit ton more wind to run the floor and just shoot all these 3s. So for injuries, good, for the game itself, it's going to be more 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3.
