From Flickr via Britl

The 1980 playoffs start this in this week’s installment, but they begin with more of a whimper than a bang. After getting a bye through to the second round, the Lakers begin their march to the title against All-Stars Paul Westphal, Walter Davis and the Phoenix Suns in Game 1 of the Western Conference Semi-Finals, which can be found here.

Are there enough empty seats in this picture to make a joke about Laker fans? I can’t decide.

The obligatory “Holy crap, Kareem is amazing” play for this game, as he goes from here…

to here, blocking the shot:

This game stays pretty tight throughout the first half, thanks in large part to good perimeter shooting for Phoenix. However, this series feels a lot like the 2012 series between the Heat and the Knicks, where New York could hang around for chunks of the game with good shooting, but as soon as that regressed to the mean, it was all over. Los Angeles, while not at all dogging it, seems to know that they can put away a perimeter-oriented team like Phoenix away if and when they need to.

In the third quarter they did just that. The combination of L.A. swarming passing lanes on defense and missed jump shots by Phoenix led to numerous fastbreak opportunities for the Lakers, and specifically Norm Nixon, who was flying all over the court to start the second half. The lifeless crowd gained energy and the Lakers, despite Phoenix’s Mike Bratz hitting five three-pointers to make the score look better, cruised to a Game 1 win.

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From Flickr via Britl

With the 1980 playoffs on deck, let’s do a brief double dip lamenting the loss of two great games from the YouTube library.

The first is a double overtime thriller on Super Bowl Sunday between the Celtics and the defending champion Sonics. Larry Bird had an all-around good game with some fantastic passes, and Boston’s Chris Ford hit five three-pointers, an amazing feat for this era. For Seattle, who muscled their way to the win, Gus Williams dropped 29 and Jack Sikma went off in the early stages of the second half, but the defining shot of the game was Dennis Johnson’s fadeaway three off of a crosscourt pass with just one second to go to send it into overtime.

The blog linked here has the text of the great Bob Ryan’s eloquent recap.

Quick Grade: A-, only knocked down for poor shooting by both sides and a longer time commitment due to the overtimes, but overall, a thrill to watch, especially for those of us who still miss the Sonics.

The other game is the 1980 All-Star Game, a game that’s been on YouTube in a couple different iterations only to keep getting pulled from the site by the league. Not sure why the NBA goes out of its way to restrict certain games and not others, but it is what it is. In the midst of his third straight season leading the league in scoring, San Antonio’s George Gervin dominated the first half to push the East -not a typo, the Spurs at that point were in the Eastern Conference- to a commanding lead and what looked to be a rather lackluster game. That is, until Kareem went into God Mode. If this had been a video game, controllers would have been flying as players accuse the game of cheating. Lenny Wilkens went with a Twin Towers look down the stretch -Magic Johnson, Phoenix’s Paul Westphal and Walter Davis, Jack Sikma and Abdul-Jabbar, with help from Dennis Johnson- which the East, led by Moses Malone, Larry Bird, Gervin and Julius Erving, couldn’t match. However, in overtime, Bird redeemed himself after missing a look that would have won the game in regulation, as he hit back-to-back shots from the corner, one a three, the other his foot just on the line, and put an exclamation mark on his performance with an amazing no look, off the rebound tip pass to Moses Malone underneath the basket.

In lieu of the whole game, a top plays countdown will have to suffice. The most notable among them #4, where the East ends up scoring, but it provides a glimpse at Kareem’s dominance on defense, and the #1 play, the aforementioned tip pass by Bird.

Quick Grade: A, the best players in the world, including a handful of the all-time greats, playing up-and-down ball, with the best player on the planet essentially single-handedly bringing his team back and getting into overtime, where another all-time great steals the show despite being only a rookie. What more could you ask for?

These games have popped up on YouTube before, so hopefully they will get re-posted in the future, as they are both classics. Until then, come back next week for the start of the playoffs.

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From Flickr via Britl

A titanic game is on tap for this week’s Total Recall: the first matchup between Magic Johnson and Larry Bird in the Boston Garden (their first overall meeting is unfortunately not on YouTube). To set the scene, Boston holds the league’s best record at 32-10, while the Lakers are 30-15, two games behind Seattle for the top seed in the West, trying to hand the Celtics just their second home loss of the year. Such a tough task becomes even more daunting for the Lakers when accounting for a nagging groin injury for Magic (insert Magic Johnson joke here). To watch this game, here’s part one.

Obvious statement is obvious, but it’s amazing how big Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is. I mean, Anthony Davis gets attention for how freakish his wing span is, but this is a whole other level:

Color commentator Hot Rod Hundley: “Nice to watch two highly touted rookies come into the league who feature passing.” He’s obviously speaking of Bird and Johnson, but the same could have applied to the legendary rivalry from the Class of ’03. Of course, I’m referring to LeBron James and Kirk Hinrich.

Boston’s Chris Ford, one of the few sharpshooters at this point in the league, has hit a three pointer in 11 straight games, which is treated as some sort of crazy accomplishment. It obviously was at the time, but it’s funny to hear considering it’s been a whole season since Kyle Korver went without a triple in a game.

With Boston up ten early, Michael Cooper gets the steal, his first of many impact plays in this game picking up the slack for Johnson. The ensuing Abdul-Jabbar basket is just unfair. 7’2″ with that kind of footwork?

Hundley: “Larry Bird’s a good defensive player. I think he’ll surprise a lot of people in that area.” This must be the 1980 version of saying Andrew Luck is “a better athlete than people give him credit for,” or that Julian Edelman has “deceptive speed.”

Part of the fun of these iterations of the Lakers and Celtics is their point guards. Norm Nixon and Tiny Archibald are smaller guys who can penetrate into the lane like in this play. They both seem like players who would have thrived in today’s pick and roll dominated NBA.

The broadcast highlights both assistant coaches, K.C. Jones and…woah, 1980 Pat Riley!

Interesting nugget: Brent Musberger notes that before hiring Bill Fitch, Red Auerbach offered the Celtics head coaching gig to… Bobby Knight.

NOTE: Part 5 of this video was pretty wonky. Maybe it’s an isolated problem on my end, but it skips around and randomly ended multiple times.

Play of the game:

The first time I saw that play I’m pretty sure I ended up yelling “OH MY GOD!”

Unfortunately for Boston, that amazing block is merely a speed bump in L.A’s 21-0 to come back and take the lead. The best part about the run is only a couple buckets into it, you can hear the Boston crowd getting nervous. It’s like one, big collective “Uh oh.” Magic and Bird get the headlines for these dynasties, but the 1980 Lakers are far and away Kareem’s team. Magic is either on the bench or ineffective for the whole run and essentially the game.

Too long, won’t watch (picking a slice of the action for those short on time)

Watch parts 9 and 10. Combined, they’re only 15 minutes long and it’s a great, frenetic stretch of basketball.

Off a Kareem miss, Bird does a great job pushing in transition and Cedric Maxwell does an even better job avoiding Nixon (you can see him in the sideline on the left) and finishing with a Derrick Rose-ian degree of difficulty to tie the game at 98.

With three seconds left, Nixon draws a foul, one too hard to tell if it was a good call, and puts the Lakers up two. Out of timeouts, Boston still gets a wide open look from Dave Cowens…

but he misses and Los Angeles escapes with a narrow road victory.

Spoiler Alert

Boston builds a double digit lead and holds it into the third quarter. However, Abdul-Jabbar spurs a 21-0 run that puts the Lakers ahead. Los Angeles looks ready to seal the win, up five with less than two minutes to go, but the Celtics rally. In the final seconds with the game tied, a questionable call puts Norm Nixon on the free throw line. He hits both, and with no timeouts, Boston pushes the length of the court, getting a quality look for Dave Cowens to send it into overtime, but he can’t convert. Los Angeles squeaks out a 100-98 victory as Boston loses at home for just the second time.

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From Flickr via Britl

Let the games begin here at Total Recall. If you missed the introduction to the series last week, check it out here. Our first game is from October 12th, 1979, as Magic Johnson makes his NBA debut against Lloyd Free (not yet World B. Free) and the San Diego Clippers. To watch, check this playlist. For game grades and spoilers, skip to the bottom.

 

 

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From Flickr via Britl

Welcome to Total Recall, a new feature here at Bulls by the Horns. I’ll be your driver for this weekly stroll through NBA history, using YouTube to marvel, examine, question and laugh at the players, teams and trends that formed the backbone of the league we love today.

Born in 1991 I have as many memories of Larry Bird watching Pacers games in a suit, Magic Johnson dispensing head-scratching basketball analysis, and Michael Jordan in Hanes commercials with an awful mustache as I do memories of them being pillars of some of the game’s greatest dynasties. So I want to emphasize that this is an exploratory project and intended to form a community discussion. Feel free to chime in with observations or corrections.

Speaking of Bird and Magic, the series will start with their rookie years in the 1979-1980 season. It functions as a good starting point as it was the debut year for not just the most famous rivalry in NBA history, but the three-point line as well. Beginning with the 80s also doesn’t ignore any significant dynasties. Eight teams won a championship in the 70s with no back to back championships while just nine franchises have combined to win the next 34 titles with 11 repeat champions during that span.

Before starting with games next week, let’s set the table by looking at the landscape of the league. The 78-79 season culminated with my hometown Seattle SuperSonics (/sheds tear) avenging their Game 7 loss at home to the Bullets in the 1978 Finals by beating them in five games to claim Seattle’s lone championship in a major sport. Seattle got past Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s Lakers 4-1 in the Conference Semifinals, though all five games were close and two went to overtime. The Sonics then survived a Conference Finals that went the distance versus Paul Westphal, Walter Davis, and the Suns before beating the Bullets to win the title.

Abdul-Jabbar- who posted 23.8 PPG (8th), 12.8 RPG (3rd), 5.4 APG (15th), 4.0 BPG (1st), and was 2nd in FG%, 4th in MPG, 1st in PER, 4th in TS%, 2nd in EFG%, and 1st in WS- had an amazing season but lost to Seattle in the playoffs for the second year in a row. In addition to this, he finished a very distant fourth in MVP voting to Houston’s Moses Malone (24.8 PPG-5th, 17.6 RPG-1st, 1.8 APG, 1st in MPG, 3rd in PER, 7th in TS%, 13th in EFG%, 2nd in WS), according to The Association for Professional Basketball Research.

Los Angeles might have won 47 games the previous year, but thanks to compensation for Gail Goodrich signing with Utah years prior, they were gifted with the first pick. They, of course, used that pick on Magic Johnson, and while he was the only Hall of Famer from the 1979 draft, it did end up with eight All-Stars. Five of them were picked among the first dozen picks with Bill Laimbeer selected in the third round by Cleveland. This draft would deliver four Defensive Player of the Year Awards, with 5th pick Sidney Moncrief winning the very first DPOY in 1983. He would repeat in 1984 and fifth round pick Mark Eaton also won two that decade.

Notable moves in free agency:
-Washington signed 3-time assist champion Kevin Porter at the price of two first round picks going to Detroit as compensation.
-In return for signing M.L. Carr, Boston traded 5-time All-Star Bob McAdoo to Detroit and also received a pair of first round picks as part of the transaction.
-The Lakers traded a young Adrian Dantley to Utah to get big man Spencer Haywood. Dantley would go on to make six All-Star teams in his seven seasons in Utah… and work as a crossing guard.
-Los Angeles continued to beef up their front line, acquiring Jim Chones from Cleveland via trade.
-The San Diego Clippers acquired Joe Bryant, Kobe’s dad, from Philly for a pick that would end up as the top pick in 1986. 18 year old Isiah Thomas reportedly loved this trade.

Next week: A big debut, a balding scorer nearly drops 50 and getting used to young Brent Musberger.

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