How Scottie Pippen changed the 1998 Finals | Enhanced pod

You need more of these videos. You could literally do this with every playoff series ever

Things like this aren’t explain in basketball history enough and people just take numbers at face value. A perimeter scorer in the era of illegal defense (Jordan) always had spacing, or something like a 1on1 matchup. And in the modern era, shooting bigs create the spacing that went away when they overruled the illegal defense. The in between is the deadball era, the 2000s. Guys like Kobe, AI, TMac get a “shot chucker” label, when really, they were the first and only group of stars to play basketball with zero spacing. The 2 bigman lineups of the 90s, without the rules that forced defense to follow them outside. So its reasons like this that comparing the stats of someone like AI, to a modern guard today will never ever ever measure his real impact. Or even going back and comparing Kobe to Jordan. The numbers dont see that major change.

What's crazy to me is that in the series before against the Pacers Pippen was tasked with point of attack defense and pressuring Mark Jackson. Truly incomparable defensive versatility.

Imo, the illegal defence rules being removed has to be taken heavily into consideration when comparing the players in the mid 2000s to the players of eras before them. When looking at the great scorers of the mid 2000s people are quick to point to their low scoring numbers and low field goal percentage, but once people realize that they might have played in the toughest defensive era in league history (no more illegal defence, and not much spacing) I feel they can rank them better. Understanding how tough the defence was back then will allow people to have greater appreciation and respect for the scoring numbers players like Kobe, ai, tmac, young lebron, young d wade etc. were able to put up.

Scottie defensive strategy was outstanding. He could score, pass, defense, act as a facilitator and an energy so efficiently in his career. He could easily play all the position too.

The illegal defence rule was an absolutely insane thing to put in place. Presumably they conceived it as a kind of rule mandated spacing (?).

We need that video of the evolution of defensive rules and how it shaped that end of the game; absolutely. Upwards of 90% of the people who watch this will not be able to grasp watching the game with that type of illegal defense. I think it’s vital to understand and have a background in this facet of history.

I think a video series that adds context for why the rules changed would bridge the gap between the older and newer generations of basketball fans. I know TB already touches on it every now and again but I think showing seperate episodes on Wilt, Shaq, Jordan and Lebron dealing with new defensive strategies would be an awesome watch. Thinking basketball is the perfect channel to explore how these developments impacted the game we watch today. Love the videos Ben. Keep up the masterful work.

Sunday just got better. Pippen is just another level of basketball. He has his problems with mouth nowdays but let's not forget he was incredible to watch.

i would love to see a video on the evolution of these rules, it seems crazy that they ever implemented them so it would be nice to know why they did it

The outlandishness of how teams abused the illegal defense rules is exactly what pops into my head when someone says "Well, MJ would have been impossible to guard if he had 3pt spacing like today!". He already had that due to the dumb rule.

Love these enhanced podcast parts

Finally. Smart people talk about basketball in a smart way about Scottie Pippen.

cool! I was so unaware of this dynamic as a kid watching this series!

Was about to go searching for that Bill Walton clip, thanks for including it at the end.

Love the content ben

The inability of coaches to make changes because of what traditional knowledge states is frustrating. It's especially frustrating as a Jazz fan because I really think if Malone was the 5 and the jazz take a few more 3s per game (jazz were a better shooting team) we win the 98 finals. It shows what non-threats can do to an offense

The illegal defense rule change was the biggest shift in basketball in the last 30 years..That's why it's so funny to see people say that NBA doesn't play any defense today, when guys could literally just go one on one all game back then.. Scottie was a great player back then but I do think his offensive game would be weak weak in comparison to guys like Kawhi, PG-13, Jimmy Butler, Giannis etc who are his size, can play great defense and score much better than he ever could..shows how much better the league is now

This was fantastic. Thanks!

Best Enhanced pod yet!