Duuuude, I'm telling you. It's not the player, it's the game. EVERY team has 3 or 4 guys whose game revolves around getting certain calls from officials. The truly great players work in a tandem with the lead official and appear damn near unstoppable (Kobe, DWade, Dirk... Former dolls of the officiating include Michael Jordan, Steve Nash, and Tracy McGrady).

It's not just Griffin; everytime CP3 stutter-steps through the lane, he's looking over his shoulder to see if he can brake-check a defender into an And-1 over-the-back foul. He didn't play last night, but Billips has a few pet moves of his own; he almost ALWAYS gets high-five fouls on his jump shot and is dangerous with the pump-fake-jump-into-you move with the shot-clock running down.

If you have a favorite player on any team, I can literally draw you a picture of certain moves they use to curry the favor of the officiating. Even us, bro. Think Monta REALLY gets hit hard enough to go sideways and wipe-out on all these lay-up attempts? That's a favorite of Blake Griffin, Manu Ginobli, Chris Paul... Any dude who goes to the hole hard will occasionally use the mid-air flop to get calls. That's what worries me most about trading Ellis; seeing him show up on the Mavericks or Bulls and suddenly get all these calls that he's not getting in Golden State.

Griffin also employs the cheerleader-kick-flop on reach-ins (which nearly every post guy does; including David Lee) aaaaaand he mugs the official on his foul calls (then he charges the basket the very next play, trying to get a return call... And only the greats really get this call; Kobe, LeBron, Durant, they can all go get a foul after they are charged with one. Griffin wants THAT kinda love from the officials.

In Kemp's day, when men were men, players played with scruples. Everyone started flopping after 2000. Seriously. I can't hate on Blake Griffin for dealing with the times; I can literally name 20 players who flop harder and more often than Blake. AND he gives me Kemp-level dunks! I just can't dislike him...

OK, I didn't know it's the team. I used to like Paul, but I'm not his biggest fan after all that annoying trade talk, and him cherry picking, I just don't like that. But I'll admit it that Clippers are fun to watch if you're into that.

I don't know, I haven't seen that Paul and/or Billups flop nearly as much as Griffin does, but that doesn't mean I'm right. His flops are just to obvious to me...maybe because he is so big and strong and it looks kind of pathetic. But, yeah, these times are definitely different than those in the 90's. That's one of the reasons I can't put Griffin even close to Kemp. And not just because of that, I just don't have that same "WOW" look on my face when I see him dunk, and when I was seeing Kemp dunk.

But to each his own I guess. We can agree that we don't agree on this matter. Probably the truth is somewhere in between.

That sounds right to me, bro.

Man, the 90's had some crazy dunkers. LJ and Kemp, for sure, we on another planet, but even the subordinate would MASH on any dunk contest nowadays. TMac and Vince in the late 90's, Kobe and Grant Hill and KG before that, and especially the big guys; the Robinson's, O'Neal's, Ewing's, Zo's... Such a golden age of 7-footers.

Sigh, this depresses me about the modern game.

True, true...just makes you feel even worse, not just because your teams sucks, but because NBA sucks compared to the NBA of the past.

We need a nostalgia thread here, lol.

More Griffin highlights.



Just pulling your leg, 32, don't take it seriously.

Guybrush wrote:More Griffin highlights.



Just pulling your leg, 32, don't take it seriously.

HAHAHA, pretty sure I saw that live too!

Hey, I never vouched for his FTs... Just his dunks!