Mostly fair arguments, Don C.

I don't agree at all with your point about more teams necessarily meaning a dilution of talent, though.

Back then, you were filling the rosters of 8 teams with talent from the USA only, and the USA had a much smaller population. Today the NBA draws the best players from all over world.

So while there are four times as many times, the population pool that the players are being drawn from is probably four times as great as it was in the 60's, hence no dilution of talent.

I would also add that the conditions Jordan played under were much tougher.

The original 8 team league that Russell played in was Boston, New York, Syracuse, Cinncinatti, Detroit, Minneapolis (then L.A.), St. Louis, and Philly (then San Fran). There was not nearly the amount of travel as there is today.

But the biggest factor for me is still 4 rounds of playoff games vs. only 2.