I originally spotted this story at PacersDigest.com...
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/sonics/2002689768_allen18.html
NBA's greatest games at your fingertips
By Percy Allen
Seattle Times NBA reporter
I must admit the basketball geek inside of me went a little spastic when I read the league is creating a digital archive of NBA games and will make the content available — for a small fee, I presume — on its Web site.
Think about it. Every game at your fingertips. How cool is that? All bets would be settled. Did Jordan push off when he nailed that jumper over Bryon Russell in Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals? (Yup. He did.)
We can relive the epic battles between Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain without waiting for them to be aired on ESPN Classic. No more highlight montages, which tend to exaggerate a player's greatness. Actual games from start to finish.
A video library where we can watch the advent of flight in the NBA — when Julius Erving, David Thompson and George Gervin elevated the game above the rim — and the birth of cool, which was epitomized by Walt Frazier, Earl Monroe and Chamberlain.
We'll be able to trace the lineage of the league and prove to the underage crowd that before LeBron James, there was Magic Johnson and before him there was Oscar Robertson.
The project is expected to be completed in six years, but fans may have access to some games as early as next year. The league is archiving the older and the newer games first and working its way toward the middle.
"Many people would probably want to relive the shot that Michael hit over us [in the 1989 playoffs], but I'd want to see the play right before that one," said Lenny Wilkens, former Cleveland Cavaliers coach. "We were down with something like 10 seconds to go and everybody thought the ball was going to [Mark] Price. ... But Craig [Ehlo] ran a backdoor [play] from out of bounds. The thing is, he scored too soon."
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/sonics/2002689768_allen18.html
NBA's greatest games at your fingertips
By Percy Allen
Seattle Times NBA reporter
I must admit the basketball geek inside of me went a little spastic when I read the league is creating a digital archive of NBA games and will make the content available — for a small fee, I presume — on its Web site.
Think about it. Every game at your fingertips. How cool is that? All bets would be settled. Did Jordan push off when he nailed that jumper over Bryon Russell in Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals? (Yup. He did.)
We can relive the epic battles between Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain without waiting for them to be aired on ESPN Classic. No more highlight montages, which tend to exaggerate a player's greatness. Actual games from start to finish.
A video library where we can watch the advent of flight in the NBA — when Julius Erving, David Thompson and George Gervin elevated the game above the rim — and the birth of cool, which was epitomized by Walt Frazier, Earl Monroe and Chamberlain.
We'll be able to trace the lineage of the league and prove to the underage crowd that before LeBron James, there was Magic Johnson and before him there was Oscar Robertson.
The project is expected to be completed in six years, but fans may have access to some games as early as next year. The league is archiving the older and the newer games first and working its way toward the middle.
"Many people would probably want to relive the shot that Michael hit over us [in the 1989 playoffs], but I'd want to see the play right before that one," said Lenny Wilkens, former Cleveland Cavaliers coach. "We were down with something like 10 seconds to go and everybody thought the ball was going to [Mark] Price. ... But Craig [Ehlo] ran a backdoor [play] from out of bounds. The thing is, he scored too soon."
