re: When NBA basketball was great.

Correct, the rules of today dictate a face up style game as every players foundation so most players are more skilled in that way. In some of the past eras rules dictated back to the basket scoring to be more effective and you had players who were more skilled in the post. Of course you have overlap and outliers all the time but overall. For example someone like a Big KAT or Embiid are much more skilled in face up offense but someone like an Al Jefferson or Hakeem Olajuwon were way more skilled on the block. It’s not that one era is more skilled than the other they’re just skilled in different ways. Could Embiid have been developed into a great post scorer, almost certainly he could. Could someone like a Derrick Coleman or KG develop into a pick and pop, face up big, almost certainly. The styles change based on the best path to success which has a lot to do with the rules, avenues and obstacles they present. If the NBA wants to get back some of the more physical aspects the game has lost, all they have to do is alter some of the rules.