And the 3pt line was wide open back then.
As far as the lane....defenders couldn’t help as much back then. So mike got to play 1 on 1....with LATE help due to the illegal defense rule. He also came into the league....when the league played at its FASTEST pace...ever. And scoring was up crazy. Then year by year...it slowed in the 90s...and he still got buckets then. He gets buckets wherever. He’s showed it (80s,90s,00s). He’s the GOAT. But we gotta put context into it.
And The lane is more open now, because the court is spaced due to shooting and because bigs who can’t defend the perimeter or multiple positions got played off the court. The elite defensive teams still play great team defense and have rim protection. There’s just a lot more ground to cover. And the concepts of defense are more advanced. Defensive versatility is at a premium.
And to your first question...I think guys would score just about the same. They’d score differently, and utilize the 3 now, as opposed to long twos. All the elite scorers (except harden) utilize the midrange. Even PGs like Curry/Paul/Kyrie. KD, LBJ, Kawhi/Butler etc score in the mid range. And Jokic, Embiid, KAT etc still do too.
I think shot distribution changes across eras. But usage, and who’s using possessions etc is what remains.
