Tag Archives: Players

This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at the players whose stints with their current team runs through the past two generations of consoles.

It seems almost inevitable that the stars of the NBA will play for more than one team these days. While player movement is nothing new, and some of the biggest names in NBA history had stints with more than one team, we’re seeing more and more future Hall of Famers jump ship in their prime. With the retirement of Tim Duncan, Dirk Nowitzki, and the late Kobe Bryant, we may have seen the last players to spend their entire career with one franchise, or at least retire where they had their most success. It’s certainly becoming more of a rarity, as the culture of the league continues to shift.

At the same time, there are a few players who are in the midst of lengthy tenures with their current teams. With the launch of a new generation of consoles, there’s a group of players who are still with the same teams they played for at the beginning of the previous generation. How many do they number, and how does that compare to older eras and console generations? Let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at ten more familiar faces who found themselves back in familiar places.

Yes, there are even more examples of familiar faces in familiar places, and video games that represent those tenures! Many well-known players who leave the team they’re most closely associated with ultimately end their careers in strange (or at the very least, different) places, but quite a few of them do end up donning a familiar jersey once again. As I’ve said before, while one might think that the familiarity of the situation would make those stints stand out, sometimes we end up forgetting that stars and key rotation players returned to their former team.

On the other hand, there are also players whose returns were quite successful, and thus tend to be remembered. Of course, whether it’s a low-key homecoming, a high profile farewell tour, a brief reunion, or the welcome return of a player that still has a lot left in the tank, they lead to some interesting situations in the real NBA, and on the virtual hardwood. Once again, I’ve compiled ten more examples to reminisce about through the lens of basketball video games, so let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at ten more familiar faces who found themselves back in familiar places.

Just as there are have been several familiar faces that ended up in strange places, there are more familiar faces who made it back to familiar places than I can possibly fit into just one list of ten! To that end, I’m also making this spinoff topic an ongoing series for Wayback Wednesday. As I previously noted, these homecomings can be just as interesting as the strange stints of well-known players, as they can also end up flying under the radar and being forgotten due to being unremarkable returns. In other cases, it’s the original stint with a team that is overlooked.

Either way, they’re fun to look back on. We can obviously do that by going back and watching old games, but it’s also possible to revisit these tenures through the virtual hardwood. I’ve grown quite fond of referring to basketball video games as interactive almanacs and time capsules to the point where I’m probably overusing the expression. It is quite apt though, and with that in mind, I’m using video games to demonstrate these examples of familiar faces back in familiar places. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at yet more NBA players who became familiar faces in strange places, and those stints in video games.

Just when you thought I was done talking about familiar faces in strange places, here is part four in an ongoing series of Wayback Wednesday articles! Not all of these players are Hall of Famers or even perennial All-Stars, but they are nevertheless significant and recognisable, thereby qualifying as familiar faces. They’re also players that we grew accustomed to seeing play for one or two teams in particular, so the strange places they ended up in do make for a jarring sight, both in real life and on the virtual hardwood.

Once again, I’m looking at these familiar faces in strange places through the lens of basketball video games, in part because that’s obviously what we cover here at the NLSC, but also because it emphasises how games like NBA Live and NBA 2K in particular act as time capsules and interactive almanacs. From past champions and the glory days of the game’s brightest stars, to the forgotten and overlooked stints I’m recalling here, those memories come flooding back upon firing up old favourites. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at another selection of players that I remember primarily because of video games.

It’s time for Part 4 in an ongoing series for Wayback Wednesday, in which I take a look back at players that I remember thanks to basketball gaming. I’ve joked about it a few times before in articles and on the NLSC Podcast, but I can’t remember a single thing about quadratic equations or pretty much anything else I learned in high school maths. However, I can still recall the “dunk from anywhere” code for NBA Jam Tournament Edition on SNES, the location of bonus barrels and DK coins in Donkey Kong Country 2 and 3, and a ton of quotes from classic episodes of The Simpsons.

Oh, and a bunch of lesser known NBA players from the 90s and 2000s. I may have also seen them play in real games, and basketball cards have also played a role in helping certain players to stand out in my mind, but playing video games (and in particular, creating roster updates for them) is what truly embedded them into my memory. As I said, I’ve got another list of ten players to share today, so let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at another selection of players that I remember primarily because of video games.

In a couple of previous Wayback Wednesday features, I recalled some of the players that stick in my mind in large part thanks to basketball gaming. Making roster updates for NBA Live is unquestionably a factor here, as I ended up spending a lot of time looking at names, researching players to create them and edit their ratings, or simply moving them around from team to team. After I stopped making rosters, I found that I was far less familiar with players at the end of the bench, and even some of the lesser-known rotation players on basement teams.

That’s led to me being able to remember benchwarmers and other somewhat obscure players from the 90s and 2000s much easier than I can name certain current players. I expect that will change somewhat now that my current roster update for NBA 2K11 is taking shape, but growing up with basketball games has embedded a number of role players from yesteryear in my memory. I figured this would become an ongoing series when I posted the first article last year, and indeed, I have another list to share with you all today. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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Welcome to this week’s edition of The Friday Five! The Friday Five is a feature that I post every Friday in which I give my thoughts on a topic that’s related to NBA Live, NBA 2K, and other basketball video games, as well as the real NBA, and other areas of interest to our community. The feature is presented as either a list of five items, or in the form of a Top 5 countdown. This week’s Five is a list of five more players who only appeared on certain teams in video games.

It’s time for Part 2 of a topic I’ve previously covered here in The Friday Five: players who appeared on certain teams in video games, but not in real life. As I said last time, one of the fun parts of revisiting old games is seeing a snapshot of the NBA as it was when they were current, and recalling players’ forgotten stints with various teams. In doing so, you can also discover oddities such as players appearing on the rosters of teams that they never actually suited up for in real life. Although these look like mistakes, there are several reasons why it happens.

As I noted in my previous article, these include early roster cut-off dates and deals made later in the offseason, deals that are voided, and injuries that put players on the shelf for the entire time they’re with a particular team. Roster cut-off dates aren’t an issue anymore thanks to official updates – and we could always make updates to the rosters ourselves – but due to the aforementioned circumstances, some players will still only ever suit up for a particular team on the virtual hardwood, while being little more than a name on the roster/payroll in real life. Once again, I find trivia like that to be quite interesting due to the different back stories, so here are five more examples!

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Welcome to this week’s edition of The Friday Five! The Friday Five is a feature that I post every Friday in which I give my thoughts on a topic that’s related to NBA Live, NBA 2K, and other basketball video games, as well as the real NBA, and other areas of interest to our community. The feature is presented as either a list of five items, or in the form of a Top 5 countdown. This week’s Five is a list of five players who only appeared on certain teams in video games.

I’ve mentioned that one of the fun aspects of revisiting old games for my Wayback Wednesday features is that they’re a snapshot of the NBA at the time. It’s interesting how it can jog your memory when you fire up an old title, see a familiar name, and think “Oh, I forgot he played for them!” For me it happens with a lot of journeyman who I recall from the 90s and early 2000s, and even a couple of stars who had brief stints with unusual teams at the end of their careers. With the way that some players change teams, it can be difficult to immediately find them in older titles.

Of course, the snapshot that games can provide of the NBA of yesteryear isn’t always completely accurate. Older titles had roster cut-off dates and no official updates, so players would end up on teams they were cut or traded from by the time a title was released. Other players might indeed spend time on a team’s roster during the season, but never actually play a single game for them due to injury or other factors, thus only appearing for them on the virtual hardwood. As with the players who have appeared in more video games than NBA games, I find it to be an interesting trivia note. Let’s look at five players whose stints with teams only came on the virtual hardwood!

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at some more players that I remember because of video games.

Back in September, I listed ten players that I remember in large part because of basketball video games. I could have easily listed many more, but I didn’t want the article to be too long. I also figured that it was a topic I could revisit from time to time, much as I’ve done with my series of Friday Five articles on retro teams that I’d like to see in NBA 2K. Furthermore, it’s something I enjoyed doing the first time around, as the players we used to play with and against in old basketball games make up a big part of our nostalgia for them.

Although I may also remember these players from watching real games, or collecting basketball trading cards, video games tend to be the main reason that I recall their names and faces. Through playing with and against them on the virtual hardwood, they remain familiar to me all these years later, even though they weren’t NBA All-Stars or future Hall of Famers. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! In this feature, we dig into the archives, look back at the history of basketball gaming, and indulge in some nostalgia. Check in every Wednesday for retrospectives and other features on older versions of NBA Live, NBA 2K, and old school basketball video games in general. You’ll also find old NLSC editorials re-published with added commentary, and other flashback content. This week, I’m taking a look back at some players that I remember because of video games.

In response to my retrospective of NBA Live 95 for our 25th Anniversary of NBA Live celebrations, our own Q noted that the game helped him form opinions about NBA players. I can certainly say that video games were one of my main resources for learning about the league and its players when I was first getting into basketball, and I know a lot of other 90s kids can say the same. I’ve wondered if that still applies to the younger gamers these days. NBA 2K’s success has unquestionably made the genre mainstream, but the Internet has also made the NBA itself more accessible than ever.

I’ve previously joked that you know you’re a long-time hardcore NBA fan when you can name benchwarmers from over a decade ago. Trading cards and video games are also a reason that I remember a lot of lesser-known players from the 90s and 2000s, and a few of them will often spring to mind thanks to the virtual hardwood. For this week’s Wayback Wednesday, I’m recalling some of those players who stuck in my mind due to their video game counterparts. Let’s take a look back…way back…

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Welcome to this week’s edition of The Friday Five! The Friday Five is a feature that I post every Friday in which I give my thoughts on a topic that’s related to NBA Live, NBA 2K, and other basketball video games, as well as the real NBA, and other areas of interest to our community. The feature is presented as either a list of five items, or in the form of a Top 5 countdown. This week’s Five is a list of five players who left the NBA quite abruptly.

Not all NBA players receive a big send-off when they call it a career. Farewell tours are generally reserved for future Hall of Famers, and even then, that’s something that only happens when a player makes a definitive declaration that the current season will be their last. Even when a player leaves the NBA without a big announcement or much fanfare, it isn’t necessarily a surprise. If they’re getting on in years and have already enjoyed a lengthy career, there’s usually no mystery as to why they’ve decided to hang it up, and are no longer a fixture after being around for so many years.

And then, there are the players who appear to leave the NBA quite abruptly and without any kind of statement, even when they seem to have several seasons left in them. Some quietly go overseas to play, or officially retire a few years later, but whatever the case, they’ll fail to latch on with a team and then that will be the last we’ll ever see of them in the NBA. While that’s inevitable given the limited amount of roster spots and the constant influx of new talent, we are left wondering what happened when prominent players seemingly just disappear. Here are five such players whose NBA careers came to a rather abrupt halt.

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