Oscar Robertson talks Jerry Sloan, Deron Williams, and the state of today’s sorry-ass NBA

** “I watch some [Playoff] games. Some games I don’t like to watch–phantom calls and everything else. Everything is one-on-one basketball; there’s no real team play.”

** “What you have today in this game of basketball is…there’s no real back-door play, no double screens, no throwing the ball to the weak side or any of those type of things like that. It’s just throw me the ball, get out of my way, hopefully I can make a one-on-one play. 95% of the guys, they’re not good one-on-one players.” (Me: Is this or is this not a description of the Jazz this past season?)

** Back in the day: I did a lot of one-on-one, but one-on-one for me is that you don’t hold the ball. If it’s not there, you get rid of it. Do something else. You hit the pivot, you pick down on the forward or you pick up cross on the guard, you double screen, you go back door, and those types of things. The ball was moving primarily through the pivot quite a bit. (Me: Is this or is this not a description of the Ghost of Jazz Past?)

** on Derrick Rose: He was anointed the MVP before the season started, and I’m glad he played well enough to win it.

** on Jerry Sloan the player: Very physical player, dedicated. Knew very well how to play people. He was a team player.

** on LAL: The Lakers are a team that fell victim to Kobe Bryant. Kobe Bryant is a great, great basketball player, going to be in the Hall of Fame one day. But because of Kobe Bryant’s, ooooh, attitude about his play, what he can do, he killed everybody else’s play. He killed Ron Artest, Ron Artest had no game. Pau Gasol’s game went down. Bynum played OK, but Bynum’s not going to win a championship for you. Fisher. When one guy takes all the shots, if he’s not making them, you’re in trouble. And look at their bench! On the contract, you give a guy, what’s [Kobe] getting, 25-30 million? Someone else has to pay for that on that bench, and if you have guys that come into the game who can never score or can’t make a basket anywhere, you’re not going to win. And it proves, their type of play just won’t win. (Cackle with me ;p)

** on Jimmer: When I gave [Jimmer Fredette] the [Oscar Robertson] Award, I said, “You made a lot of coaches change their defenses and do all these 1, 3, triangle, 2s just to try to stop you and it never worked.”

** on defense: There’s not that many guys in the NBA that can defend. You’ll find some, but when a guard can just drive by you…it’s unbelievable. There’s just no defense.

** on Deron: I thought Williams that you had was probably one of the better guards [in the league], and because he played in Utah he didn’t get the hype the kid down in New Orleans got, or Jason Kidd…He’s just as good as any of those basketball players…I’m sure that he’s going to be picked to play on the USA team in London for the next Olympics.

** on hype: What bothers me more than anything is that you get writers who never saw Williams play, or some of the guys on your team play…You find writers who never, ever caught a basketball; they’re the ones who are picking players [for awards] and ranking players and doing these things..I think it’s really a flaw in the whole system that we have.

** on averaging a triple double for a season: When I did all those things, no one mentioned it at all. No one ever said a thing about a triple double. When Magic started playing with Bird, all of a sudden the triple double was so important to the point where they changed what an assist was. Today, if I throw you the ball and you dribble it four or five times and score, that’s considered an assist. Years ago, it was not. (KFAN)

(I apologize if there are any typos. I just discovered today that there’s a browser version of Angry Birds, and, well, I need to get back to that.)