SH Blog: Thaddeus Young is the last man standing in Philadelphia; Knicks buy out Metta and Udrih

Lately I’ve been watching classic NBA games on YouTube. There’s a fair few of them up there in full, and while it’s obviously nice to watch Michael Jordan in his prime (and the Bad Boys-era Pistons, Charles Barkley in Philly, young Scottie Pippen… the list goes on), what’s struck me most has been the differences in how the game is played between then and now.

Namely, I’m talking about the veritable avalanche of long twos. These days, if a player jacks up a long two with 16 seconds on the shot clock, they’re probably getting pulled pretty quick. But 25 years ago, it seems like players were shooting whenever they got daylight. It’s like every player is Josh Smith. It’s an exciting style of play for sure, but you have to wonder how one of those teams would do against, say, the drive-and-kick Spurs, or Mike D’Antoni’s Phoenix teams, or Golden State’s Splash Brothers.

One game I know I’d like to see would be the late-80s Pistons against the early-2000s Pistons. Bill Laimbeer against Rasheed Wallace? Yes, please.

Now let’s get to the latest news from around the NBA:

THADDEUS YOUNG STILL STUCK IN PHILLY

Not literally, of course, but with Jrue Holiday, Evan Turner, and Spencer Hawes all gone now, he’s the only member of the Sixers’ former young core that is still with the team. That Andrew Bynum trade was a real winner.

Bob Cooney of the Philadelphia Daily News:

Young doesn’t hide on or off the court. Thursday’s trades that sent away fellow starters Evan Turner and Spencer Hawes left him as the elder statesman of the team, and the lone remaining vet left to endure what is sure to be gut-wrenching end of the season.

“This situation, I don’t know how much worse it can get, but there’s a lot of great guys in this locker room who can play,” he said dutifully. “Hopefully, we can just go out there and get better as a team and continue to play hard.”

Now in his seventh season, all with the Sixers, Young has seen some good and a whole lot of bad. The teams have compiled a 233-300 record during his tenure under five head coaches and only one winning season. Through it all, though, Young is the stabilizing force who says all the right things and plays as hard as he can each game. But he was deprived of being dealt from this situation, a fact that he has thought about.

“I am not going to lie, a little bit,” he said of feeling left out on trade day. “Certain things don’t always happen in your favor or it doesn’t happen the way everybody else thinks it should play out. It’s been a very tough year so far, but you try to make the best of the situation.”

I can’t remember a GM who made as many moves after taking over a team as Pete D’Alessandro — although I’ve played as the Kings in NBA 2K14 and that roster does require a good deal of tinkering. This week they moved Marcus Thornton to the Nets for Jason Terry and Reggie Evans, in a move that has to be largely to clear up playing time for Ben McLemore, especially since Terry won’t play for Sacramento this season.

Kings guard Jason Terry will not join the team this season, Kings coach Michael Malone said during his weekly appearance on the Grant Napear Show.

Terry, 36, instead will rehab in Dallas in preparation for next season. Terry had left knee surgery in the offseason and hasn’t felt right all season, Malone said.

Terry was acquired along with forward Reggie Evans for Marcus Thornton on Wednesday.

Terry is averaging a career-worst 4.5 points on 36.2 percent shooting this season. Knee problems have limited Terry to 35 games this season and a career-low 16.3 minutes per games.

The Kings indicated they did not plan to buyout the remainder of Terry’s contract, which has one more season on it worth $5.45 million.