As a keen observer of the game, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar knows every NBA era has its defining philosophy. The ’80s revolved around bruising post-battles. The ’90s celebrated dominant centers who controlled the paint, while today’s NBA is built around pace, spacing and 3-point shooting.
Lots of 3-point shooting.
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To many NBA fans, the low-post game has become a relic of basketball history. To Abdul-Jabbar, however, that conclusion is far too convenient.
The NBA’s former all-time leading scorer has long argued that post-up play did not disappear because it stopped working. Instead, Kareem firmly believes players simply stopped doing it.
“Anybody that knows how to post up can go out there and do it today,” Abdul-Jabbar told Fox Sports in 2020. “There’s nothing stopping anybody from going out there and playing a dominant post-up game. It’s just that there are no players that are forcing that issue.”
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Coming from arguably the greatest and most effective offensive center the game has ever seen, that statement is hard to ignore or dismiss. Kareem spent two decades punishing defenders with his impeccable post moves, and perhaps the most unstoppable shot basketball has ever produced: his signature skyhook.
Abdul-Jabbar’s point is straightforward. Modern defenses may switch more often and stretch the floor, but none of those tactical changes eliminate the value of having a player capable of consistently scoring with his back to the basket.
“When you get the player that can deliver in the paint, he’s going to create problems for the other team,” he explained. “It always happens that way.”
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Kareem’s concern regarding the 3-point revolution
History certainly supports Abdul-Jabbar’s argument. Nearly every NBA dynasty has featured an elite presence down low, from Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell to Hakeem Olajuwon, Shaquille O’Neal, David Robinson and Tim Duncan.
However, Kareem could tell that in recent years, the league’s big men are no longer willing to develop a bag of post moves. They have completely stepped out of their territory, all the way to the 3-point line.
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Abdul-Jabbar has never dismissed the value of outside shooting. However, he believes today’s game has become overly dependent on it.
As players continue to set new records for 3-point attempts, Kareem worries that younger centers have become fascinated by difficult shots while overlooking the most efficient scoring opportunities.
“Young players are falling for a ruse, in that they put a premium on a low percentage shot,” Kareem said of too many 3-point shots in today’s NBA. “High percentage shots win games.”
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Abdul-Jabbar’s perspective comes from firsthand experience during one of basketball’s greatest eras. According to “Cap,” when he helped lead the Los Angeles Lakers to win multiple championships through the Showtime years, the 3-point shot already existed. However, it was merely a complementary weapon rather than the foundation of a team’s offense.
“I looked at the stats in 1985, we played the Celtics in the Finals, the most three-point shots taken by either team in a game…was seven. Nowadays, they’re shooting twenty in a half, easily. So that reliance on the three-point shot, it has changed the game. Playing from my era, that’s what I see. Why don’t you work the ball inside and take a high percentage shot?”
The forgotten art of the skyhook
Along with the post-game, Abdul-Jabbar has admitted that his trademark skyhook shot has also become something of a forgotten craft. He assessed the same with the low-post: the skyhook has largely vanished from today’s NBA, not because it suddenly became ineffective, but because only a few to no young players spend the countless hours necessary to perfect it.
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Yet, Kareem has never believed that the shot itself became obsolete.
In fact, he has argued on more than one occasion that a properly executed skyhook shot remains one of the game’s most efficient ways to score. That is especially when compared to Steph Curry’s revolutionary yet insane long-range 3-pointers.
Even with that in mind, Abdul-Jabbar has recognized how shooting talent has evolved dramatically over the years.
“They showed Stephen [Curry] shooting 100 three-point shots in practice. He made 92 out of 100 from the three-point arc, including 77 in a row. This is just practicing. Anybody that can shoot like that is on a different plane from all the guys that I played against, and the people that I saw when I first started watching the game in 1960, I’ve never seen anybody shoot the ball like that,” Abdul-Jabbar said on Conversations with Tyler in 2016.
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The Hall of Famer openly acknowledges that trendsetters like Curry have fundamentally changed what is possible from beyond the arc. Elite shooting in the current era reaches levels that would have been unimaginable decades ago.
On the flip side, Kareem also believes that it has made basketball development overly one-dimensional these days, and that it shouldn’t be the case.
“If that is the coming talent level of NBA players, they’re going to be forgetting a lot about the guys that played in my era and the earlier eras of the NBA because the talent level of the guys playing now has really risen,” he stressed. “But they’re not teaching the kids how to score in the paint with their back to the basket, and, therefore, a lot of them don’t get to learn the hook shot, and they don’t get to realize that if you get close to the basket, a lot more of your shots will go in. They don’t seem to understand that.”
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Modern centers challenge Kareem’s argument
While Abdul-Jabbar’s criticism of the 3-point shot resonates with most traditional basketball purists, today’s NBA also presents evidence that challenges part of his argument.
It will always be true that shots near the basket generally carry the highest probability of success. However, the evolution of the center position has transformed offensive efficiency in ways that simply didn’t exist during Kareem’s playing days.
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Modern big men are no longer confined to the paint. Instead, many have become legitimate stretch players capable of knocking down outside shots at elite rates.
The numbers from the 2025-26 season illustrate that astronomical transformation.
Bobby Portis emerged as the NBA’s best 3-point shooting frontcourt player of the past season, with a 45.6% accuracy. Kel’el Ware led the league’s true centers list with a solid 39.5% from 3-point land, followed by Myles Turner and Nikola Jokic with 38.3 and 38 percent, respectively. Truth be told, those percentages rival, and in many cases, even exceed the efficiency of many guards and wings.
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Ultimately, the truth is in the pudding, as both Kareem and these modern 3-point percentages are hard to ignore. Abdul-Jabbar will certainly be waiting for the next great big man to dominate the low post, while most centers will continue to jack up 3-pointers because, according to analytics, the team generating more high-value threes wins the game.
This story was originally published by Basketball Network on Aug 8, 2026, where it first appeared in the Off The Court section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
