...different than it is now? Most of his development growing up wouldn't have been going to expensive bball camps, playing AAU and high level competition, etc. It would be shooting baskets at his local play ground in the off-season, playing in his local YMCA league until junior high then playing on the school teams after that. There'd likely be no holiday high school invitational tournaments against high level competition.

Kobe would still be uber athletic but his game likely doesn't develop to fully take advantage of his athleticism had he grown up in the West era. Being 6'7" he would've likely been pigeon-holed playing a back to the basket game for much of his growing up years.

Since we don't really have DeLorean's that can travel through time when you think about a modern player and what their impact would be if they played in the very different NBA back in the day you have to figure how their development would be different if they had grown up playing in that era.

Same with plucking an old-timer like Wilt or Jerry West and putting them in today's NBA, you have to factor them growing up playing highly competitive bball early on, going to camps getting specialized training, watching YouTube videos of spectacular plays/dribbling, etc, playing AAU, etc. How would Wilt's 8 ft wingspan, 10 sec 100 meter speed, 40+ in vertical and freakish strength translate to today's game and how would his game be different growing up playing with the advantages kids have today? 3pt shot, better FT shooter, running the fast break, leading the fast break, playing PNR offense?

Picture him grabbing the defensive rebound and then taking off bringing the ball up the floor on the break and being the fastest guy on the floor at 7'1" and leaping from the top of the key to dunk it. How do you stop that? Picture him iso'd on the perimeter with another big guarding him and he sets him up with a sick crossover and flies at the rim with a full head of steam or coming from the wing off of a double stagger screen, taking a dribble hand-off at the top and slicing down the middle of the lane to attack the rim?

It's crazy to think about.