“Post up. Come on, big fella!”: Snoop Dogg candidly calls out modern NBA for abandoning old-school basketball

If anyone has spent time on a couch with a fan of 90s basketball, the rant is familiar: "Why is the seven-footer standing at the three-point line?" It’s a sentiment that echoes through barbershops and sports bars daily, but it carries a different weight when it comes from the D.O. Double G. Snoop Dogg, a lifelong Lakers die-hard and a permanent fixture in the front row of NBA history, recently voiced a candid, frustrated critique of the modern game’s obsession with the perimeter.Snoop isn't just a casual celebrity observer, he grew up in the era of Kareem, Magic, and eventually Shaq. To him, the evolution of positionless basketball feels less like progress and more like the abandonment of the game’s physical soul. Playing post is just not making the tallest member stand at the centre, it an an offensive advantage where a little body contact draws a foul from defensive players. After Snoop Dogg went viral clip for his commentary during the Olympics with Kevin Hart, his ability as a broadcaster needs no introduction. Now he has carried the same ability to the hardwood, and fans can’t have enough. During the match between Warriors and Clippers on Monday night at Intuit Dome, Snoop Dogg joined NBC/Peacock NBA announcers Terry Gannon and Reggie Miller to help with the second half. And he didn’t disappoint. But what stood out was his exasperation with players not using the post position at all. “Oh, this straight mismatch right here. Get the ball up and go down. Go down. Go down. They don’t play the way I did in the '80s. You are supposed to go down and set up…post up, man. Come on, Big fella! You’re 7 feet tall. Go on the paint. Look at this man.”Dogg remarked, “This is what basketball has become,” followed by some laughs.Snoop, who knows the physical intensity of the '80s and '90s basketball, wants to see the grit, the elbows in the post, and the dominance of a center who understands that being seven feet tall is a physical cheat code, not a reason to become a glorified shooting guard.Snoop’s commentary is about the loss of basketball’s diversity. When every player, from the point guard to the center, operates from the same spot on the floor, the unique roles that once defined the league start to blur. The big fella used to be the anchor and the enforcer, the one who got into the paint and played some intensive one-on-one.While the NBA is unlikely to move away from the three-point line anytime soon, voices like Snoop’s serve as a necessary reminder of how much the game has evolved and revolutionized. To a certain extent, it portrays the excitement that came with dominant post-up plays, but we can’t refute how the three-point line has changed the game’s landscape. But Snoop is speaking for a generation that believes the shortest distance to a win is still a straight line to the rim.Also read: Before the league caught on, Kobe Bryant already knew Steph Curry was a serious problem