The problem of assessing old time against new isn't as difficult as it seems.
All you have to do is look at the skill-sets the players of old needed when compared to those of the modern player.
We also have to look at the training modern teams do and the way their rosters are populated.
Start by looking at the relative size and age differences between teams of old and today.
Today we are smaller, faster and younger.
On top of those physical differences, we are better skilled, better trained, better motivated, more committed and more sophisticated.
Any top Am team would beat any of the top pros from yesteryear on Sup 'Air.
The level of technical skill the top ams use nowadays is far in advance of the skill sets displayed by old pro teams.
Also, modern pros would cream the ass outa the old pros on Sup’Air, no argument.
That level of ascendancy of modern pros would also be transferred into the woodland game if up against the old pros.
You put Dynasty, Dogs, Legion, Oakland Assassins, whoever up against any of the old pros in the woods, it would be a matter of a few games where the modern pros would readjust and the old timers wouldn’t get a look in from then on.
I played in both eras, I know the level of commitment and training we used to do as well as the skill-set levels we had.
I have already mentioned in PGI articles the level of training we used to do on Aftershock when we were at our height.
Aftershock thru the mid to late nineties reigned supreme and as far as I know, we never did one drill in the three years I was with them.
The team used to train for a few hours on a Sunday by playing against other am teams who used to turn up.
If we were lucky, we got thru training without Mikey Bruno exploding, Danny Love moaning and bitching, Dino Yario killing some fool, Todd Adamson eating somebody and so on.
It was a joke.
The team did this on average about once every three weeks.
It was a ramshackle arrangement and was virtually useless in terms of team and skill development.
We were 5 time world champions and trained like Muppets.
That was then and now is now, the paintball landscape has drastically changed revealing the shortcomings of yesteryear and highlighting the more professional approach we all now try to assume.
Nostalgia will dictate that some people suggest old teams would beat the new ones in the woods, it just wouldn't happen.
