6) This year does remind me of 1969; an aging past champion chasing younger more talented opponents with savvy, guts and tenacity.
Which team were the Celtics chasing that fit that description? It certainly wasn't the Lakers who were just as old. The Knicks, maybe, but they were too young to really be a threat to the Celtics or Lakers (that season). It was definitely not the Sixers who had no where near the talent.
In the 69 playoffs, Wilt was 2 1/2 years younger than Russell, and 32 during these playoffs. He averaged a 20/20 that year. Jerry West was 31. Since he averaged 31 points a game the following year, we can assume he was still in his prime. Elgin Baylor was only 6 months younger than Russell, but he did average 25 a game that year, so he wasn't washed up either. They had three of the top 20 players of all-time still in their primes.
The only key New York player not in their prime yet was Walt Frazier, who was a 2nd year player. Reed and DeBusschere were established stars. Bill Bradley, Cazzie Russell and Dick Barnett were all experienced, big time players. It's hard to buy the idea that they were too young.
No matter how many teams are in the league, it always boils down to three or four teams that have any chance at all. We know this because teams with less than 50 wins have won the title only twice in the last 50 years, and even those teams had some spectacular players.
What Russell did will never be duplicated.