By the 90's, the game was more antiseptic, and the league watered down.
I'm not belittling the Bulls and Lakers, simply pointing out that if you didn't screw up (like Ainge did letting Posey go in '08) doing a threepeat is much easier today.
Nobody repeated once after we did in '68-69, until Len Bias dropped dead in his dorm the night we drafted him.
Especially when you see the ferocity of the competition, what the Celtics did winning eight straight world championships is the most impressive team accomplishment in sports history.
And that's not hyperbole.
I got the news about Bias from a police detail that I knew and I remember it like it was yesterday. I was in a vehicle and as I passed him by on the morning after the draft he yelled "Len Bias is dead" as I passed him. I was in shock.
I feel blessed to have been able to witness Russell's career live. I understand that many current fans have never seen him play so they don't realize the impact that he had on games, but when a group of folks who never saw him play decided to rank the top NBA players of the last 75 years, they put him 6th. What a joke.
Russell won not 1, not 2, not 3, not 4, not 5, not 6, not 7, not 8, not 9, not 10 but 11 titles in only 13 years, and as you said 8 straight. That was on a team that never won squat until he got there and didn't win again until a few years after he left.
It's funny that you mentioned Danny Ainge here and Gerald Henderson in another post. Those were the only two players that I ever saw cry after they found out they'd been traded by the Celtics. It meant a lot to them.