They also got to coast on defense against a bunch of stiffs that had no shooting, compared to today where it's a court spread with 5 deadly 3pt shooters.
Also the game had way less possessions as offense got 24 seconds instead of 14 today, so there was a lot of time just pounding the ball and resting.
Don't get me wrong - I love 90s NBA and prefer most of it to todays boring 3pt yawn fest. But the effort players have to exert today is incomparable. Additionally a sample of 2 guys that played all those games like Stockton/Jordan isn't indictive of what the other 95% of players can do. Those guys are exceptions - not the rule.