RealGM 2017 Top 100 List: #4

[kayess]

[quote="ThaRegul8r"][/quote]

If the top 100 project were nothing but you bringing stuff out of your files to bring perspective, I would still tune it to every thread. Thanks for the enlightening read.

That bit about him hitting his first 12 shots was interesting - I thought for a second it was about Game 6 in 2013, where he had 25 and hit his first... 10 or 11 I think? Missed a couple, but put the Spurs in prime position to seal the deal. 24/12 and good defense in the decider too (although I have to admit that that missed bunny hurts...) If Kawhi/Gino make their free throws, we aren't even talking about a Game 7 and instead talking about one last vintage performance from Timmy D to seal the title.

[Senior]

People always act like luck only ever went one way. Greer doesn't hit that shot and the 76ers lose in five and there isn't even any need for Havlicek to steal the ball. Probably most people who talk about Havlicek's steal don't even know about Greer's shot because that isn't the moment shown over and over since his team lost the series, and most basketball fans don't know much about that period of time (Wilt scored 100 in a game and averaged 50 for a season, Oscar averaged a triple double, Russell won 11 rings, and West went 1-8 in the Finals).

Fatal9, by the way, is the poster I was referring to who actually mentioned that.

I mean, that's the very same series. Does Greer deserve no credit? Jerry West gets credit for his shot against the Knicks even though they ultimately lost the game because the three-pointer didn't exist yet, but Greer gets absolutely no credit—except from fatal9—for keeping the Sixers from falling into a 1-3 deficit.

Totally agree here. The luck factor only comes into play for the losers because it's a great way to explain away their losses. But it's not uncommon for the title winners to face just as much adversity...they just overcame it. The losers did not. For example, in 1968, we hear plenty about how the Sixers were blown up by injury and that's why they lost...but they were already up 3-1 with Cunningham out. The Celtics made an adjustment to have Wayne Embry defend Wilt while Russell took Chet Walker. Sixers had three chances to close them out and didn't get it done - and had a great chance in Game 6 with Greer dropping 40.

Another example - Reg has pointed out that Russell played with a broken bone in his foot during the 66 playoffs. I'd never even heard about it until recently because they won the Finals, so it couldn't be used as an excuse for a Celtics loss. IIRC Russell didn't let word of whatever injuries he had slip out because he didn't want to give other teams an excuse to target his injury.

I tend to see luck as relatively even and overall not significant in determining who wins a series because there were plenty of other events within a player's control that could've gone differently. When it comes to Russell, his consistency in elimination games is mind-blowing. And even if you want to flip years such as 62 and 65, that still leaves like 6-7 other titles and coming within 3-4 plays of winning the 11 he actually did.

This Russell vs Wilt is going to set the tone for the rest of the project - the criteria used to support both guys are nearly opposite each other. Looking forward to it.

[ThaRegul8r]

Reg has pointed out that Russell played with a broken bone in his foot during the 66 playoffs. I'd never even heard about it until recently because they won the Finals, so it couldn't be used as an excuse for a Celtics loss. IIRC Russell didn't let word of whatever injuries he had slip out because he didn't want to give other teams an excuse to target his injury.

Correct. I first posted about this here in the aforementioned Retro Player of the Year Project, but this was before you registered here:

I just got through saying this somewhere else—when people talk about injuries, I have NEVER heard anymore mention the fact that in the 1965-66 season Bill Russell himself was playing with a broken bone in his foot and a chipped (left) elbow (thought at the time to be possibly broken, but found out after the Finals to be chipped) since February.

“His right foot has a swelling which protrudes about three inches on the outside of the foot.”

Russell swore Auerbach and the Celtics to secrecy: 1) because he didn't want to give opponents a reason to target the injury and try to take Russell out and thus hurt the Celtics' chances of winning again, and 2)

.“I don’t want any alibis if I lose this year”

Russell wanted nothing to be said about it because he didn't want any excuses if the Celtics failed to win. But, I mean, we know Kevin McHale played the 1988 postseason with a broken foot. We know Wilt played the deciding game of the '72 Finals with a broken hand. But I have NEVER seen anyone other than myself mention this, even though injuries are always cited for other players. Russell was playing from February through the NBA Finals with this, and then was finally able to get something done once the season was over. This was potentially catastrophic. Why this oversight? Why is the full story not being presented, and only the injuries for one side?

Yes, Wilt had some team cohesion issues, but Russell by this point was missing a lot of practice time too to try to stay healthy.

Good reason to, when you've got a broken bone in your foot (which no one outside the Celtics knew about) and a three-inch swelling, wouldn't you say?

And this is one of the things that irks me. What I've found is that when people on internet basketball forums talk about the NBA pre-merger, they often don't tell the full story. And there's only two explanations:

1) they don't know it

or

2) they do and they're omitting it because it doesn't fit whatever it is that they're saying

The second is worse since it's outright deception, but the first means their research wasn't complete. (And the farther back from whatever your personal knowledge is you go, you don't even know what you don't know, and won't have any idea you're missing something.) Which is why I started posting on internet basketball forums to being with. To post information people didn't know, because basketball posters on the internet didn't know as much about NBA history as baseball posters did about MLB history on baseball forums I frequented, even though the NBA was a younger league and thus had less history to know (I can't speak on what baseball posters know now, since it's been years since I've been on any baseball forums). To stay on topic, no one ever said anything about Russell's injury on any basketball internet forum before I did (and there have been some posters—including this board—who I explicitly told about it, but they ignored it and continued to not mention it in the future when talking about who got injured doing that period of time), and no one ever said anything about Greer's shot before I did. Since there have been posters who didn't actually watch the NBA in the '60s who've posted about that time anyway, and the fact that nothing I've ever posted anywhere on the internet was top-secret information that only I had clearance to access (I actually know it happened, but it isn't as if no one else in the world could have had this information but me, it's just true that I do have it), the typical internet poster simply doesn't fully research, they only do enough to prove whatever point they're trying to make.

[Texas Chuck]

When a person exaggerates badly enough it makes you feel you need to reconsider other things you've heard from them. You can be a ridiculous braggart and also be the GOAT, but I need to make sure that falling for the former is not leading me to conclude the latter.

I'm assuming you had never heard this story before it was posted above?

Doesn't that make labeling him a ridiculous braggart somewhat off the mark? Bill Russell has had 50 years of being in the basketball public eye since his playing days ended and if he was a ridiculous braggart wouldn't we all be familiar with this?

I think is obviously fine to be skeptical about his claims, but without more context about that quote its hard for me to be that harsh considering this isn't the sort of thing Russell is known to do---exaggerate his own physical prowess.

Now doing some searching around I found some info stating a 9'4" standing reach for Russell with a measured 12'7" max vertical reach (Wilt shown at 12'9", Shaq at 12'5"

Also stories with multiple witnesses seeing Wilt grab a coin off the top of the backboard, as did David Thompson and Bob Lewis and witness accounts of Russell putting his armpits over the rim in college.


Some of the sourcing is a book called The Dandy Dons fwiw.

[colts18]

Also stories with multiple witnesses seeing Wilt grab a coin off the top of the backboard, as did David Thompson and Bob Lewis and witness accounts of Russell putting his armpits over the rim in college.

We don't have witnesses for that. It's all BS. We don't see any modern players reach the top of the backboard let alone grab a coin off of it. Who is the one putting the coin on top of these backboards? The highest vertical players of this era can barely reach top of the backboard (13 feet), but somehow Russell was reaching 1 foot higher than that. If so, he is the greatest athlete in history no matter the sport.

[trex_8063]

On the Duncan subject... I don't those many people ranking him outside the top 10.

I think there's a word missing from that sentence: You don't "????" those people ranking him outside the top 10.....

I don't think there are those many people ranking him outside the top 10

Not many, it's true. But still, having also chaired the Pre-Lists mini-project, I can tell you I had 28 lists submitted to me, and two of them had Duncan outside the top 10 (one as low as 14). And there were NINE other lists that had him somewhere between 7-10. So based on the pre-list indications, that's roughly 40% of the demographic that ranks him #7 or worse (25% rank him #9 or worse).

So although he's had some support since the first thread, I actually don't think he's a serious threat to Bill Russell for this spot, and he may have a close race (against Wilt) even getting in at #5.

[trex_8063]

Spoiler:

I am voting Russell here but I still do not understand this thing that people put forward about Wilt's earlier years, as if we're supposed to ignore that:

1962: They came within a game 7 buzzer beater of beating Boston
1964: They made the Finals
1965: Havlicek stole the ball.

'65 is interesting, because everyone talks about Havlicek stealing the ball, but I only recall one poster on RealGM (aside from me, who posted it here in the first place seven years ago during the Retro Player of the Year project) talking about this that happened that same series:

BOSTON (AP) — Boston Coach Red Auerbach, fuming over what he called a long count basket which evened the series, has guaranteed the Celtics will beat Philadelphia for their ninth straight Easten Division play-off crown.

The vow implies an assurance of a Celtic victory Sunday in the televised National Basketball Association game at Boston Garden. The best-of-seven set is knotted 2-2 after the 76ers won a 134-131 overtime thriller Friday night.

“We will win this thing, I’ll guarantee that,” Auerbach said. “I’m not worried about Philadelphia. They have come about as far as they can go.

“We had the game won Friday night and they took it away from us.”

The controversial 35-foot shot by Hal Greer came off an out of bounds play with one second of play remaining. It tied the score and forced the extra play during which Wilt Chamberlain scored six of his 34 points. He also had 34 rebounds in the game.

Auerbach said it was impossible for Greer to take a pass, turn around, dribble the ball and get off a shot in one second.

“I’m not saying the timer was dish0nest, but I guess rooting for the home team he might hesitate,” said the Boston coach.

The Celtics were divided in their opinions as to whether Greer actually bounced the ball or not.

Dolph Schayes, Philadelphia coach, called the Boston beef sour grapes but admitted his club was lucky.

In effect, it now is a best two-of-three situation with Boston still holding the home court edge. This has been strictly a home court series to date.

People always act like luck only ever went one way. Greer doesn't hit that shot and the 76ers lose in five and there isn't even any need for Havlicek to steal the ball. Probably most people who talk about Havlicek's steal don't even know about Greer's shot because that isn't the moment shown over and over since his team lost the series, and most basketball fans don't know much about that period of time (Wilt scored 100 in a game and averaged 50 for a season, Oscar averaged a triple double, Russell won 11 rings, and West went 1-8 in the Finals).

Fatal9, by the way, is the poster I was referring to who actually mentioned that.

The what-ifs go both ways.

A. What if Hal Greer doesn't make a miracle 35 footer to send the game 4 in to overtime (Sixers won)? What if that doesn't happen? Sixers likely lose in 5. Havlicek stole the ball in game 7, but the Sixers got their own miracle earlier in the series for them to even get to that point.

I mean, that's the very same series. And I originally posted it during the Retro Player of the Year project, so it isn't as if the information wasn't there.

Philadelphia won Game 4 134-131 in overtime, after Hal Greer’s 35-foot shot at the buzzer tied the game at 118-118 at the end of regulation. “It was a play set up by Dolph,” said Greer. “It went perfect. I didn’t throw it. It was a shot that went right in, like it should” (Eugene Register-Guard, Apr. 10, 1965). “The 76ers opened a five-point lead in the overtime and stayed on top after breaking a 123-123 tie on Lucious Jackson’s shot from the side” (Kentucky New Era, Apr. 10, 1965). Wilt Chamberlain led Philadelphia with 34 points, 34 rebounds and three assists. Chet Walker had 31, and Hal Greer had 27. Sam Jones led Boston with a game-high 36 points. Tom Heinsohn had 19, John Havlicek and Bill Russell had 18 each—Russell with 25 rebounds, and Satch Sanders had 15.

[On an aside, why do we never hear about Greer's shot? Everyone's seen Jerry West's, and while it would have won the game had a three-pointer existed, and they lost in overtime, Greer's team won the game, so whether there was a three-pointer or not, Game 4 would have ended in a Philly win.]

Does Greer deserve no credit? As I said back then, Jerry West gets credit for his shot against the Knicks even though they ultimately lost the game because the three-pointer didn't exist yet, but Greer gets absolutely no credit—except from fatal9—for keeping the Sixers from falling into a 1-3 deficit.

The other thing that often gets lost in the whole "Havlicek stole the ball!" narrative is that Boston was up by a point when it happened. Suppose Havlicek doesn't steal the ball, it's not like Philly was guaranteed a bucket. The narrative sometimes is spun like Russell wouldn't have that ring if Havlicek doesn't steal the ball......but it's a coin-flip at best for Philly, even if they did get the ball in-bounds.


That said, on the whole I do feel like Russell got at least slightly more than his fair share of luck in crucial moments. While '65 doesn't feel overly lucky (especially in light of the forgotten Hal Greer story), the Frank Selvy miss ('62) that was mentioned was quite fortunate.

In game 7 of the '69 Finals, there's that ball that was poked away from Havlicek with about 1:20 left, but it [fortunately] goes right into Don Nelson's hands at the FT-line, and he puts up that shot that bounces like 8 feet above the rim and drops back in......if that shot is literally a couple mm shorter, longer or to either side, it's a miss. Going in, it gave the Celtics a somewhat more comfortable 3 pt lead (when momentum had otherwise definitively swung back in LA's favor).
I recently re-watched the 4th quarter of that game, I also thought there were some questionable foul calls against the Lakers (though I can't say if that isn't balanced out by calls made earlier in the game). And of course the question mark of BVBK's decision to not put Wilt back in the game.

But long prior to game 7, there was game 4, in which the Lakers had a 1 pt lead and the ball with 7 seconds left, when Baylor apparently steps out of bounds catching a somewhat errant pass turning the ball over. Boston runs a broken/mis-performed out of bounds play which results in Sam Jones getting the in-bounds but almost immediately running into teammate Bailey Howell, then chucking up an off-balance 22-footer to beat the buzzer......which goes in. If that shot misses (which no doubt it would probably 8 times out of 10), the Lakers take a nearly insurmountable 3-1 lead in the series.


There are one or two other instances (missed shot by opponent at crucial moments, etc) that do make it feel kinda like Russell was sort of charmed.

[penbeast0]

CHOICE: Bill Russell
2nd: Wilt Chamberlain (though open to changing to Mikan or even Tim Duncan if strong arguments convince me, I can't see Shaq, Hakeem, Magic, or Bird having the consistent decade long impact that Wilt did.)

I'm somewhat curious as to your thinking on Wilt > Duncan, considering Russell is your top pick (and has been since the first thread).

What I mean is, if Bill Russell is your GOAT, you [presumably] must value defense, leadership, intangibles, +/- good big man passing (as these are the things Russell excelled at). They happen to all be things Duncan excelled at as well. I would argue Duncan is actually the GOAT team leader, and he's (imo) probably a little better passing big man, too. While defensively he's likely not as good as Russell, I think the gap as scorers (in Duncan's favor) might be larger than the defensive gap, for whatever that's worth.

Longevity is probably [arguably] slightly in Duncan's favor, too.

And both have fantastic records of strong impact throughout their careers (from start to finish), and fantastic records of general success.

idk.....it just seems that all the things by which you could validly label Russell "great/greatest" are also the things that Duncan easily qualifies in, too.

Wilt, otoh, is somewhat a horse of a different color.

I do value all of those things. On the other hand, I also value rebounding (Rodman, Russell, WIlt) and efficient scoring at volume which happen to be areas Wilt is truly dominant at. That's why I keep bringing up Wilt's playoff record when not facing Russell (where he scored less but tended to play better defense and rebound even better than regular season) to counter the Wilt as choking empty stats stereotype that has become very prevalent here. Yes, he was a lousy practice player and not a locker room leader and yes, he was intellectual rather than instinctual in a game where instinct is sometimes better but people forget or never recognized just how incredibly dominant Wilt was. He just had the misfortune to face Russell constantly and Russell had his team's number . . . if you switch his entry into the league and teams with Kareem, I think he does clearly better than Kareem did in the 70s.

[penbeast0]

-The bigger "era" question for me, which I'd like to hear takes on, is how to account for differences in longevity? We can't really expect guys in the 60's to play 20 years like Kobe, right? Hard to even start by 21, and then hard to reasonably play beyond 35 (health tech, sneakers, rest, hard floors, etc.). If you buy that, what curving for longevity is done by era for longevity? In other words, if the idea is "impact in era" shouldn't longevity be judged within the era?

I do sort of "grade on the curve" where longevity is concerned. I don't have a specific mathematical model, but more just kind of eye-balling some things. One thing I do is I don't ONLY look at seasons played, or even ONLY games played; I'll also look at minutes played: because players in the 60's and early 70's were routinely playing >40 mpg, which was a relatively sporadic occurrence in the last 30 years (unless you're Allen Iverson), and basically doesn't happen at all in the last 6-7 years.

-My interpretation: franchises are increasingly protecting their assets (players). Obviously that's potentially going to increase their longevity in terms of games or seasons played.

-Medical care, in terms of dealing with certain injuries, has no doubt improved as well; so it needs to be considered.

-Footwear* (as it pertains to ankle protection, arch support and cushion--->relevant in avoiding other chronic injuries such as fasciitis, etc) is substantially better today. Weirdly, this didn't get much better from what it was in Russell's era up to the start of the career's of Bird/Magic. I think we were WELL into the 1980's before there was enough of "shoe market" to where the manufacturing companies had money to dump into development of the "shoe technology" that we have today.

*On the flip-side of this, I think the increased average mass of players, increased horizontal speed of the game, as well as increased verticality in the modern era relative to prior eras also put increased stresses and injury potential on the ankles/knees of modern players.
Ironically, the increased horizontal speeds are in part a result of better shoes and better care/maintenance of court floors seen in more modern eras: these allow greater traction (quick first-steps, quick changes of direction, etc) as well as greater general confidence in the support/stability of the footwear.
The other factors contributing to the more mass/faster speed/increased verticality are: better training (methods, facilities/resources), training that is more focused on explosiveness (as opposed to cardio and flexibility), greater emphasis on strength/weight lifting, larger player pool perhaps made organizations more selective in getting truly elite athletes, looser ball-handling rules (enables people to take off on the dribble quicker).
It's actually perhaps even possible that these factors and game changes have out-paced the benefits of better shoes (obviously debatable, though).

-Financial motive to keep healthy and have longer career (obviously much larger motive today than 50 years ago, or especially 60+ years ago, like in Mikan's day).

I think you miss the biggest factor which is early entry. If you take 4 years off Moses/Garnett/Kobe/LeBron and only look at the seasons after their class graduated college, I don't think the era differential is that huge. (or 3 years for early entries who went one and done, etc.)

[ElGee]

Okay so here's what we would expect in an ideal setting:

The more the alpha shoots, the easier it is for his teammates to shoot.
Thus, while the alpha's efficiency goes down, the teammates' efficiency goes up.
And were the alpha to shoot less, we'd expect his teammate's efficiency to go down.

If that was what happened in '67, it wouldn't be nearly as big of a deal. What we found instead was:

When the alpha shot less, his teammates's efficiency went up. WAY up. The NON-Wilt '67 76ers shot a higher FG% than the '66 76ers did including Wilt.

And so that's what's important here along with considering why Hannum made the change he did.

This feeling you have that individual production essentially can't lie is misguided. This is not baseball.
In basketball the best player on the court can make his team worse if he gets in the way of their flow.

Wilt's teammate efficiency went up because he went from up 5.2 to 7.8 apg though in 67'. He had to carry the 1st option role, and playmaker duties that season. Why penalize him for adapting his game to improve his team? He had to take more shots in 66' because Cunningham was a rookie, and Jackson/Jones were both in their 2nd year. In 1967 the young guys took more of the scoring load and Wilt had more help so he played more of a facilitator role.

Conversely, Russell never was leading Boston's offense, and had his teammates carrying the offense throughout his career. If Wilt had guys like Cousy, Sam Jones, or Hondo most of his career, then he wouldn't have needed to score nearly as much. Once he finally got some scoring help he did adjust his game.

To me, this is just Global vs. Individual impact -- something so important that it's the cornerstone of my book. It has nothing to do with Wilt really, he's just the most illustrative example.

“In 1967, Chamberlain shot the ball eleven fewer times per game. This precipitous decline came after several record-setting seasons in which he shot at least 25 times per game. Of the ten regulars in the Philadelphia lineup that season, Wilt was eighth in scoring attempts per minute. The result was the league’s best offense by a landslide and the highest rated offense to that point in NBA history.”

They went from a league average offense to the GOAT offense at the time with nearly perfect roster continuity. Simply crediting this to three young players aging a year defies all evidence and probability, especially since (a) Hannum talked to Wilt about the Global game and (b) Wilt clearly changed, then the results happened. And what was Wilt's new role? Leveraging his ability to improve the efficiency of his teammates. You're describing the game as if it's a bunch of at-bats, and Wilt just let some of the young guys have more attempts when they were finally ready.

Conversely, guys like LeBron are so good not because they dominate the ball, but because they are constantly stressing the defense by either calling their own number or a teammates', depending on which has a higher percentage play based on response of the defense. This is also why Doc criticizes Wilt (rightfully) even after 67, because he didn't simply find a court balance that turned him into a big-man version of Magic or Nash, but instead went back to being individual-centric at times, or became overly infatuated with assists or FG% so he could claim those titles. This suggests that Wilt could never intuit (or cared to intuit) an optimal balance, and that instead 67 was so effective because how novel it was to opponents.

I am voting Russell here but I still do not understand this thing that people put forward about Wilt's earlier years, as if we're supposed to ignore that:

1962: They came within a game 7 buzzer beater of beating Boston
1964: They made the Finals
1965: Havlicek stole the ball.

It's not as if his style of play made it impossible for them to win. Acting as if Wilt's teams those years were so definitively inferior to the Celtics is acting like the 2013 Spurs were definitively inferior to the 2013 Heat.

If Ray Allen misses that shot, you still give LeBron the same credit right? So because Jones made that shot or Hondo made that lucky steal, why are those singular plays taking Wilt's credit?

Can't speak for others, but for me the teams weren't very good outside of 64. Weaker teams will upset better team all the time just due to normal variance in the sport. In 62 they were -6 vs. Boston. In 64 only -3. In 65 -8! This is a 1-seed vs. an 8-seed. If you were to credit teams for how they performed in a single game or a single series, you'd have to start doing backflips to explain how the 08 Lakers were worse than the 08 Hawks, and thus Kobe and Gasol really weren't as good as Josh Smith and Joe Johnson.

[MisterHibachi]

Thinking of Shaq vs Wilt for this spot. Similar peaks and primes. Any opinions on this comparison?

Interesting that you went with the offensive bigs right after I went with the defensive ones. (yes I know that all 4 of them, including Russell are all 2-way players, but speaking in terms of where they provide the most value.)

Wilt is a guy I really struggle with. Statistically what he did is just hard to even wrap my mind around. But how much of that was really added value and how much was it him just cannibalizing his teammates numbers for his own? His greatness team successes came when he cut his shots way down. I just don't know how to put him into a context I am totally happy with.

Meanwhile Shaq's teams thrived when his usage was at its highest. Feeding the big man was absolutely the right strategy and I think there is a real argument that he got under-utilized at times.

On the flip side, Wilt was ridiculously durable and played stupid minutes. Shaq in the RS wasn't nearly so dependable. This has to count for something meaningful. And how much does Wilt suffer that he spent so much of his career being the foil to the superior Russell? And unlike say Durant and Lebron in recent years, they faced each other in the playoffs a ton with Russell and his team getting the upper hand time and again. Is it fair to Wilt if your career lands you competing directly against the highest impact player of all-time?

I lean Shaq over Wilt because I feel like his game lent itself better to team success tho again his ego and inability to coexist with Kobe long-term is a negative for me. If Wade doesn't lose his mind in a year when the rules changed to make a player like Wade even more effective and if Dirk plays just a bit better in the Finals then he doesn't have that title without Kobe and I think his narrative changes considerably.

With Wilt, I don't pay much attention to the eye popping numbers because I know they are very context dependent, from weaker competition to sub-optimal game strategy to high pace. I've been convinced by posters like Doc MJ and others that his playing style early in his years was simply sup-optimal. He wouldn't be putting up 50/25 in today's game because there are better strategies to impacting games.

So Wilt played for 14 seasons, but only 12 games in 1970 (I actually had no idea he actually missed basically an entire season, what happened this season?) He seemed to be capable of being a championship-anchor in basically all of them, so that's 13 seasons (someone correct me if I'm wrong on my judgement of his later years. A previous thread I made seemed to have 73 Wilt as high as any other 14th year season ever). Shaq on the other hand was capable of being one from 94-05. So that's 12 seasons, with 93, 06, and 09 thrown in as meaningful seasons. So neither has a real advantage in terms of longevity.

I would say Wilt was more impactful in the regular season simply because of his MP, while Shaq was clearly a better playoff performer, and while I'm not a PS > RS (or even vice versa), the reason for the disparity in playoff resilience is key I think. Although some of Wilt's losses were all super close and came down to game 7s, so I can't completely put all the team's fault on him. Would we think differently of him if the ball had bounced in his favour? Someone posted earlier in this thread that Wilt's winning percentage against non-Celtics opponents was 80%. How do I account for him facing the greatest dynasty in sports for his entire career? Does he deserve blame for not producing a decade long dynasty of his own? I'm not sure.

I think their talents are very close. Wilt probably wouldn't be a 30 point scorer in today's league, but I have no doubt he could be as impactful as anyone if he listened to proper coaching. If he came later, it's possible he wouldn't be as focused on stats, but rather on surpassing Russell's 11 rings. I don't want to take away from a player's talent and ability because he wasn't always in the optimal situation.

BUT I have to give credit to Shaq for actually listening to coaching and knowing what way he could best impact the game. As I said when comparing Shaq to LeBron, Shaq had a very simple game. He knew what he could do and he did it. LeBron's advantage against him was LeBron made even better decisions than Shaq in more complex situations. Wilt doesn't have that advantage. Wilt seemed to make the wrong decisions in easier spots than Shaq, and he made the game more complex than it needed to be for him. I don't think facing Russell is that big a handicap for Wilt, because Shaq faced Duncan, who I think is a better player than Russell and probably an equal defender, and also played in what is considered to be the greatest defensive era in the league's history.

I'm not gonna vote yet, but I'm leaning Shaq unless someone can convince me that Wilt's decision making was on par with or better than Shaq.

P.s. Sorry, TC, this post kind of got away from me. I started off responding to your post than veered off. My apologies!

[Senior]

That said, on the whole I do feel like Russell got at least slightly more than his fair share of luck in crucial moments. While '65 doesn't feel overly lucky (especially in light of the forgotten Hal Greer story), the Frank Selvy miss ('62) that was mentioned was quite fortunate.

In game 7 of the '69 Finals, there's that ball that was poked away from Havlicek with about 1:20 left, but it [fortunately] goes right into Don Nelson's hands at the FT-line, and he puts up that shot that bounces like 8 feet above the rim and drops back in......if that shot is literally a couple mm shorter, longer or to either side, it's a miss. Going in, it gave the Celtics a somewhat more comfortable 3 pt lead (when momentum had otherwise definitively swung back in LA's favor).
I recently re-watched the 4th quarter of that game, I also thought there were some questionable foul calls against the Lakers (though I can't say if that isn't balanced out by calls made earlier in the game). And of course the question mark of BVBK's decision to not put Wilt back in the game.

But long prior to game 7, there was game 4, in which the Lakers had a 1 pt lead and the ball with 7 seconds left, when Baylor apparently steps out of bounds catching a somewhat errant pass turning the ball over. Boston runs a broken/mis-performed out of bounds play which results in Sam Jones getting the in-bounds but almost immediately running into teammate Bailey Howell, then chucking up an off-balance 22-footer to beat the buzzer......which goes in. If that shot misses (which no doubt it would probably 8 times out of 10), the Lakers take a nearly insurmountable 3-1 lead in the series.


There are one or two other instances (missed shot by opponent at crucial moments, etc) that do make it feel kinda like Russell was sort of charmed.

There were moments in Russell's career where luck fell to him. You don't win that much without some things going your way. However, "luck" is a minor part of what decides a championship. For every singular luck-based event such as refereeing, random bounces, or basketball god interference, there were multiple events decided by the players, and the winning team is almost always making the big plays.

The only thing luck gives you is an opportunity. A player must take that opportunity for that luck to even matter. For example, you mention the Selvy miss in 62. The Celtics still needed to play out 5 minutes of ball to win and they did. Celtics went 7 with the 62 Warriors and there was a controversial goaltending call in a 2 point win...but Wilt only had 22 for the game, down from around 40 ppg he averaged against Russell in the RS.

You mention the Wilt vs BVBK feud and the Nelson shot, but the Celtics were up 15 at the start of the 4th quarter of Game 7 in 69. Not only that, but Boston crushed LA in Game 6 with Wilt having a bad game. If LA wins Game 6 none of these things matter, but they didn't.

I guess my point is that we can't handwave games/titles away because of luck. Players on the court are almost wholly responsible for the outcome of the game. If you want to talk about Russell's luck in title clinching games, you gotta also remember that he was always raising his performance in crucial games - and that's why he had so many chances for things to fall his way. And even when things went against him, he and his team were able to overcome their obstacles.

[Doctor MJ]

Wilt's teammate efficiency went up because he went from up 5.2 to 7.8 apg though in 67'. He had to carry the 1st option role, and playmaker duties that season. Why penalize him for adapting his game to improve his team? He had to take more shots in 66' because Cunningham was a rookie, and Jackson/Jones were both in their 2nd year. In 1967 the young guys took more of the scoring load and Wilt had more help so he played more of a facilitator role.

Conversely, Russell never was leading Boston's offense, and had his teammates carrying the offense throughout his career. If Wilt had guys like Cousy, Sam Jones, or Hondo most of his career, then he wouldn't have needed to score nearly as much. Once he finally got some scoring help he did adjust his game.

That's not a causal explanation. The entire system didn't change because Wilt got more assists. Quite clearly it was the opposite.

Wilt also was not primary option by any definition that does not include passing. He shot less per minute played than his teammates did. That's not a criticism, just being making sure we're all talking about the same things with standards that can be more than just rhetoric.

How was Wilt not the primary option?

He shot 14.2 FGA which was 2nd behind Greer's 19.1, but also 10.8 FTA/game, which speaks volumes about how he was still the focus on offense. Then you add his 7.8 apg on top of that. Can't think of a player who gets penalized for having his young guys improve and adapting to a better roster. No way could Wilt shoot less and still have success like in 67's simply because the offense firepower didn't exist on his previous rosters.

As mentioned, per minute of actual play he shot less than others.

Note though I wasn't refusing to call him the lead option, just pointing out that it is double counting to talk about someone as both a lead option and a lead playmaker when it is his lead playmaker status that makes his alpha status still undeniable.

Why penalize him for adapting to improve his team? That's not remotely what's happening here, but I think I can imagine where a thought like that would come from. Because I use an existing fact to form a conclusion than calls into question the basis for most people's opinion on Wilt, you see that as penalizing him because without my conclusion there would be less ammunition against Wilt.

But none of that is real. All of that has to do with a network of interacting opinions wrestling with each other. It has nothing to do with how Wilt actually played.

How Wilt actually played, the evidence tells us, was much more effective when he shot less. If you choose to use that conclusion to say that Wilt was the GOAT scorer and therefore he must have been a super-GOAT passer, that's at least coherent with that we see. To form an opinion though that sidesteps all of it in the name of "new good things shouldn't ever be used to evaluate the less good things that came before". It's not rational.

Well help me understand then. Wilt's rosters were thin in the early 60's.....they improve in the late 60's and Wilt adapts...but then gets called out for not player in his early days like he did in his later ones where he actually had help. Lebron went higher than Wilt and we can actually see drops in players when they play next to him due to his ball domination, but I don't remember this argument used against him at all, which is odd considering that I think it's the major reason why he's lost so many disappointing playoff series through the years. KAJ won 5 with Magic scoring much less, and one with Oscar early in his career. In his prime he didn't win a thing and even missed the playoffs, so what are we to think of the all-time NBA scorer? I personally don't agree that the scoring of KAJ is the reason his prime year teams failed, but I scratch my head at why Wilt is singled out for actually adapting his game to a better roster and droping 7.8 apg as a center.

I appreciate how you put that first sentence. I'm aware that I sometimes come across as presumptuous in my words. You started us off here magnanimously.

To answer: If Wilt had gone to a new team for the first time, changed his role, and had great success, it would have have been coherent to argue that the real difference was simply teammates, and that Wilt responded with amazing versatility.

But Wilt went to the new team, gave it his best shot as a score-first player, and then the new coach threw that player effectively in the bin never to return again, and Wilt's teams were better for it.

Because of this we have to ask ourselves whether Wilt was having vastly greater impact all those years on the Warriors than he was in his score-first start on the 76ers. And given that those Warriors never had an impressive offense, and Wilt showed in '65 he was fully capable of getting his stats while having no impact whatsoever, there's very little tying his huge scoring to actual impact, and ample evidence to suggest that Wilt's impact came elsewhere on the court.

Note that I'm not saying that Wilt never had a positive impact due to his scoring ability. The issue has to do with defenses' ability to chip away at the value added by Wilt-scoring attempts using strategy, and the fact that teams can better specialize strategy in the face of predictable opponent strategy along the tunnel vision that often comes with guys looking to score.

Re: Why not used against LeBron. Because LeBron can lead an elite offense with his eyes closed and Wilt, to put it charitably, could not. I do criticize LeBron for his unipolar-fetish and it has a significant effect on my opinion of him, but LeBron's issue is basically inconsequential compared to Wilt's.

Re: What are we to think of Kareem. Well you're talking to a guy who basically made clear he thought Kareem is being considerably overrated by the voters here. He was however a far more effective scorer than Wilt along with a more consistent defender (though Wilt at peak focus was a considerably stronger defender).

Re: punished for adapting. Well that's what we're talking about. Again, I'm not punishing him for adapting, I suppose though you could say I'm punishing him for the need to adapt in the first place.

If Phil Jackson had made the Bulls win titles by having Jordan score 20 PPG, I'd think less of Jordan's seasons scoring 30+. Simple as that.

To be clear though, it's the combination of the need to change how Wilt played with the fact that Wilt took to it inconsistently from that point on that's so problematic. Had Wilt enthusiastically played the '67 way in Philly until '75 and had the results been spectacular, it wouldn't make sense to me to knock Wilt. The knock on his prior impact could be chalked up only to primitive coaching strategy.

But in '68 Wilt decided he wanted to leave Philly to play in LA.
In '69 Wilt destroyed the best offensive scheme in the league in LA, the place he had pushed to come.

Wilt started making progress again in '70 eventually leading to that beautiful run in '72, by then he'd been in the league more than a decade playing most those years highly sub-optimally and earning a reputation as a flighty prima donna. None of this makes him something other than a legend and an all-time great, but competition is tough this high up on the GOAT list, and he's competing with a bunch of players who maxed out basically everything they could (and Shaq).

BTW, I definitely don't think Wilt is the GOAT scorer, just that he was clearly the best of his era. Russell gets all the praise for Boston's team defense, but Wilt is getting a bit of shade for not scoring...less? on his early teams that had little offesnive firepower? You can see why I'm having a tough time swallowing this premise.

He wasn't the best scorer in his era though given that his teams were better off with others on the team shooting more than him.

There was a reason why Jerry West was the lead scorer by a larger margin on those Laker teams ahead of Wilt and it certainly wasn't because of West's ego which has always been negligible compared to Wilt's.

Re: he didn't have scorers with him early on!

Wilt's teams just never took that massive of a leap forward on the Warriors like you'd expect if it was helping a ton. In his rookie year they had the 2nd worst offense in the league. It wasn't Wilt's "fault" because it was better than they'd been before, but we're talking about a difference of basically a single basket made by Wilt scoring 38 PPG despite playing on a team that would seem ready to take a major leap forward given their humble place before.

But to be clear, it's not really about what Wilt "should" have done on the Warriors. It's about evaluating the impact he was having in various roles and judging him on that rather than by the size of his box score.

This also goes with what I'm saying it not being about "punishing" Wilt. It's about coming up with the best estimate possible for the impact Wilt actually had without being biased by things that tend to bias observers.

Re: If Wilt had had those teammates... Nah man, both Wilt & Russ began their NBA careers basically playing THEIR way. They took some input sure but each had a style and their teams adapted to them...up until Wilt in '67 at least. Russell approached the game that people didn't think would work and it led to a dynasty that eclipsed all others in history. Wilt did not.

Pretty sure Russell came in and played Red's way. The Celtics super team racked up more titles than any other team, but Mikan had already led the first defensive NBA dynasty in the 50's. The Celtics did improve 5 games when they added Russell, but Wilt added 17 games his rookie season. Russell took a good team and made them great, Wilt took a bad one and made them contenders. The Warriors were 32-40 in 1959. Wilt comes into the NBA in 1960 and the Warriors go 49-26 with 37.6 ppg. He had to score that much to lift a bad team into a contender, and didn't have a roster he could rely on to score outside of 30+ year old Arizin who got 19 FGA/game. Clearly his scoring volume was needed since the offensive talent around him was paper thin.

Oh he played "Red's way"?
Please point to the previous player Red worked with who played like Russell.
Please point to the roots of the defensive scheme the Russell Celtics used in the years before Russell arrived.

AUF you've been around here a while. You surely have read the interviews and anecdotes about the sheer unorthodoxy of Russell's play. It was considered the wrong way to play. Russell just kept right on doing it. He brought it with him to college, and then to the pros. He got away with it to some degree just because he was lucky. He couldn't have known that he'd so rarely get burned even in the NBA that his seemingly risk-heavy defensive approach would transform the game, he was just playing the way it came naturally to him.

This is not to say that I think Red had no influence over Russell, but it's frankly in my mind a really high compliment of Red to say that he adapted his team strategy to Russell rather than forcing Russell to play like other big men.

Re: Mikan already. Mikan, like Wilt, tried to do everything. We can look back now and say Mikan's teams won with defense, but back when MIkan was winning titles while leading the league in scoring people didn't understand this.

Russell thus doesn't represented the spearhead of winning with defense, but the spearhead of understanding that you're winning with defense.

Of course that's not what I really mean when I talk about Russell being a new thing. Mikan was a giant compared to his peers, and his peers were basically brand new to trying to become professional athletes. In the wake of Mikan, people THOUGHT that the league would be dominated by absolute behemoths and there was an article I believe Regul8r has posted showing a bunch of high school big men who were thought to be the future of the league. Of those profiled, only Wilt accomplished anything in the NBA.

What those involved with the NBA soon found is that with some basic strategy and skill improvements, you could avoid much damage from a slow big man.

Along came Russell. Quick as a guard, great motor, extremely long, and an astonishing intuitive feel for how to impact the game. All of that meant that he could dive out to the perimeter, or leap up to contest shots you were supposed to not leave your feet on, without getting his team burned. Once Red saw what he had, he adjusted team strategy to funnel opposing players like a Venus fly trap so that Russell could have his way with them.

[Doctor MJ]

I am voting Russell here but I still do not understand this thing that people put forward about Wilt's earlier years, as if we're supposed to ignore that:

1962: They came within a game 7 buzzer beater of beating Boston
1964: They made the Finals
1965: Havlicek stole the ball.

It's not as if his style of play made it impossible for them to win. Acting as if Wilt's teams those years were so definitively inferior to the Celtics is acting like the 2013 Spurs were definitively inferior to the 2013 Heat.

If Ray Allen misses that shot, you still give LeBron the same credit right? So because Jones made that shot or Hondo made that lucky steal, why are those singular plays taking Wilt's credit?

Ah, this is good.

What you're saying it that it appears that I'm letting luck determine how I see these players, as if in the end, I'm just counting rings.

But I'm not counting rings. Let's took at team records for the years in question:

'62: Boston 60, Warirors 49
'64: Boston 59, Warriors 48
'65: Boston 62, 76ers 40

In the regular season in each of these years, Wilt's team wasn't in Boston's league. So then, what you're doing is essentially throwing out the large sample size in favor of the small sample size...despite the fact that the team that was better all year still won in the small sample size.

It is true that that had Wilt won enough of these small sample size series it would influence my analysis of him, but the roots of my opinion on Wilt come from the RS not the playoffs, and I don't see that as remotely unfair to the man given that the playoff results were no more in his favor when all was said and done.

[Doctor MJ]

When a person exaggerates badly enough it makes you feel you need to reconsider other things you've heard from them. You can be a ridiculous braggart and also be the GOAT, but I need to make sure that falling for the former is not leading me to conclude the latter.

I'm assuming you had never heard this story before it was posted above?

Doesn't that make labeling him a ridiculous braggart somewhat off the mark? Bill Russell has had 50 years of being in the basketball public eye since his playing days ended and if he was a ridiculous braggart wouldn't we all be familiar with this?

I think is obviously fine to be skeptical about his claims, but without more context about that quote its hard for me to be that harsh considering this isn't the sort of thing Russell is known to do---exaggerate his own physical prowess.

Now doing some searching around I found some info stating a 9'4" standing reach for Russell with a measured 12'7" max vertical reach (Wilt shown at 12'9", Shaq at 12'5"

Also stories with multiple witnesses seeing Wilt grab a coin off the top of the backboard, as did David Thompson and Bob Lewis and witness accounts of Russell putting his armpits over the rim in college.


Some of the sourcing is a book called The Dandy Dons fwiw.

If Russell didn't say it, I'd like to be told this. As of right now Reg is saying it was in Russell's book in Russell's words.

There are some exaggerations that there is no walking back from. If in your book you claim to able to reach a foot and half higher than anyone else that I've ever seen, I'm not going to believe you, and that means I'm going to have to figure out how that affects the accuracy of other things you say.

Re: if he were a braggart would't we know? Well that's the always the argument presented by those suffering from cognitive dissonance. I make it a point to deal with my potential biases more proactively than that.

Re: Also stories... Yes that's the problem. There's a wealth of stories from back in the day talking about physical accomplishments no modern athlete seems to be able to do despite far more training, far bigger talent pool, and far better equipment.

I'd actually love to hear someone try to come up with an explanation for why players port in the great depression were physically much superior to the players of today, but short of being convinced by that, I have to conclude it most likely that there was simply a culture of extreme exaggeration back then that likely was built on the lack of objective evidence available...despite the fact that these all of this could have been recorded with basic photography back then.

[O_6]

My Review of Bill Russell's Athleticism

Just wanted to start off by saying I really love the work so many of you put into this. I wish I had more free time to really be apart of this project. Even though I don't have a vote, I still want to make a post regarding BIll Russell's athleticism.

I remember 10 or so years ago, "Bill Russell was the same size as Tayshaun Prince! He couldn't make an NBA roster today!" was the go-to comment in regards to Bill Russell's ability to play in today's league. I didn't necessarily buy into that line of thinking, but I did believe that Russell's athleticism would look like crap against today's modern athletes.

But then I started watching him play. And now I'm convinced that he's in the discussion for the best pure big man athlete the game has seen. I used to think Robinson/Hakeem in particular were way better athletes, which really made me question Russell's GOAT candidacy. But the more I watch of Russell, the more I feel like an absolute idiot for ever entertaining the idea that he was simply Tayshaun Prince transported back 40 years.

Russell vs. Hakeem/Robinson: Pure Athleticism + Especially How it Translates on D

Russell vs. Hakeem: Quickness of Jump + Verticality
- Hakeem's greatest defensive attribute in terms of pure athleticism was the quickness of his jump, and the quickness of his 2nd/3rd/etc. jumps. This gave him a "WHERE TF DID HE COME FROM?" type of blocking ability that I don't think anyone else had... except for Russell. When you watch Russell play, the quickness of his jump is by far the biggest difference between him and Wilt.

- Hakeem and Russell were both 6'10" with ~7'2"-7'4" wingspans. But Russell's functional length actually seems longer because he was more ambidextrous than Hakeem (Dream was very right hand dominant) and he was a much more fundamental defender in terms of verticality. Russell comes across as a perfect combination of Duncan (verticality) and Dream (Quick Jump).

- Russell was much faster than Hakeem and was quicker on the perimeter while Hakeem was stronger

- WHAT HAKEEM DID BEST on D (QUICKLY GOING FROM THE GROUND TO THE RIM), RUSSELL PROBABLY DID BETTER... while being a better overall defender

Russell vs. Robinson: Speed/Strength/Length
- Robinson was 7'1" vs. Russell's 6'10" but they had roughly the same wingspan. Robinson had a much stronger upper body, Russell had a stronger lower body

- RUSSELL WAS EASILY FASTER... Robinson was fast for a Center, Russell was fast for a wing. I cannot emphasize enough how Robinson (the great floor runner that he was) did not have the 5th gear of Russell. Robinson was very explosive, in a 10yd straightline dash he was right there with Russell... but in a 40yd/full court race it wouldn't be close imo.

- Russell had a MUCH lower center of gravity. Robinson was 3-4" taller while having much smaller torso. Waist vs. Waist, Russell was nearly half a foot lower to the ground. This gave him superior change of direction ability to Robinson. Not to mention that in terms of ball-handling, Russell's lower waist + much longer arms made it easier for him to dribble than Robinson.

- Robinson was a more powerful finisher but Russell blew him (and Hakeem, and every great Center) away in terms of Hang-time. Russell had insane hang-time.

RUSSELL WAS A BETTER ATHLETE THAN HAKEEM OR ROBINSON IMO. I feel more comfortable placing Russell above these 2 all-time after watching him a lot. '87 MJ was more athletic than '17 Westbrook, a freak of nature who just avg'd a triple double. '70s Dr.J was more athletic than '17 Paul George, a guy considered a freak athlete today. Is it really that far out of the question that 60s Russell was on the same tier or even better than 90s Dream/Robinson?

...


BONUS OPINION... Russell's Face-Up Game COULD be deadly in today's game. It took him 2 dribbles from a standstill to dunk from the 3pt line. I've seen him dunk it viciously off of 1 dribble from ~20ft away.

Considering that he could comfortably run point with 60s ball-handling rules (no carrying), he had a great 1st step, he had LONG steps, he could change directions in a dime, he had a 7'4" wingspan, a low center of gravity, tremendously strong hands, INSANE hang-time... we're talking about a guy with all the requisite skill sets to be a dangerous face-up player in today's game. His shot would limit him, but he would have crazy potential as a driver/finisher.

If you want to argue that Russell's D wouldn't be as dominant today, that's fair. But if we're playing that game, I see reason to believe that his O would be much more valuable today.

[70sFan]

I'd also add to Russell faceup game that he actually had short midrange jumpshot and he used it quite often. He wasn't gifted shooter but don't compare him to guys like Jordan ot Howard in that aspect.

[eminence]

[
Considering that he could comfortably run point with 60s ball-handling rules (no carrying), he had a great 1st step, he had LONG steps, he could change directions in a dime, he had a 7'4" wingspan, a low center of gravity, tremendously strong hands, INSANE hang-time... we're talking about a guy with all the requisite skill sets to be a dangerous face-up player in today's game. His shot would limit him, but he would have crazy potential as a driver/finisher.

If you want to argue that Russell's D wouldn't be as dominant today, that's fair. But if we're playing that game, I see reason to believe that his O would be much more valuable today.

I agree with you on Russell's athleticism. But 'comfortable running point' seems to vastly overstate Russell's ball skills from every game I've ever watched of his. Do you have any particular games you could point to that you feel demonstrate this?

[O_6]

[
Considering that he could comfortably run point with 60s ball-handling rules (no carrying), he had a great 1st step, he had LONG steps, he could change directions in a dime, he had a 7'4" wingspan, a low center of gravity, tremendously strong hands, INSANE hang-time... we're talking about a guy with all the requisite skill sets to be a dangerous face-up player in today's game. His shot would limit him, but he would have crazy potential as a driver/finisher.

If you want to argue that Russell's D wouldn't be as dominant today, that's fair. But if we're playing that game, I see reason to believe that his O would be much more valuable today.

I agree with you on Russell's athleticism. But 'comfortable running point' seems to vastly overstate Russell's ball skills from every game I've ever watched of his. Do you have any particular games you could point to that you feel demonstrate this?

He was literally a part-time PG during their late 60s run. Unlike Wilt, Russell dribbled the ball and wasn't racking up pure mid-post hub assists. He had ability to pass the ball off the dribble.

Russell had no problem at all bringing the ball up the court under 60s rules. Hakeem had a nasty crossover, but he really struggled to bring the ball up the court with 90s rules. Russell, with his giant mitts, would have an even easier time bringing the ball up with more lenient carrying rules of today. With his change of direction skills + his ability to keep the ball really low with his long arms means he could do more than just straight-line dribble like Robinson.

[eminence]

[
Considering that he could comfortably run point with 60s ball-handling rules (no carrying), he had a great 1st step, he had LONG steps, he could change directions in a dime, he had a 7'4" wingspan, a low center of gravity, tremendously strong hands, INSANE hang-time... we're talking about a guy with all the requisite skill sets to be a dangerous face-up player in today's game. His shot would limit him, but he would have crazy potential as a driver/finisher.

If you want to argue that Russell's D wouldn't be as dominant today, that's fair. But if we're playing that game, I see reason to believe that his O would be much more valuable today.

I agree with you on Russell's athleticism. But 'comfortable running point' seems to vastly overstate Russell's ball skills from every game I've ever watched of his. Do you have any particular games you could point to that you feel demonstrate this?

He was literally a part-time PG during their late 60s run. Unlike Wilt, Russell dribbled the ball and wasn't racking up pure mid-post hub assists. He had ability to pass the ball off the dribble.

Russell had no problem at all bringing the ball up the court under 60s rules. Hakeem had a nasty crossover, but he really struggled to bring the ball up the court with 90s rules. Russell, with his giant mitts, would have an even easier time bringing the ball up with more lenient carrying rules of today. With his change of direction skills + his ability to keep the ball really low with his long arms means he could do more than just straight-line dribble like Robinson.

So... any particular games to recommend?