1. One way dominance and two way valueArguments that Russell was by far the most impactful player in history generally rely on an inaccurate definition of how a player can impact the game. The idea usually goes something like this:
• Celtics had the best relative DRtg in NBA history by far
• Russell had the highest DWS seasons in NBA history by far (this used to be a popular argument back in the days)
• No team in history have a better relative ORtg than the Celtics relative DRtg (in regular season at least)
• Celtics DRtg matched Russell's career arc and he was the only player from the start to the end of the dynasty
• No player in history have been as dominant on offense as Russell was on defense and therefore he is the GOAT.
I agree Russell dominated on defense more than anyone else in NBA history but focusing on one end of the floor alone does not prove he had more total impact than all other players. A player's value is not the maximum of either offense or defense but the summation of both offense and defense. Instead of looking only at the Celtics's relative DRtg, why not include relative ORtg as well for the team's total net rating? Instead of looking only at Russell's DWS, why not his OWS and total WS? If we use Boston's dominant defense to showcase Russell's defensive impact, why do we overlook the fact that their consistently below average offense was reducing their overall performance? Everybody knows about the poor defense of Nash-led offenses so why should we ignore the poor offense of Russell-led defenses when discussing his overall impact? The 64 Celtics have the best rDRtg in NBA history but they had a league worst relative ORtg of -4.5. That is as bad as the relative DRtg of the 04 Mavs, the team with the best rORtg in NBA history, yet only one of these teams is panned for their poor play on one end of the floor. When a team is giving up so many points on one end of the floor, you can't just ignore their weakness and exclusively focus on the one end of the floor that they were dominant in and credit the superstar for it. A 7 SRS team with -4 offense, -11 defense or +11 offense, +4 defense is not better than a 10 SRS team with +5 offense, -5 defense. Russell's Celtics were a one way team whereas the very best teams in NBA history by SRS were elite on both ends of the floor. They may not be as good on any one end of the floor as the Celtics defense but they were an overall better team when looking at both offense and defense.
Boston had the best relative DRtg in history but not when it comes to overall net rating. Russell had the highest DWS seasons in history but not when it comes to overall WS. Unless one makes the mistake of defining a player's overall value as only one way rather than two way impact, it is very difficult to argue that Russell was far more dominant relative to his era than anyone else. In fact, Russell is behind LeBron, Jordan, Magic and several others in WOWYR, the best in-era impact metric we have across NBA history. People talk about Russell immediately transforming the Celtics defense when he entered the league but when you consider their offensive decline as well, the Celtics's overall team improvement by SRS in his rookie season was less than that of LeBron or Jordan's in their rookie seasons. The 57 Celtics were also already a much better team than the 56 Celtics even without Russell so the WOWY impact he had that season was actually not that large. Here are some numbers I posted in the peak project on Russell's impact during his rookie season in comparison to Mikan's final season just the year prior:
LA Bird wrote:1956 Lakers and Mikan
With (37G): +2.22 MOV
Without (35G): -4.17 MOV
Difference: +6.39 MOV
1957 Celtics and Russell
With (48G): +6.02 MOV
Without (24G): +4.54 MOV
Difference: +1.48 MOV
And here are some numbers by colts18 in an old thread on Russell's WOWY impact over his entire career:
colts18 wrote:Bill Russell missed 52 games in his career, here is how his team did without him.
26-26 W-L
1.54 MOV, 0.70 SRS
114.31 PPG against opponent D of 108.63 (+5.67)
112.77 PPG allowed against average O of 107.04 (+5.73)
So the Celtics offense was very much above average without Russell. In fact most years that offense would be at the top. The same story for the defense except the opposite. Without Russell, they are around the worst defense of that era.
Now here is how did in comparison to weighted average of the 57-69 Celtics:
Without Russell vs. overall Celtics:
0.70 SRS vs. 5.38 SRS (-4.68 SRS)
114.31 PPG vs. 110.71 PPG (+3.59)
112.77 PPG allowed vs. 104.77 PPG (-8.0)
So the offense was clearly much better without Russell which jives with my opinion that he is a net negative on offense, but Russell's impact on defense was clearly higher. That minus 8 PPG shows that Russell was the best defender of that era by a clear margin.
There are some limitations with this WOWY analysis because of the lack of data on pace before the 70s but the point still stands that Russell didn't have by far the greatest impact overall of all time. We can make Russell's numbers look better with a reduced prime sample but even then, LeBron, Robinson, Walton and Jordan have seen their teams decline more by SRS than the Celtics did without Russell (note: removing Russell's rookie season means we are looking at only around 2 missed games per season for his career). Russell's Celtics teams had the GOAT defenses but they never reached the heights that the greatest two way team like the Jordan Bulls or Curry Warriors did because of their consistently negative offense. The same goes for Russell individually, where his negative offense meant he wasn't necessarily the most impactful player overall despite being the most impactful defensive player. A player's value depends on both offense and defense and as such, focusing on only one end of the floor alone exaggerates how impactful Russell was in comparison to all time great two way players who contributed on both ends. It is not impossible for a one way player to be the GOAT but Russell never reached that level of dominance IMO.
2. The playoffs and relative ORtgsI think most of us can agree that Russell had the most defensive impact of any player ever, relative to his own era. However, as we have seen from part 1, having the GOAT in-era impact is more than just having the most impact on one end of the floor. Another element to that discussion is whether there are any players who were as impactful on offense as Russell was on defense. If we are looking at the regular season, that answer is a clear no. However, that changes if we look at the playoffs where offensive stars can sometimes elevate their team more than defensive stars. For example, if we compare Russell and Magic, the only other one way player in the top 10, these are their team results over their best years.
Regular season60-65 Russell: -2.54 Offense, -8.52 Defense, +5.98 Net
85-90 Magic: +6.12 Offense, -1.17 Defense, 7.29 Net
Playoffs60-65 Russell: -2.81 Offense, -9.58 Defense, +6.77 Net
85-90 Magic: +8.97 Offense, -0.24 Defense, +9.22 Net
No player has come close to leading an offensive dynasty comparable to the defense of Russell's Celtics in the regular season but this advantage of Russell's is small when it comes to the postseason. Besides Magic, Shaq and LeBron led offenses have also been around +9 or more over a multi-year period in the playoffs. And importantly, none of these offense-first teams led by LeBron / Magic / Shaq come with the issue of being a huge negative on the other end of the floor like the Celtics were. Boston need a large lead in one way dominance to overcome the deadweight of a negative team offense but they weren't that dominant historically on defense relative to the greatest postseason offenses.
3. Russell's offenseAn issue I find with Russell arguments is that he is often not only not penalized for the Celtics's poor offense, he is almost rewarded for it as though it is even more impressive that their defense was dominant enough to overcome the negative offense. Just because the Celtics won overwhelmingly with their defense does not mean Russell gets all the credit for the defense while his supporting cast is regarded poorly because of the mediocre offense. Offense and defense are two sides of the same coin. If people are going to credit Russell as being a point center through which Boston ran their offense, why shouldn't we consider the team's relative ORtg as a measure of his offensive impact? After all, every argument for Russell's GOAT defense starts with his team's relative DRtg.
An argument that is often raised in favor of Russell on offense is that he could turn defense into offense by blocking a shot and tipping it to his teammates to start the fastbreak for easy buckets. If that was the case and the Celtics were getting so many high efficiency transition opportunities, how were they still consistently a subpar offense under Russell? Either:
a) They weren't actually any good in transition. I personally find this to be unlikely since Boston had a great fast paced offense with Cousy before Russell arrived, or
b) They had a garbage half-court offense that negated the value of their transition offense
If the situation was a), what does that say about the (lack of) offensive value that Russell generated with all these transition opportunities? And if the situation was b), what does that say about Russell's value as a high post passing center in the half court? No matter the justification, the Celtics were a poor offense. It doesn't make sense to credit Russell for his role on the offense and the cliche 'doing all the little things to help his team win that don't show up in the stat sheet' while overlooking the fact that the end result was a consistently negative offense that took away from the greatness of their defense.
Everything up to this point has been in-era with no consideration for Russell's value over different eras. Sometimes though, Russell supporters would argue that he could develop more offensive skills in a later, more offensive-oriented league if that is what was required of him to win. I think this is wishful thinking. Russell's career FT% is lower than Dwight Howard's. He came into the league among the leaders in FG% but stagnated as the NBA around him improved and he was among the worst starting centers in both scoring volume and efficiency for the second half of his career. Russell ranked highly in assists per game especially later in his career but he wasn't anywhere close to Jokic or elite passers like Walton, Divac and others. Numbers aside, even Mikan who came before him looks to be a more skilled passer from the limited footage I have seen:
Russell is a high IQ, selfless team player but he is still bound by his limited offensive skillset. He grew up in an era where bigs had the green light to do whatever they want on offense and if he couldn't develop some scoring skills then, why would he suddenly be able to be become a better offensive player today when perimeter guys are given more offensive primacy? If Russell's career FT% was something like 76%, you could maybe argue he would develop a nice perimeter game today. But it's not. He shot 56% from the line. Unless there are other centers who shoot that poorly on FTs and has a good jumper from mid range or 3pt line, Russell is not likely going to be a much better shooter today than who he was in his own days.
4. WinningSome Russell fans may just skip all of the above and go to the rings argument. After all, it is simple and foolproof. If you play the game to win and Russell won more than anyone, any weaknesses from him or the Celtics can be dismissed as an irrelevant byproduct. I personally disagree with this argument. The Celtics were pushed to close Game 7s far too often during their dynasty by relatively weak teams and many of those final posessions came down to clutch shots which had little to do with Russell himself. The fact that a championship run only required two series wins for most of his career also helped decrease the chance of an upset. They still won in the end but in comparison to teams led by other all time greats, the 11 rings overstate how dominant the Russell Celtics were. For example, here is a combined graph of the ELO ratings of the teams of Magic, Russell, Duncan, Bird, Jordan, LeBron and Curry:
The Duncan Spurs played at a higher level for longer. The Jordan Bulls and Curry Warriors peak were shorter but far higher. Bird's Celtics were just as good as Russell's Celtics but won less because they had to compete against another all time great team in the Showtime Lakers. LeBron teams's ELO fluctuated widely in some years because the metric is not designed for players changing teams but they have hovered around the same level for most of his prime too. One thing you can say about the Russell Celtics is that they were very consistent but if you look at the ELO of all the other title teams by these superstars, every single one except the 88 Lakers were higher than Russell's best championship teams. The Celtics were a very good but not otherworldly dominant team and just kept on winning because teams largely stayed the same year in year out due to the lack of player movement
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