Heej wrote:70sFan wrote:Heej wrote:Nah man I've played ball in my Converses once or twice. For one, when your adrenaline is pumping you're just playing like how you normally play. If anything you're more worried about the shoe itself coming undone than your own feet, because at the end of the day on a game to game basis it's not that big of a difference in performance. It's just over time playing in those are gonna hurt your feet more.
I'm sure it makes a slight difference, but honestly man I think Shaq is just in a different class of balance and fluidity compared to Wilt. Chuck Taylor's vs some Kyries aren't gonna completely change your gait to the point that you look like a significantly different person when you run. There's gonna be a marginal difference at most. When you watch Shaq and Wilt run when they're at similar playing weights, It's not a marginal difference in their movement patterns; Shaq straight up looks better and more balanced.
Now let me not hyperbolize it either. Shaq runs like a 4 and Wilt runs like a 5. Shaq running in Converses would still run like a 4 and Wilt running in modern shoes would still run like a 5. I'm not saying Shaq moves like a guard the way KD does or a wing the way Giannis does, but he definitely is more fluid and has better balance and deceleration than Wilt does.
And speaking of which, that is another trait of athleticism that gets highly underrated along with fluidity and coordination where I think Shaq has Wilt beat by a country mile. It goes hand in hand with every movement, not just stopping and starting and changing direction, but literally just being able to maintain better balance when taking your next step or allowing you to more quickly go into a power move vs bending your knees a ton and having to arrest all that momentum before exploding up. It's a major factor in why Shaq moved so well for his size and what made someone like Jordan a substantially better functional athlete than Vince Carter even though their physicals looked the same.
Wilt may have had more stamina, and arguably even had the advantage in power and explosiveness; but these hidden athletic traits like fluidity, balance, deceleration, coordination (aka everything that made Steve Nash a great athlete) are where I think Shaq clearly has him beat and imo contributes to him being the superior athlete in my eyes.
Can you show us the example of the massive difference in balance, coordination or fluidity? I'd like to see the examples in exact clips, cause to be honest I'm not sure I understand your take here.
I mean I'll try to take some time to pull out specific plays from the 2 videos you posted but I think it's just a holistic feeling I get watching clips of the two. Shaq just looks more fluid to me. If you're convinced Wilt is the better athlete it's gonna be hard to just convince you from just watching their movements on film but maybe later today or tomorrow I'll take time to try and analyze in-depth where I find Shaq has superior movement patterns in comparable situations.
I'd appreciate some clips anyway!