RealGM 2017 Top 100 List: #45 (Dolph Schayes)

[trex_8063]

Thru post #40 (11 votes, requiring 6 for true majority):

Bob Cousy - 2 (euroleague, Pablo Novi)
Willis Reed - 2 (Clyde Frazier, dhsilv2)
Dolph Schayes - 2 (trex_8063, eminence)
Elvin Hayes - 1 (scabbarista)
Wes Unseld - 1 (pandrade83)
Tracy McGrady - 1 (twolves97)
Alex English - 1 (penbeast0)
Dikembe Mutombo - 1 (micahclay)

Deke, Blade, TMac, Unseld, and Hayes are eliminated. Two votes transfer to Schayes (not enough for a majority), and secondary votes make no distinction between Cousy and Reed; so we go to a 3-way runoff between Schayes, Cousy, and Willis Reed.

Dolph Schayes - 4 (trex_8063, eminence, scabbarista, pandrade83)
Bob Cousy - 2 (euroleague, Pablo Novi)
Willis Reed - 2 (Clyde Frazier, dhsilv2)


If you're not one of the names listed there who has already made his position on this runoff known, please state which ONE of these three candidates you favor the most (with brief arguments).

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[Winsome Gerbil]

Cousy

[Outside]

Thanx for the well-wishes and compliments; I REALLY appreciate them.

Earthquake "stuff":
TWO MONSTER QUAKES IN 10 DAYS:
We've had TWO monster quakes in 10 days. The first was an 8.0, much further away from Mexico City - and did relatively little damage HERE - but the sheer number, an 8-point quake, had people plenty jumpy. With this new one, inevitably there's bound to be some kind of psychic shift amongst the 20+ million people here.

CLOSED-FOR-BUSINESS
Yesterday we walked to downtown, 45 minutes each way (neither of us has any interest in getting on the Metro anymore (I can only imagine what it was like either underground (most stations) or high up (a few stations). We've got a legal issue going, so we were checking in for an update - but almost everybody was off work (particularly the actual legal bureaucrats. Some of them were sitting outside. One joked that the guy we most deal with was, "still buried under the rubble"; and I responded, "Yeah, and nobody's volunteered to dig him out!" Which got a big scream of laughter from three people, one of which we'd never seen even smile before.

A MASS "CONFESSIONAL"
This is a HIGHLY (Catholic) religious country. Everybody is talking about how, as the shaking ripped thru the buildings, people were praying AND begging God for forgiveness for their latest and/or un-confessed "sins". Meaning: a LOT of people PUBLICLY revealed a LOT of stuff (that they'd normally never reveal to anybody but their priest) to people they would NEVER normally reveal anything to. Once confessed, there's no way to erase the memory - so there's going to be a TON of awkward interactions / relationships in the days to come.

HIGH PANIC IN HIGH PLACES
One interesting dynamic: its SOP that in tall office buildings, the security staff do NOT allow the people on the higher floors to even begin to try to descend until both the shaking stops AND people are clearly showing that they are NOT in panic mode. This makes sense as you can't allow too many people onto the stairs at any one time; particularly trying to descend as rapidly as possible. Given how much the upper floors moved, that panic mode must have been near-universal. Not being allowed to move towards the stairwells must have only made many people even more nervous.

We've seen a whole number of closely-built buildings that suffered significant damage to their upper corners - such building-to-building collisions must have been one of the worst experiences.

ELEVATOR HELL
And then there's all the people stuck in the elevators.

HOW MANY BUILDINGS WILL HAVE TO BE TORN DOWN
Most of the damage we've seen came in two widely separate categories: wiped-out buildings vs building SHOWING little to no damage. You have to wonder how many of the buildings with little external visible damage have been weakened enough to merit either major renovations or complete demolitions?

The MONSTER quake that hit PRECISELY 32 years earlier just wrecked havoc on the city - massive destruction, death and injury. Upgraded quake-codes prevented anything approaching that.

PSYCHIATRY IN MOTION
The psychological repercussions are going to be many, massive and a bit hard to predict.
A) Employees in tall buildings are gonna be seriously questioning remaining in those jobs;
B) People who live in or next to tall buildings are gonna face similar questions;
C) People who (will) have on-going reasons to visit offices in tall buildings are gonna re-evaluate how important those issues are to them VS the risks. We wouldn't be surprised if the number of legal cases, for example, gets significantly reduced,as people decide that:
i) bogus cases aren't worth the physical risk;
ii) real cases aren't worth the physical risk given how long most of those cases drag out. (Legal intra-family battles TEND to drag out beyond 10 years! We're aware of a number of cases that have gone on over 20 years with no end in sight.)

OOPS! EARTH-QUAKE WARNING SIRENS ARE GOING OFF!!!

What a great post. Thank you for being our boots-on-the-ground reporter.

[70sFan]

Finally, Schayes gets the recognition he deserves. He's definitely better than Cousy in my opinion even though he didn't won as much. Reed has outstanding peak, but I can't take him over Schayes because he had shorter CAREER than Dolph prime alone.

Schayes was also one of the best shooting bigs of all time while being excellent rebounder. That's a rare combination and very dangerous one.

Dolph Schayes

[dhsilv2]

Finally, Schayes gets the recognition he deserves. He's definitely better than Cousy in my opinion even though he didn't won as much. Reed has outstanding peak, but I can't take him over Schayes because he had shorter CAREER than Dolph prime alone.

Schayes was also one of the best shooting bigs of all time while being excellent rebounder. That's a rare combination and very dangerous one.

Dolph Schayes

I've got Shacyes after Iverson, if he makes it here moot, but why him over the answer ?


I still have Reed due to peak firmly here, but after that I'm pretty open.

[THKNKG]

Thru post #40 (11 votes, requiring 6 for true majority):

Bob Cousy - 2 (euroleague, Pablo Novi)
Willis Reed - 2 (Clyde Frazier, dhsilv2)
Dolph Schayes - 2 (trex_8063, eminence)
Elvin Hayes - 1 (scabbarista)
Wes Unseld - 1 (pandrade83)
Tracy McGrady - 1 (twolves97)
Alex English - 1 (penbeast0)
Dikembe Mutombo - 1 (micahclay)

Deke, Blade, TMac, Unseld, and Hayes are eliminated. Two votes transfer to Schayes (not enough for a majority), and secondary votes make no distinction between Cousy and Reed; so we go to a 3-way runoff between Schayes, Cousy, and Willis Reed.

Dolph Schayes - 4 (trex_8063, eminence, scabbarista, pandrade83)
Bob Cousy - 2 (euroleague, Pablo Novi)
Willis Reed - 2 (Clyde Frazier, dhsilv2)


If you're not one of the names listed there who has already made his position on this runoff known, please state which ONE of these three candidates you favor the most.

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Did you see that I changed my secondary vote yesterday during the day to Schayes? Sorry, I didn't think to write in an edit.

[trex_8063]

Did you see that I changed my secondary vote yesterday during the day to Schayes? Sorry, I didn't think to write in an edit.

I did not. Will add your name to the runoff totals:

Dolph Schayes - 5 (micahclay, trex_8063, eminence, scabbarista, pandrade83)
Bob Cousy - 2 (euroleague, Pablo Novi)
Willis Reed - 2 (Clyde Frazier, dhsilv2)


For the sake of discussion (though technically not required if he was your 2ndary vote), would you care to briefly elaborate on why you take him over Cousy or Reed?


btw, to anyone else reading this: if you do change your vote in the course of the thread, I would like you to both edit the original post that contains your vote, BUT ALSO give me a heads up as you do so. I don't save all the vote tallying until the end/deadline.......I'm counting them as we go and have spreadsheets to tabulate them (to save time when the deadline comes, as I'm often doing it at work or in a situation where I can't take a lot of time), and I generally DO NOT go back over posts that I've already counted. So if you go back and change something without giving me a heads-up, I can miss it.

[janmagn]

Runoff vote: Bob Cousy

Cousy was the second best player in the GOAT team imo. He was a great playmaker, and a true winner.

Lähetetty minun LG-M250 laitteesta Tapatalkilla

[trex_8063]

Cousy

Just a reminder to contribute some reasoning.

[trex_8063]

Runoff vote: Bob Cousy

Cousy was the second best player in the GOAT team imo. He was a great playmaker, and a true winner.

Lähetetty minun LG-M250 laitteesta Tapatalkilla

Can you offer us just a little more wrt your thinking? For instance, where Cousy was the second best player (some would disagree with this, fwiw, and with good reason at least by '62 and after) on title teams, Schayes [his contemporary] was the best player on a title-winning team (and several other contender/near-contender teams). Cousy was a great playmaker; Schayes was a great scorer and rebounder, and had better longevity.

Not necessarily trying to get you to switch your pick, but rather trying to draw you out on how you would respond to these points (since two brief, and very general, statements is sort of walking the line of minimal required/allowable argumentation).

[janmagn]

Runoff vote: Bob Cousy

Cousy was the second best player in the GOAT team imo. He was a great playmaker, and a true winner.

Lähetetty minun LG-M250 laitteesta Tapatalkilla

Can you offer us just a little more wrt your thinking? For instance, where Cousy was the second best player (some would disagree with this, fwiw, and with good reason at least by '62 and after) on title teams, Schayes [his contemporary] was the best player on a title-winning team (and several other contender/near-contender teams). Cousy was a great playmaker; Schayes was a great scorer and rebounder, and had better longevity.

Not necessarily trying to get you to switch your pick, but rather trying to draw you out on how you would respond to these points (since two brief, and very general, statements is sort of walking the line of minimal required/allowable argumentation).

Schayes might have been the best player on a championship team, but Cousy was the second best player in a team that many, including me, consider the best team in the history of NBA. He wasn't a bad scorer either, and gets some 'legacy points' for showing that you don't have to be the biggest to be dominant

Lähetetty minun LG-M250 laitteesta Tapatalkilla

[Winsome Gerbil]

Cousy

Just a reminder to contribute some reasoning.

1) There is no remaining player, NONE, that can even remotely compare to mass of accolades and achievements Cousy amassed:

6x NBA Champion
1x MVP
12x All NBA (10/2)
13x All All Star
8x Assist Leader

2) By the time of his main retirement he was the league's all-time leading assistman, by over 50% over his nearest competitor, the league's 3rd all time scorer, had won more titles than anybody else in league history, had played in more playoff games than anybody else in league history, and was the league's all time leading playoff scorer and assistman (the later by 3x over his closes competitor).

3) Bob Cousy made receding hairlines cool. Unlike insecure prima donnas like LeBron who spray in hair and then magically regrow their hairlines, Cousy owned his male pattern baldness like a real man:



4) Bob Cousy was such a boss he could dribble with one hand, and hold his smokes with his other. He had Vlade's devil may care Marlboro man look beat by decades, and since we have limited TV from the era, I choose to see him playing with a lit cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth and blowing smoke in the face of opponents he wanted to intimidate.

[Doctor MJ]

Runoff vote: Willis Reed

Short career, with a peak sometimes overrated in my opinion. But I would love to have him on my team. All-star level player with the kind of backbone that helps create a good culture.


Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

[penbeast0]

Schayes wasn't really on my radar but his supporters make a stronger case for him than those backing Cousy or Reed. Early stretch big with great FT shooting, good defense, rebounding, led a team to a championship. So, for this runnoff . . . Dolph Schayes.

[dhsilv2]

4) Bob Cousy was such a boss he could dribble with one hand, and hold his smokes with his other. He had Vlade's devil may care Marlboro man look beat by decades, and since we have limited TV from the era, I choose to see him playing with a lit cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth and blowing smoke in the face of opponents he wanted to intimidate.

Yikes! That certainly lowers my view on the man. Funny how these things work.

[trex_8063]

4) Bob Cousy was such a boss he could dribble with one hand, and hold his smokes with his other. He had Vlade's devil may care Marlboro man look beat by decades, and since we have limited TV from the era, I choose to see him playing with a lit cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth and blowing smoke in the face of opponents he wanted to intimidate.

Yikes! That certainly lowers my view on the man. Funny how these things work.

To me the smoking add just further contributes to the opinion of just how remarkably different the circumstances were for players of that age to how it is today. And thus, one absolutely cannot/should not speculate on how a player from era X would do in era Y without putting a tremendous amount of thought into the whole "walk a mile [or in this case: a lifetime] in his shoes" idea.

In Cousy's time, it was commonplace for athletes [even in a sport that requires endurance] to smoke and perfectly acceptable for them to even appear in an advertisement for it. Nowadays it would be all but unheard for an NBA to be a regular smoker at all. Just one of a myriad of circumstances that have changed dramatically.

[dhsilv2]

4) Bob Cousy was such a boss he could dribble with one hand, and hold his smokes with his other. He had Vlade's devil may care Marlboro man look beat by decades, and since we have limited TV from the era, I choose to see him playing with a lit cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth and blowing smoke in the face of opponents he wanted to intimidate.

Yikes! That certainly lowers my view on the man. Funny how these things work.

To me the smoking add just further contributes to the opinion of just how remarkably different the circumstances were for players of that age to how it is today. And thus, one absolutely cannot/should not speculate on how a player from era X would do in era Y without putting a tremendous amount of thought into the whole "walk a mile [or in this case: a lifetime] in his shoes" idea.

In Cousy's time, it was commonplace for athletes [even in a sport that requires endurance] to smoke and perfectly acceptable for them to even appear in an advertisement for it. Nowadays it would be all but unheard for an NBA to be a regular smoker at all. Just one of a myriad of circumstances that have changed dramatically.

I've pointed this out somewhere else here, but tour de france bike riders often smoke. Smoking is hardly the performance killer that people make it out to be. There are some real benefit from nicotine for endurance. That said, I still can't imagine a pro basketball player today smoking regularly. After all we have nicotine gum now!

[pandrade83]

Runoff vote: Bob Cousy

Cousy was the second best player in the GOAT team imo. He was a great playmaker, and a true winner.

Lähetetty minun LG-M250 laitteesta Tapatalkilla

Can you offer us just a little more wrt your thinking? For instance, where Cousy was the second best player (some would disagree with this, fwiw, and with good reason at least by '62 and after) on title teams, Schayes [his contemporary] was the best player on a title-winning team (and several other contender/near-contender teams). Cousy was a great playmaker; Schayes was a great scorer and rebounder, and had better longevity.

Not necessarily trying to get you to switch your pick, but rather trying to draw you out on how you would respond to these points (since two brief, and very general, statements is sort of walking the line of minimal required/allowable argumentation).

Schayes might have been the best player on a championship team, but Cousy was the second best player in a team that many, including me, consider the best team in the history of NBA. He wasn't a bad scorer either, and gets some 'legacy points' for showing that you don't have to be the biggest to be dominant

Lähetetty minun LG-M250 laitteesta Tapatalkilla

So, does it not bother you that pre-Russell - when Schayes & Cousy were both in their primes, that Schayes beat Cousy 3/4 times in the playoffs, made 3 Finals & won a title, while Cousy never made one Final?

[Dr Positivity]

Sorry I was travelling for a few days and couldn't contribute as much

I'm going with Dolph Schayes of these 3. He is a tremendous offensive player, efficiency, spacing, good passing, etc. and he was a star until 61 which is a pretty far ways out from just pre shotclock guys. Cousy had higher reputation at this time but his competition for guards was worse and it's hard to ask them to realize the higher volume guy isn't necessarily the best at that time. Reed was a great player at his peak but the longevity difference is too big for me here

[penbeast0]

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