John Thomas wrote:I don't understand why Wilt is rated out of the top 5
Maybe someone can reply with a comprehensive argument
He never developed a consistent identity as a player, and there's some statistical support for the idea that a lot times the approaches he took didn't help his team as much as you'd expect from his raw stats. In a lot of his high scoring years his team offense wasn't that spectacular, which might make you think he was stat padding. His defense focus was come-and-go, and he clashed with a lot of his coaches. He had an article ripping his coach one year that come out right before the season started, essentially sabotaging the team before the year had even started. Obviously another player--Russell--dominated the decade in terms of team success, while Wilt was somewhat nomadic as far as superstars go.
I think there's a general (though not necessarily universal) agreement that when Wilt was right, he was better than anyone else of his day. But there are a lot of factors that cut against him, enough that, when you're comparing him to the very best ever, you might rank him lower than you'd expect to rank him at first blush. He's very similar to Shaq in that manner.
A lot of these guys have more blemishes on their career resumes than is commonly admitted, and sometimes it's a matter of what you make of those blemishes. Bird and Magic have longevity issues (and Bird had some bad playoff performances), e.g., and Shaq's defensive effort and conditioning varied pretty wildly from season-to-season. For some people Shaq's blemishes are a bigger deal than Wilt's/Bird's, for others it's Wilt's that stand out, etc. Even a guy like Kareem arguably has
some blemishes on his resume. Same with Jordan.
