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Been thinking about this a bit. It’s very, very tough since I’m peak-heavy, and weight very strong years more than typical prime years.

LeBron - no
Jordan - probably not (but there’s an outside argument)
Russell - unlikely but if the ORtg/DRtg splits from the Russell’s teammates thread are accurate then this is possible
Kareem - don’t think so
Duncan - he actually had a very strong prime, don’t think so
Magic - another possibility, but I’m high enough on his offense that it doesn’t make sense
Garnett - he’s a candidate but I think his peak years were strong
Curry - no
Shaq - no but his peak probably warrants greater scrutiny in defense
Wilt - don’t see it
Olajuwon - like Shaq, probably should scrutinize him more
Bird - open to it but don’t have him in my top 10
Kobe - same as above
Robinson - his peak was fine
Oscar - doubt it give how good his offenses were
West - he’s possible
Giannis/KD/Jokic - strongish peaks but too soon for top 10

I guess it’s either KG or Russ out of my top 10, but then I’m penalizing defense.

You guys have anyone in your top 10 who has a clearly worse peak than the rest?

Among those you mentioned, I think the weakest peak is clearly KD, but he's not top 10 candidate to me.

Of players in my top 10 I’d rank their peaks like so:

LeBron
KG
Duncan
Hakeem
MJ
KAJ
Shaq
Wilt
Russell
Magic

So Magic for me.

My top 10 ranked by peaks:

Kareem
Wilt
James/Jordan
Duncan/Hakeem
Shaq/Russell
Garnett
Magic

So Magic for me as well.

70sFan wrote:My top 10 ranked by peaks:

Kareem
Wilt
James/Jordan
Duncan/Hakeem
Shaq/Russell
Garnett
Magic

So Magic for me as well.

I'm actually kind of surprised you don't have Russell at the top there. I know you said you didn't strictly go by era-relative impact. Are there other factors here?

OhayoKD wrote:

70sFan wrote:My top 10 ranked by peaks:

Kareem
Wilt
James/Jordan
Duncan/Hakeem
Shaq/Russell
Garnett
Magic

So Magic for me as well.

I'm actually kind of surprised you don't have Russell at the top there. I know you said you didn't strictly go by era-relative impact. Are there other factors here?

I have my doubts about his offensive game and I hope to get a clearer picture with more footage. For primes, I think he's clearly GOAT candidate with his remarkable consistency but I think we can discuss who was more impactful between Russell and Wilt in 1964. To be honest, I probably should have put him on Duncan/Hakeem tier.

70sFan wrote:

OhayoKD wrote:

70sFan wrote:My top 10 ranked by peaks:

Kareem
Wilt
James/Jordan
Duncan/Hakeem
Shaq/Russell
Garnett
Magic

So Magic for me as well.

I'm actually kind of surprised you don't have Russell at the top there. I know you said you didn't strictly go by era-relative impact. Are there other factors here?

I have my doubts about his offensive game and I hope to get a clearer picture with more footage. For primes, I think he's clearly GOAT candidate with his remarkable consistency but I think we can discuss who was more impactful between Russell and Wilt in 1964. To be honest, I probably should have put him on Duncan/Hakeem tier.

Is the offense an era-relative concern or a translation concern?

Also curious how much do you weigh other years when trying to assess Russell at his best. Does 1969 for example play a strong factor? My approach is to generally try to look at the high-end and low-end looking stuff and then assume a general average. With Russell always winning and what he did right before retiring, it's pretty tough for me to go against him with anything that isn't longetvity

OhayoKD wrote:

70sFan wrote:

OhayoKD wrote:I'm actually kind of surprised you don't have Russell at the top there. I know you said you didn't strictly go by era-relative impact. Are there other factors here?

I have my doubts about his offensive game and I hope to get a clearer picture with more footage. For primes, I think he's clearly GOAT candidate with his remarkable consistency but I think we can discuss who was more impactful between Russell and Wilt in 1964. To be honest, I probably should have put him on Duncan/Hakeem tier.

Is the offense an era-relative concern or a translation concern?

Also curious how much do you weigh other years when trying to assess Russell at his best. Does 1969 for example play a strong factor? My approach is to generally try to look at the high-end and low-end looking stuff and then assume a general average. With Russell always winning and what he did right before retiring, it's pretty tough for me to go against him with anything that isn't longetvity

A bit of both, as Russell was mediocre shooter with limited offensive "feel".

I try to use as much information as possible, so I definitely include lower end seasons if they tell us something important. It's possible that I underrated Russell peak on this list when I think about it. Russell was basically washed up offensively in 1969 and yet he still had an all-time impact. 1962 Russell was actually a solid offensive player, clearly a positive one in my opinion. Even with 1969 defense, that's a scary peak and we can assume he was better in 1962 defensively as well.

To be honest, we just need more Russell film. I have seen some crazy things he did on the court, but without legit full 15-20 games it's hard to get the great picture.

Add another to the Magic camp. Not like he wasn't amazing, but...

Think I'd go

LeBron MJ
Shaq KAJ KG Duncan Hakeem Wilt
Russell
Magic

I think the problem with the Russell scenario is the pattern of scoring in those runs.

As it a was a volume and a high pace era (kind of like today but instead spamming 3’s)

The reason why I think this is because I believe the Celtics were in an over abundance on the scoring front.

It’s kind of like a comparable Garnett stylistically that just happened to have 2x Pierces running with him at his prime

Havlicek for a example has a very rare distinction of leading 3x in scoring W/S and something else in the finals that only Jordan has.

It’s not uncommon to have multiple 20ppg scorers on the one team it’s just that Celtics had it in different positions and doing seperate things.

You’d have to go over the 12 year reign. Russell whose my weakest GOAT candidate still can’t be ignored of how much defensive impact he had relative to the rest of the league. I find his scoring patterns as alluded too very very iffy which dampens my overall evaluation. He could score but didn’t have to. He wasn’t great offensively from the findings but it’s like how much is that covered by the rest of the team’s output?

Because at the end of the day especially in the 60’s it was a volume scoring era where team totals were very high.

I think it is very hard to gauge to find how deep those rosters were with exact relevancy to all the other teams.

Take for example 59. They went 4-0, Russell could have probably averaged 0 in the finals and they would have won. Now he could be the greatest player of all time but in basketball terms no matter how incredible you are there’s zero precedent in history for having a sub 10 average.

That’s why the Wilt/Russell debate can be more hairy than a Lebron/Jordan because there’s an endless amount of historic evidence film wise for the aforementioned.

70sFan wrote:

OhayoKD wrote:

70sFan wrote:I have my doubts about his offensive game and I hope to get a clearer picture with more footage. For primes, I think he's clearly GOAT candidate with his remarkable consistency but I think we can discuss who was more impactful between Russell and Wilt in 1964. To be honest, I probably should have put him on Duncan/Hakeem tier.

Is the offense an era-relative concern or a translation concern?

Also curious how much do you weigh other years when trying to assess Russell at his best. Does 1969 for example play a strong factor? My approach is to generally try to look at the high-end and low-end looking stuff and then assume a general average. With Russell always winning and what he did right before retiring, it's pretty tough for me to go against him with anything that isn't longetvity

A bit of both, as Russell was mediocre shooter with limited offensive "feel".

I try to use as much information as possible, so I definitely include lower end seasons if they tell us something important. It's possible that I underrated Russell peak on this list when I think about it. Russell was basically washed up offensively in 1969 and yet he still had an all-time impact. 1962 Russell was actually a solid offensive player, clearly a positive one in my opinion. Even with 1969 defense, that's a scary peak and we can assume he was better in 1962 defensively as well.

To be honest, we just need more Russell film. I have seen some crazy things he did on the court, but without legit full 15-20 games it's hard to get the great picture.

Yeah, unfortunately there's a lot of uncertainty here, but based off what we have, Russell looks pretty absurd. Even if we were to just pretend 1969 was his peak, how many players, at any point, do we have elevating an average cast(I think we agree that would be the optimistic outlook here) past two of the most impressive teams of the era(at least if we go by srs)?

I've said this before, but really the only things that seem in a similar tier of "impressiveness" would be Wilt coming within a possession of beating Celtics in 1962(followed by leading a team on par with the peak celtics in 1967), and Lebron knocking off the Warriors in 2016.

Could it be that this is a situation like the second stint cavs, where Russell compensated for declining physical ability with "intelligence" or know-how, but we'd probably need more film to sus that out.

I do think the offensive stuff may be fairly debilitating for future translation, but I'm not sure it was that important for his time.

If I’m looking at my top 15 I’d rank them

MJ
LeBron
Shaq
Kareem
Hakeem
TD
Wilt
Bird
Steph
Kobe
Magic
BR
KG
Oscar
Karl Malone

Would be Magic in my top 10 too.

If it's a 3-4 season prime, my answer would differ.

I have zero issues with Russ having a very high peak without volume scoring. And I don't care about some precedent since there is no precedent for his impact in non scoring areas. That would just be an arbitrary exclusion based on a preconceived personal preference.

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My list is heavily influenced by peak, so #10 would be the worst (Oscar Robertson).

Of the players listed in the OP then it would be Giannis or Durant. Probably Durant.

MJ
LeBron
Kareem
Wilt
Shaq
Duncan
Hakeem
Russell
Magic
Oscar

eminence wrote:Of players in my top 10 I’d rank their peaks like so:

LeBron
KG
Duncan
Hakeem
MJ
KAJ
Shaq
Wilt
Russell
Magic

So Magic for me.

Kg Duncan and Hakeem over MJ and Shaq? Kareem I can see but not those two really

ceoofkobefans wrote:

eminence wrote:Of players in my top 10 I’d rank their peaks like so:

LeBron
KG
Duncan
Hakeem
MJ
KAJ
Shaq
Wilt
Russell
Magic

So Magic for me.

Kg Duncan and Hakeem over MJ and Shaq? Kareem I can see but not those two really

All three are significantly better defenders, that alone makes a strong argument.

I think it's actually Russell. Mostly because he's unlikely any other player in this 10 top. He wasn't a great offensive player.

If I had to choose just one in my actual top-10 list at the moment I think it would be Hakeem. However, to answer that question does he have a peak I feel is notably worse than the rest in the slightest? No. I view a group of around 10 or so players at least around a similar level peak wise to where I see it as just mostly splitting hairs and just preference.

I have to extend my all-time list to about 13th or 14th at least before I start getting to players I feel more comfortable as saying they are a tier or so below my top-12 guys in terms of peak, but if I have to pick someone out of that main top-12 I suppose it would be Magic.