Lowest Reasonable Rankings for Russell, Wilt, Kareem

[ceiling raiser]

Very wide-reaching topic, but I think we need to have a full conversation about these players.

These three guys defined the first half of the NBA's existence. All three were titans of the court.

Russell leading the best defenses ever.
Kareem with the most unstoppable offense.
Wilt doing both when he had good coaches.

But really, how much scrutiny are we applying to this set of players?

With regards to Russell, there was a recent thread about his teammates. I'm a guy who has had him as the GOAT by default for some time, but going from the best defenses in NBA history by a clear margin, to being a peer of some of the Knicks, Spurs, and Celtics teams of the 90s and 00s with some changes in initial assumptions to calculate possessions...is a bit startling. Is it possible these defenses weren't historic outliers?

Kareem is someone who dominated with his fluid athleticism for his size, several unstoppable moves and counters (I think boiling it down to the skyhook is shortsighted -- it's like saying Jordan just had a jumpshot, it's *how*, *when*, and *where* you take this shot). However did he just dominate in the weakest era of the NBA, and benefit in the 80s from Magic Johnson providing a ton of intangible impact?

Wilt receives the most criticism of these three players, however I think people might be approaching this from the wrong angles. Yes, his teams had better offenses when he had less primacy, however how good of a passer was he? How much of his offense came from offensive rebounds, and how efficient was he on other shots? What if 1967 wasn't the ideal way to play Wilt for his career, but 1972, 1973 was? I love Lakers Wilt, but that's a much different player.

Yes, all three guys have cases for GOAT. However, is it also possible someone could put together a reasonable, fair, GOAT list that includes none of the three in their top 5, or even top 10?

Food for thought...

[Dutchball97]

I don't think I could call any list with any of these 3 out of the top 10 reasonable.

[Owly]

Very wide-reaching topic, but I think we need to have a full conversation about these players.

These three guys defined the first half of the NBA's existence. All three were titans of the court.

Russell leading the best defenses ever.
Kareem with the most unstoppable offense.
Wilt doing both when he had good coaches.

But really, how much scrutiny are we applying to this set of players?

With regards to Russell, there was a recent thread about his teammates. I'm a guy who has had him as the GOAT by default for some time, but going from the best defenses in NBA history by a clear margin, to being a peer of some of the Knicks, Spurs, and Celtics teams of the 90s and 00s with some changes in initial assumptions to calculate possessions...is a bit startling. Is it possible these defenses weren't historic outliers?

Kareem is someone who dominated with his fluid athleticism for his size, several unstoppable moves and counters (I think boiling it down to the skyhook is shortsighted -- it's like saying Jordan just had a jumpshot, it's *how*, *when*, and *where* you take this shot). However did he just dominate in the weakest era of the NBA, and benefit in the 80s from Magic Johnson providing a ton of intangible impact?

Wilt receives the most criticism of these three players, however I think people might be approaching this from the wrong angles. Yes, his teams had better offenses when he had less primacy, however how good of a passer was he? How much of his offense came from offensive rebounds, and how efficient was he on other shots? What if 1967 wasn't the ideal way to play Wilt for his career, but 1972, 1973 was? I love Lakers Wilt, but that's a much different player.

Yes, all three guys have cases for GOAT. However, is it also possible someone could put together a reasonable, fair, GOAT list that includes none of the three in their top 5, or even top 10?

Food for thought...

Otoh thoughts
Celtics ... has always been possible. I don't know what numbers are best. Suspect, to the extent I look at them, I might default to Reference, unless it's made clear to me that others are better (not necessarily as a conscious decision, just Reference is the place that has stuff so more likely to see it, and have seen it more already). But those numbers have always been ... "we're guessing turnovers, offensive rebounds etc" and so the idea that they had few turnovers and Boston got more than typical offensive rebounds was always plausible.

Being pretty much an iron man, and never away for long plus differing era norms has made even spitballing an (era fair) numerical value for Russell nigh on impossible for me. But I am confident he was very impactful, fwiw.

70s diluted versus 60s, sure. But it did compress back somewhat. And there was no lack of quality bigs (vast majority in the NBA in the split era) and in the real prime you could argue none were ever better. Would need evidence on any Magic intangible benefit to him.

Wilt is super fuzzy. Huge box (though incomplete box). Sometimes huge box with maybe uncertain impact is my impression. Playoff production superficially down though given time played versus Celtics, some suggestions on here he was actually strong resilience, I think - I don't really know what to do there. I think he took some unfair raps in his own time, but was also often his own worst enemy (and quick to blame, criticize others). Given data limitations I could see a pretty large range depending on perception/translation of era, perception of defensive impact/consistency; turnovers/time holding the ball, overall/average passing levels, intangibles etc.

Try to be open to rankings responding first to criteria (of course if non given and then it seems inconsistent happy to note this and perhaps deride) ... is it applied consistently, is it a criteria I can see the merits of. I'd be surprised to see none of them top five in a list published (though what counts for this anymore ... fuzzy again) soon though eventually it will happen. Maybe one could justify it on population, talent pool demography (I think some would/do try)?? ... comparing across eras fairly, legitimately, meaningfully gets tough real quick. Fwiw, Kareem was historically the least secure in published lists.

[Dutchball97]

The Celtics dynasty had their highest SRS and 2nd best regular season record in 1962. Bill Russell averaged 45.2 MPG with his next closest teammate being Sam Jones at 30.6 MPG. The difference in the post-season is less because there wasn't much more to play for Russell but he played the full 48 MPG throughout two extremely tough series against Wilt's Warriors and the Baylor/West Lakers, while Jones upped his MPG to 36.

The exact minute differences aren't the same every year but it's always Russell leading the pack by a sizeable margin. In short, anyone arguing the Celtics were only that good because of the people around Russell are full of crap.

[eminence]

If you're down on the 60s relatively speaking I think you could get Russell or Wilt into the 10-12 range. Kareem it's very hard to put much out of the top 5 without making inconsistent criteria. We saw him next to Magic/Bird and he didn't look out of place at all, even old old man Kareem looked fine against MJ/Hakeem. Combined with absurd longevity and it's very very tough to not see him top 5 or very close to it for most reasonable career rankings.

[Owly]

The Celtics dynasty had their highest SRS and 2nd best regular season record in 1962. Bill Russell averaged 45.2 MPG with his next closest teammate being Sam Jones at 30.6 MPG. The difference in the post-season is less because there wasn't much more to play for Russell but he played the full 48 MPG throughout two extremely tough series against Wilt's Warriors and the Baylor/West Lakers, while Jones upped his MPG to 36.

The exact minute differences aren't the same every year but it's always Russell leading the pack by a sizeable margin. In short, anyone arguing the Celtics were only that good because of the people around Russell are full of crap.

On the details this is broadly true.

Around either end less so. '57 he isn't mpg leader (3rd to the guards, 2nd in the playoffs to Cousy) and obviously comes in 1/3 through the season. '58 and '68 he's the leader but "sizeable margin" is disputable, especially in the context of the precedent raised of 14.6 minutes in '62 (3.2mpg over Sharman in '58, though a larger total minutes edge due to playing more games; '68 Havlicek trails by 2.3 and narrows the total minutes gap by playing more games - '58 playoff data is contaminated by Russell's injury, '68 Havlicek plays 0.3 mpg less for 7 total minutes fewer).

This does not affect the broader point that Russell was the primary driving force behind the Celtic dynasty (one could perhaps argue, with the Celtics less dominant as he played fewer minutes, they support it).

[Dutchball97]

The Celtics dynasty had their highest SRS and 2nd best regular season record in 1962. Bill Russell averaged 45.2 MPG with his next closest teammate being Sam Jones at 30.6 MPG. The difference in the post-season is less because there wasn't much more to play for Russell but he played the full 48 MPG throughout two extremely tough series against Wilt's Warriors and the Baylor/West Lakers, while Jones upped his MPG to 36.

The exact minute differences aren't the same every year but it's always Russell leading the pack by a sizeable margin. In short, anyone arguing the Celtics were only that good because of the people around Russell are full of crap.

On the details this is broadly true.

Around either end less so. '57 he isn't mpg leader (3rd to the guards, 2nd in the playoffs to Cousy) and obviously comes in 1/3 through the season. '58 and '68 he's the leader but "sizeable margin" is disputable, especially in the context of the precedent raised of 14.6 minutes in '62 (3.2mpg over Sharman in '58, though a larger total minutes edge due to playing more games; '68 Havlicek trails by 2.3 and narrows the total minutes gap by playing more games - '58 playoff data is contaminated by Russell's injury, '68 Havlicek plays 0.3 mpg less for 7 total minutes fewer).

This does not affect the broader point that Russell was the primary driving force behind the Celtic dynasty (one could perhaps argue, with the Celtics less dominant as he played fewer minutes, they support it).

Yeah that's also kind of the point that when the Celtics were at their best it was all Russell.

[OhayoKD]

With regards to Russell, there was a recent thread about his teammates. I'm a guy who has had him as the GOAT by default for some time, but going from the best defenses in NBA history by a clear margin, to being a peer of some of the Knicks, Spurs, and Celtics teams of the 90s and 00s with some changes in initial assumptions to calculate possessions...is a bit startling. Is it possible these defenses weren't historic outliers?

Even if they weren't historic outliers in terms of raw srs, the important bit is they were historic outliers relative to all the other defenses of the time to an extent that wasn't true for any later defense. And, ultimately what really matters, is that overall, Russell's teams were vastly better than any other team in the league.

Remember, the "raw srs" isn't what we're really after here, it's the championship probability. The Celtics always won with russell healthy, at their apex, they doubled basically everyone in srs, and, going off the "off" data we have, some of that winning came with average help, even as russell was about to retire.

TLDR: The Celtics won way more than any other team in history. And from what we have(tiny sample size wowyr has it at 40 throughout, large 82 game sample has the celtics at 35 wins when russell leaves in 69 with a nigh identical roster), some of that came without special help. The raw srs/d-rating isn't all that important. Arguably, what matters is a player's ability to make their teams more likely to win chips. And on that front, Russell's prime is probably unassailable

[No-more-rings]

Kareem: Maybe like 6th or 7th, if you are lower on his defense than most, dock him for weak competition in the 70s and dock him for a few weak playoff series against Thrumond.

Russell: Out of the top 10 if you value offense highly, unimpressed with 60s competition, and don’t much care for era-relative dominance.

Wilt: I suppose like 9th or 10th, if you think his volume scoring was largely unimpactful, and that his defense was where most of his value came.