CHALLENGE: Make an era-relative case for a non-russell season/peak against 1969 Bill Russell(read OP)

[mstat13shuh]

Russell is maybe as good as bigs like Reed and Unseld in 69. Still a great player but it's not that hard to find better ones.

??? Are you freaking serious? Russell is maybe as good as Reed & Unseld in '69?
Maybe for you but certainly not for me.

(Reed & Unseld were certainly great, even then, but I'm just saying..)


I don't know about overall players, however, as far as centers are concerned, the only 68-69 centers, ABA included, whom I feel were equal or exceed Russ were:

Wilt
Nate

[One_and_Done]

I wouldn't have Russell in my top 10 for era reasons, so I'd have a long list of guys with better seasons. In today's game he's be an all-star rather than a superstar.

[70sFan]

I wouldn't have Russell in my top 10 for era reasons, so I'd have a long list of guys with better seasons. In today's game he's be an all-star rather than a superstar.

This thread specifically said "era-relative case".

By the way, it's interesting that you see 1970 Kareem as great season, but 1969 Russell suddenly is only an all-star.

[One_and_Done]

Russell wasn't posting Kareem's stats, nor carrying a bad team to a 56 win season.

[70sFan]

Russell wasn't posting Kareem's stats, nor carrying a bad team to a 56 win season.

Celtics won 34 wins without Russell next season and they didn't make the playoffs. It seems that Russell carried them quite heavily.

[One_and_Done]

They dropped from 48 wins to 34. Not at all comparable to Kareem taking one of the worst teams in the NBA to 56 wins as a rookie, and then Kareem got even better.

[70sFan]

They dropped from 48 wins to 34. Not at all comparable to Kareem taking one of the worst teams in the NBA to 56 wins as a rookie, and then Kareem got even better.

1. The shift is actually comparable:

1969 Bucks: -5.07 SRS
1970 Bucks: +4.25 SRS
Shift: +9.3 SRS

1969 Celtics: +5.35 SRS
1970 Celtics: -1.6 SRS
Shift: +6.9 SRS

The main difference is that:

- the Celtics beat the Knicks in the playoffs, winning the series in 6 games as well as the title,
- the Bucks got dominated by the Knicks in the playoffs.

2. Kareem got better, that's true. The thing is that Russell also was better when he was younger.

I don't see any reason to think that 1969 Russell and 1970 Kareem are "not at all comparable".

[One_and_Done]

That's a huge difference in SRS. Then Kareem got much better in year 2, statistically it's not even close tbh with how much Kareem improved.

[70sFan]

That's a huge difference in SRS. Then Kareem got much better in year 2, statistically it's not even close tbh with how much Kareem improved.

+2.4 SRS is definitely a big value that you can't ignore, but keep in mind that Russell played on a better team and it's relatively harder to impact better teams than weaker ones. I mean, Russell won the title with a -1.6 SRS supporting cast, what more do you expect from him?

Russell also was much better statistically in previous years, it's not even close either. We have two non-prime seasons that happened almost at the same time that suggest the two were on similar level

[One_and_Done]

The further back you go from 1970 the weaker I feel the league was, so Russell logging bigger numbers early in his career is less and less meaningful to me.

[70sFan]

The further back you go from 1970 the weaker I feel the league was, so Russell logging bigger numbers early in his career is less and less meaningful to me.

But this is your assumption that you don't have any evidences for. You don't account for the fact the ABA started to dilute the talent pool in the early 1970s or that the rapid expansion made the average team weaker.

Do you really believe that 35 years old Russell was comparable to 29 years old Russell, but the league simply became better?

[AEnigma]

Do you really believe that 35 years old Russell was comparable to 29 years old Russell, but the league simply became better?

It is conceivable; not like 1964 Russell had any real scoring advantage lol, and in 1969 his passing was more fully developed. I personally have 35-year-old 2020 Lebron as quite comparable to 29-year-old 2014 Lebron. 35-year-old 1999 Malone seems comparable to 29-year-old 1993 Malone. In terms of accomplishment, 35-year-old 1972 Wilt looks comparable to 29-year-old 1966 Wilt, although there admittedly I balk a bit and read that as more support for the notion of the pre-merger 1970s being excessively diluted.

Personally, instinct suggests that 29-year-old Russell should still have enough of an athletic advantage for him to be better despite 35-year-old Russell’s superior experience… but I am not sure I see a gulf between the two. Many of the best players do seem to exhibit an extraordinary ability to resist the usual aging curves.

[70sFan]

Do you really believe that 35 years old Russell was comparable to 29 years old Russell, but the league simply became better?

It is conceivable; not like 1964 Russell had any real scoring advantage lol, and in 1969 his passing was more fully developed. I personally have 35-year-old 2020 Lebron as quite comparable to 29-year-old 2014 Lebron. 35-year-old 1999 Malone seems comparable to 29-year-old 1993 Malone. In terms of accomplishment, 35-year-old 1972 Wilt looks comparable to 29-year-old 1966 Wilt, although there admittedly I balk a bit and read that as more support for the notion of the pre-merger 1970s being excessively diluted.

Personally, instinct suggests that 29-year-old Russell should still have enough of an athletic advantage for him to be better despite 35-year-old Russell’s superior experience… but I am not sure I see a gulf between the two. Many of the best players do seem to exhibit an extraordinary ability to resist the usual aging curves.

I mean, you picked the weakest scoring season out of Russell's prime to compare it to 1969. If we take a closer look on 1962-65 vs 1968-69, younger Russell actually has a noticeable advantage:

1962-65 RS Russell: 16.2 ppg on 47.2 TS%
1968-69 RS Russell: 11.2 ppg on 46.3 TS%

The most noticeable difference though is how he notably improved his scoring production in the playoffs during his peak years, while he didn't seem to have such next level as an older player:

1962-65 PS Russell: 18.5 ppg on 50.0 TS%
1968-69 PS Russell: 12.7 ppg on 45.4 TS%

I don't have the time to share pace adjusted numbers, but they show the similar picture (I have them on my statsheet, just don't have time now to share them).

About analogies - I don't agree with all of them. 2020 LeBron was quite close to 2014 version, but I still would say that Miami version was comfortably better (and LeBron is a longevity freak). I certainly wouldn't put 1972 Wilt that close to 1966 Wilt personally. Agree with Malone, he's an enigma to me.

The thing with Russell is that when you watch games from his prime years, you can understand that he's a better offensive player than the stats suggest. That's not really the case with 1969 Russell, he's not even average offensive player at this point. I am not sure if there is any difference in his passing ability across 1964-69 period, he was just used more and more as a high post playmaker. On top of that, I think his reaction time (at least on offense) got noticeably worse and he commited far more bad turnovers in the late career footage that I have than earlier (though the sample is small, so it may mean nothing).

[OhayoKD]

Russell is maybe as good as bigs like Reed and Unseld in 69. Still a great player but it's not that hard to find better ones.

??? Are you freaking serious? Russell is maybe as good as Reed & Unseld in '69?
Maybe for you but certainly not for me.

(Reed & Unseld were certainly great, even then, but I'm just saying..)


I don't know about overall players, however, as far as centers are concerned, the only 68-69 centers, ABA included, whom I feel were equal or exceed Russ were:

Wilt
Nate

Wilt exceeding Russell after he lost to Bill with the 2nd best offensive player of the era is an interesting take

[penbeast0]

Same for Thurmond who was still in his "Nate the Great" mindset taking 20 shots a game at a ts% efficiency of .460 while leading his team to a .500 record (which is good for a team with that talent level, but not amazing).

RS Unseld did take the worst team in the Eastern Conference the year before to the best record in the league despite losing All-Pro forward Gus Johnson halfway through.

[AEnigma]

Same for Thurmond who was still in his "Nate the Great" mindset taking 20 shots a game at a ts% efficiency of .460 while leading his team to a .500 record (which is good for a team with that talent level, but not amazing).

He took twenty shots a game because he played 45 minutes a game and had one competent scorer on the team.

Thurmond was fourth on that team in shot rate, and Mullins and an inefficient LaRusso were already in the top twenty for shot rate league-wide; to whom exactly should he have been sacrificing volume? Not Clyde Lee or Joe Ellis, and arguing Al Attles should have shot more is akin to arguing Don Buse should have shot more.

RS Unseld did take the worst team in the Eastern Conference the year before to the best record in the league

Unseld “took” a 36-win team with a 40-win point differential to a 57-win team with a 51-win point differential, provided we also pretend that players like Earl Monroe, Jack Marin, and Kevin Loughery experienced absolutely no internal improvement and only played better because of Unseld’s magical presence.

By contrast, the Warriors without Thurmond quite literally looked like the worst team in the league (well, okay, probably still better than the Suns) without him.

despite losing All-Pro forward Gus Johnson halfway through.

He played 600 fewer minutes than he did the year before. So we are subtracting 600 minutes of Gus Johnson, subtracting 750 minutes of Ray Scott (now a sixth man), subtracting 1100 minutes of Leroy Ellis (now Unseld’s backup), adding 3000 minutes of Unseld, adding 700 minutes of an improved Jack Marin, adding 800 minutes of an improved Kevin Loughery… and we are improving from a 0 SRS team to a 4 SRS team.

Hardly a stunning climb in my eyes, but maybe it was Unseld who secured all those extra clutch wins.

[70sFan]

Same for Thurmond who was still in his "Nate the Great" mindset taking 20 shots a game at a ts% efficiency of .460 while leading his team to a .500 record (which is good for a team with that talent level, but not amazing).

Not trying to argue for Thurmond > Russell, but this is a very misleading representation of what happened in 1969 Warriors season...

Warriors finished 41-41 in the RS, so techically it's true. The problem is that they went 38-33 with Thurmond (who missed 11 games), which puts them around 44 wins pace, but they collapsed without him and went 3-8 when he sat out. It's not a one year small sample thing either:

1967 Warriors with Nate: 38-27 (48 wins pace)
1967 Warriors without Nate: 6-10 (31 wins pace)

1968 Warriors with Nate: 32-19 (51 wins pace)
1968 Warriors without Nate: 11-20 (29 wins pace)

1969 Warriors with Nate: 38-33 (44 wins pace)
1969 Warriors without Nate: 3-8 (31 wins pace)

1970 Warriors with Nate: 21-22 (40 wins pace)
1970 Warriors without Nate: 9-30 (19 wins pace)

Across 4 straight years, we see a very consistent pattern - Thurmond was extremely valuable to the Warriors, they played extremely bad without him (even with Barry on the team):

1967-70 Warriors with Nate: 129-101 (46 wins pace)
1967-70 Warriors without Nate: 29-20 (25 wins pace)

RS Unseld did take the worst team in the Eastern Conference the year before to the best record in the league despite losing All-Pro forward Gus Johnson halfway through.

He did and I will always praise Unseld for his tremendous non-boxscore impact, but it should be noted that the raw jump in wins overrate his impact a little bit:

1968 Bullets: -0.23 SRS (40 expected wins, 36 actual wins)
1969 Bullets: +4.05 SRS (51 expected wins, 57 actual wins)

The jump was probably bigger than 10 wins that SRS suggest, but it's also likely smaller than 20 wins which raw record suggests.

[penbeast0]

Unseld “took” a 36-win team with a 40-win point differential to a 57-win team with a 51-win point differential, provided we also pretend that players like Earl Monroe, Jack Marin, and Kevin Loughery experienced absolutely no internal improvement and only played better because of Unseld’s magical presence.

By contrast, the Warriors without Thurmond quite literally looked like the worst team in the league (well, okay, probably still better than the Suns) without him.

despite losing All-Pro forward Gus Johnson halfway through.

He played 600 fewer minutes than he did the year before. So we are subtracting 600 minutes of Gus Johnson, subtracting 750 minutes of Ray Scott (now a sixth man), subtracting 1100 minutes of Leroy Ellis (now Unseld’s backup), adding 3000 minutes of Unseld, adding 700 minutes of an improved Jack Marin, adding 800 minutes of an improved Kevin Loughery… and we are improving from a 0 SRS team to a 4 SRS team.

Hardly a stunning climb in my eyes, but maybe it was Unseld who secured all those extra clutch wins.

Loughery had been in the league 7 years so I'm okay with attributing a lot of his improvement to playing with Wes Unseld rather than Leroy Ellis passing and (more importantly in an on ball jump shooter like Loughery's case) setting screens for him. It's his most efficient year by .20 points and he generally sustained it through the rest of his career with Unseld. Maybe Don Ohl (whose leaving opened up the extra minutes) was that bad but the numbers don't indicate it. In 68 they split minutes and were pretty much a wash (Ohl had slightly higher WS/48 and PER, the combination stats available on B-R.com).

Earl, surprisingly, didn't improve much from rookie to 2nd year, maybe because he was a one on one player at this time in his career and didn't use the screens that Unseld was arguably the GOAT at setting.

Marin's increased time is important, he was a very nice complementary player (used to regularly outplay the more celebrated Bill Bradley) but his extra time corresponds pretty much with All-Pro Gus Johnson's missed time so hard to say that's a team bonus.

So yes, the big difference was Unseld taking time away from Leroy Ellis and Ray Scott; otherwise the greater availability of Gus Johnson would probably make 68 the stronger team absent Unseld on the 69 squad. Contemporary observers thought so too giving him the RS MVP.

There is a clear difference between wins produced and expected wins produced in the two years which you pointed out. Whether that is due to luck, increased BBIQ with Unseld, or other factors, we can't be sure.

[OhayoKD]

Same for Thurmond who was still in his "Nate the Great" mindset taking 20 shots a game at a ts% efficiency of .460 while leading his team to a .500 record (which is good for a team with that talent level, but not amazing).

Not trying to argue for Thurmond > Russell, but this is a very misleading representation of what happened in 1969 Warriors season...

Warriors finished 41-41 in the RS, so techically it's true. The problem is that they went 38-33 with Thurmond (who missed 11 games), which puts them around 44 wins pace, but they collapsed without him and went 3-8 when he sat out. It's not a one year small sample thing either:

1967 Warriors with Nate: 38-27 (48 wins pace)
1967 Warriors without Nate: 6-10 (31 wins pace)

1968 Warriors with Nate: 32-19 (51 wins pace)
1968 Warriors without Nate: 11-20 (29 wins pace)

1969 Warriors with Nate: 38-33 (44 wins pace)
1969 Warriors without Nate: 3-8 (31 wins pace)

1970 Warriors with Nate: 21-22 (40 wins pace)
1970 Warriors without Nate: 9-30 (19 wins pace)

Across 4 straight years, we see a very consistent pattern - Thurmond was extremely valuable to the Warriors, they played extremely bad without him (even with Barry on the team):

1967-70 Warriors with Nate: 129-101 (46 wins pace)
1967-70 Warriors without Nate: 29-20 (25 wins pace)

RS Unseld did take the worst team in the Eastern Conference the year before to the best record in the league despite losing All-Pro forward Gus Johnson halfway through.

He did and I will always praise Unseld for his tremendous non-boxscore impact, but it should be noted that the raw jump in wins overrate his impact a little bit:

1968 Bullets: -0.23 SRS (40 expected wins, 36 actual wins)
1969 Bullets: +4.05 SRS (51 expected wins, 57 actual wins)

The jump was probably bigger than 10 wins that SRS suggest, but it's also likely smaller than 20 wins which raw record suggests.

a 10-win jump at that point is worth more than it would be now

[70sFan]

Same for Thurmond who was still in his "Nate the Great" mindset taking 20 shots a game at a ts% efficiency of .460 while leading his team to a .500 record (which is good for a team with that talent level, but not amazing).

Not trying to argue for Thurmond > Russell, but this is a very misleading representation of what happened in 1969 Warriors season...

Warriors finished 41-41 in the RS, so techically it's true. The problem is that they went 38-33 with Thurmond (who missed 11 games), which puts them around 44 wins pace, but they collapsed without him and went 3-8 when he sat out. It's not a one year small sample thing either:

1967 Warriors with Nate: 38-27 (48 wins pace)
1967 Warriors without Nate: 6-10 (31 wins pace)

1968 Warriors with Nate: 32-19 (51 wins pace)
1968 Warriors without Nate: 11-20 (29 wins pace)

1969 Warriors with Nate: 38-33 (44 wins pace)
1969 Warriors without Nate: 3-8 (31 wins pace)

1970 Warriors with Nate: 21-22 (40 wins pace)
1970 Warriors without Nate: 9-30 (19 wins pace)

Across 4 straight years, we see a very consistent pattern - Thurmond was extremely valuable to the Warriors, they played extremely bad without him (even with Barry on the team):

1967-70 Warriors with Nate: 129-101 (46 wins pace)
1967-70 Warriors without Nate: 29-20 (25 wins pace)

RS Unseld did take the worst team in the Eastern Conference the year before to the best record in the league despite losing All-Pro forward Gus Johnson halfway through.

He did and I will always praise Unseld for his tremendous non-boxscore impact, but it should be noted that the raw jump in wins overrate his impact a little bit:

1968 Bullets: -0.23 SRS (40 expected wins, 36 actual wins)
1969 Bullets: +4.05 SRS (51 expected wins, 57 actual wins)

The jump was probably bigger than 10 wins that SRS suggest, but it's also likely smaller than 20 wins which raw record suggests.

a 10-win jump at that point is worth more than it would be now

Yes, but it's not what we see from Thurmond.