fatal9 wrote:Re: Hakeem
His 80s career is a bit underrated. He didn't have the team game down like he did in the 90s, possibly because of how late he learned the game, but still, he was a monster.
'85 - improves lottery team to the playoffs, Rockets go from one of the worst defenses in the league to 4th best (though he was a lousy post defender early on in his career imo).
'86 - improves Rockets to 51 wins (would have been more if he didn't miss 14 games). The only time anyone took down the 80s Lakers in a 7 game series before they got to the finals. Averaged 31 ppg on 52 FG%, 58 TS% in that series, and lots of blocks and rebounds (missing some boxscores). Played well against what was probably the greatest team ever in the '86 Celtics while most of his team shrank particularly Sampson. The guy showed by just his second year he could take down all-time great teams, lead his team to the finals when given a proper cast.
'87 - The promising team around him begins to fall apart. Mitchell Wiggins and Lewis Lloyd got suspended for doing coke, Sampson played only half the season and was limited even when he was on the court. Sampson and him played for the first time in almost 3 months when the playoffs started. What he did in these playoffs was very underrated IMO, 29/11/3/4 on 66 TS% (!) over 10 games (in under 39 mpg). Upset the Blazers in the first round, only game they lost in that series was the one where he got in foul trouble and the Rockets got outscored 27-12 in the quarter. Then came the Sonics (who came off beating the 55 win Mavs team), he played/shot well in every game. His ONLY bad game was game 4 where he was limited to 27 minutes due to foul trouble. Ellis was on fire and then Chambers came on late, Rockets were outgunned. In the elimination game he had 49/26/5/6 on 19/33 shooting, including scoring 17 of the last 25 points for the Rockets.
'88 - He put up the highest PER ever in the playoffs albeit only over 4 games. I've only seen two games from the series, and can't begin to comment on how poorly the guards shot (Sleepy played well in game 2, that's it, his other three games were horrific). Hakeem put up 34/14, 41/26, 35/12 and in the elimination game 40/15 @ 57 FG% (64 TS%) for the series. These numbers are nuts. Lost to the same team that took LA to 7 games in the next round.
His career did hit bit of lull under Don Chaney, which IMO is the biggest reason his career didn't turn out even greater than it was. The chuckers on the team got too much control of the offense, ball ran through Hakeem way less until Rudy T came in and then we saw Hakeem's talent truly shine from '93-'97. His prime stretch from '93-'95 is one of the five greatest primes for me, comparable to just about anyone. Any time the playoffs rolled around, he almost always brought his A game.
It's like Hakeem's ridiculous peak makes people think he was some marginal player before the '93 season. He was the top center in the league most of those years, a top 5 player at minimum in all of those years (except rookie season) and was making both all-NBA first and all-NBA defense first teams, basically secured a playoff birth for shoddy teams each year, performed at a high level individually when he got there, whose presence essentially secures a top 5 defense year after year, and who even took down the Laker western conference dynasty on route to the finals by just his second year. For example, what makes Magic's '80-'86 career so much more valuable? Or Shaq's career from '93-'99? And so on. Whether Hakeem could have played the way he did in his best years is up for debate, but it doesn't mean that because he raised the bar so high with his peak, that he was some borderline all-star player for rest of his career. Dude by his second year, with a decent team, got within 2 wins of a championship, losing only to a team that is argued to be the greatest team ever. He didn't magically lose his ability to play the game afterwards. Bad situations often make players look worse than they really are, good situations often make players better than they really are.
For almost all of Hakeem's pre-peak years, the 3 point shot WAS NOT A FACTOR in the offense (and even in years like '93, '94, the three point shooting support wasn't actually that great compared to the 00s). It wasn't something that was an active part of the offense. The average team in the 00s made more threes in one season than the Rockets did from '85-'90 combined. This is a huge factor because the role player became more valuable offensively and a dimension was added to the offense that especially helps post players (ie. Duncan) and players who use drive and kick to make a lot of plays (ie. LeBron). You know what happened when Hakeem had role players who could do an adequate job of making threes? Championships.
Meanwhile, reduce the use of the three point shot, give them worse role players, worse coaching, dysfunctional teams and see what the result would be. Give Shaq crappy primary ball handlers (ie. no Penny, Kobe, Wade), reduce the number of threes his teams take to under 100, give him bad coaching, offenses that lack structure and worse talent (ie. teams that aren't putting up winning records year after year when he was missing games), and there will legitimately be years where Shaq would miss playoffs in Hakeem's situation (particularly years where Shaq was missing 20+ games and his team goes 6-21 or something). Wouldn't make Shaq any worse of a player or LeBron or Duncan, any worse as players, but according to many, it would. Everything matters. Coaching matters, teammates matter, type of strategies used on both ends matters, all these factors go into producing a win total, and if you don't think it does, then you're watching games with a box over your head. If you want to keep it simple and not worry about all these factors, just breakdown a player's game, know what things he can consistently do and can't do and you get a fairly accurate picture of how good he is.
Yes, he wasn't the offensive anchor he would go on to become later, but this is still one of the best scoring/offensive big men of all time. From '86-'89 over 38 playoff games, Hakeem averages 28.4 ppg on 55 FG%/60 TS% in 38.9 mpg (36 ppg/100 poss). In terms of pure scoring that's up there with ANY big man, he demolished team after team in the playoffs. I've read young Hakeem described as offensively “raw”, which is a very liberal use of that word. Certain parts of his game were less developed than you'd like but "raw" isn't an accurate word to describe someone who already possessed all-time great scoring skills for his position, as 80s Hakeem did. If I had more time, I’d try to post more 80s Hakeem playoff games than there are on youtube. Here’s a typical good game from him:
Looks “raw”, doesn’t he? The play at 4:15, shrink him down 6 inches and you could pass it off as Jordan. There's still a decent bit out there for people to get an idea of his skill-set at the early stages of his career. As always, game footage is preferable because it shows limitations as well. At worst offensively at this stage, he’s like a more physically gifted and considerably more skilled (especially in the post) Amare (who at his best was one of the best offensive big men of this decade).
Now Hakeem's offensive game did have some weaknesses in the 80s, he didn't quite read defenses as well as he did later on, he passed more to get rid of the ball when he couldn't do anything with it rather than to create a play, could take shots that would be best described as “ambitious”. However, he still brings a lot of value with great post scoring that demands double teams, excellent midrange shooting, maniacal offensive rebounding (avg’d 13.5 ORB% in 80s, which drew early comparisons to Moses), exceptional motor to get good position, strong finishing around the rim, very high skill-set to score one on one from many spots on the floor and the usual frenetic activity on both ends attributable to his insane motor. While we have come to associate Hakeem with finesse, young Hakeem had finesse combined with a bit of a power game, but his game was more unstructured compared to later. He was like a hyper aggressive bull who tried to dunk anything around the basket, reveled in physicality and possessed a very aggressive scoring mindset that relentlessly placed pressure on defenses whenever he got the ball, but he still possessed the soft touch, footwork and finesse of a guard, still operated on teams with baseline fadeaways and jump hooks, still had the ability to balance himself to get almost any kind of a shot off. His game was wild, watching some of these 80s Hakeem playoff games, at times it's like a loose circus elephant on a rampage (probably how the Lakers felt in '86). Lot of confidence, almost to the point of irrationality, makes you blurt out “who the hell does that?” (or as Heinsohn says “I tell ya, this guy Olajuwon, doesn’t know fear at all”). His talent was so supreme, his game so unconventional, that even early in his career, it appears teams could not consider dealing with him over a playoff series, his skill and unrelenting floor activity overwhelmed them, not some second rate teams either, but dynastic ones of the era like the Lakers and Celtics. The indefensible nature of his offensive game is still there, and it's a serious problem for teams over a series. Even at this stage of his career, I would say offensively at the center position, only prime Shaq and KAJ can be thought of as being clearly better. Some people write off his career pre-'93 as if he's some marginal player, especially offensively ("raw"), but he's still playing at a level that is above the peaks of the second tier centers and like usual, due to the nature of his game, he becomes even more dangerous come playoff time.
I don’t actually think Hakeem is having a huge offensive impact during the Chaney years because of how poorly the offense is organized/structured. There’s really not much synergy between him and his teammates. Watching the Lakers series in ’90, when he’s getting an outrageous amount of defensive attention, Rockets are basically clueless on how to actually take advantage of all the defensive attention he is drawing. Even when the first pass by Hakeem was a proper one, the second and third passes by his teammates weren’t (very lazy, slow, indecisive passing that allows defense to recover despite how compromised it was). There is very poor player movement, the floor spacing is puzzling at times and the Rockets were known for being a very poor half court passing team (the guards not exactly a smart, altruistic bunch). In contrast, Lakers know exactly where the ball is going after Magic or Worthy (who btw undressed Buck Johnson in the series) kicks it out of a double team and the second and third guys make the quick hitting plays to get the right guy the ball. To be fair, Hakeem iirc was also was frustrated by the attention and forced bad shots at times, but it's alarming how incapable Houston was of exploiting such aggressive double/triple teaming.
So there are weaknesses in young Hakeem’s game if your expectation is to make him the focal point to run your offense through. At this stage, Hakeem needs a good point guard or perimeter player to help run the offense as well as create situations to take advantage of his broad offensive skills (particularly strong finishing ability and midrange shooting), which is fine because most big men are at the mercy of the perimeter players they play with who handle the ball, help create a more dynamic offense and also help put their bigs in good position to score (prime Hakeem needed a dynamic perimeter player less than most centers do, because his game by itself was so dynamic). Also a coach who adds a bit more structure to help him read and predict defenses at team level better would have been helpful. So younger Hakeem may not be as capable of carrying teams with average players, but his game brings a lot of value if you put him next to some half decent perimeter players (like most players in the top 10 had the benefit of being around for a longer portion of their career than Hakeem did).
BTW I also think Hakeem’s game allows talented somewhat ball dominant guards to play more freely around him than other bigs, his skill-set and versatility doesn’t need to bog them down as much which is a slight problem for bigs who only play exclusively in the post and take a lot of clocktime to create scoring opportunities for themselves (with the right players, you can play a bit of small ball offense with Hakeem, with all 5 players capable of attacking and shooting, without actually sacrificing your defense, we saw that in ’95 playoffs for example). I'm not actually a fan of making bigs, especially those with rigid games, the centerpiece of the offense if you have decent talent elsewhere, it's only practical if the big scores on supreme efficiency, is incredibly reliable against various types of defenses, uncontainable in single coverage, or has the skill-set to fit in and “get his” around perimeter guys without needing to necessarily demand, hold and dribble dribble dribble to score. Hakeem at basically every stage of his career, passes that test.
Older Hakeem was wiser, more capable and his offensive game was more structured, but we shouldn't discount younger Hakeem offensively as he brought value in a slightly different way. Hakeem’s proponents aren’t exactly saying he would have played like ’93 all those years (at least not me), there are clear distinctions separating young Hakeem and the one of his peak years (though there’s a possibility he gets there sooner, I think by ’90 he was there). Instead, they are drawing attention to the fact that 80s Hakeem is still really damn good, like all-time good, able to lead teams to championships good. But due to what we call on this board “winning bias”, many have a manic-depressive way of evaluating careers. We often see this with Kareem and Hakeem, where they came on strong in their first few seasons, then are placed in bad situations (usually situation improves over time for a star player), and people sour on those parts of their career as if they were forgettable periods where they were incapable of leading teams to championships and call these as the meme goes; "black marks".
Good situations make players look better than they are, and bad situations paint them worse than they are. Bad situations makes people magnify things that are apparently passable in good situations, like for Hakeem, people point out that early on he wasn’t as good as his peak years…which would be the case for like virtually every player ever. I think there’s a strong argument for there being a bigger gap between ‘87 Magic and ’82 Magic, than there is between ‘93 Hakeem and ‘86 Hakeem (and not because peak Magic was better than peak Hakeem), but for most people it’s only a big problem in the latter case and that’s mainly due to “winning bias”. Everyone’s skill-set evolves over time as they reduce their weaknesses and enhance what they already do well. The skill-set of a player (synonymous for me as “fundamental qualities of a player”) if you have a good handle of it, stays largely constant over a season (though can vary and evolve season to season). The skill-set of a player’s game gets you a good picture of his talent level, and will determine what kind of players can fit around him, what kind of a system you can run on both ends, the ceiling you can achieve on either end by featuring him and the synergy of it all ultimately leads to impact (also skill-set also allows you to figure out the value and reliability of a player in the playoffs, something that’s of huge importance for me). Hakeem didn’t just go on a mid-career vacation after leading his team to the finals, the situation around him deteriorated rapidly, everything that could go wrong, did. I’d only suggest that we should seek to have a good handle of 80s Hakeem’s game instead of dismissing it as I've seen done due to circumstances outside of his control (ditto for other players), because at that point you're not rating the player anymore, instead you're rating some sort of an odd combination of the player himself, his teammates and the quality of management + coach he played under.
Key is that you have to use Hakeem's talent the right way. In his prime he was literally the perfect player to build around. Monster defender who guaranteed you a top defense in the league, 30 points a night, great decision making and passing ability that the ENTIRE offense was built around (no one on Houston was good at creating their own shot, they depended so much Hakeem's presence), unstoppable one on one scoring against any one (most double teamed big I've seen after Shaq), high bball IQ and quick decision making (this is what made him go to the next level in '93, his decision making became amazing, most centers don't act quick enough), not a liability in crunch time like many other centers, ability to outplay anyone put in front of him and an absolute ASSASSIN in big games (MJ like nerves and killer instinct, the man would just not go away).
Only very few superstars can consistently make shots over the defense while maintaining a high level of efficiency, Hakeem was one of them (Jordan, Kobe two other that stick out, though Kobe's ego takes a bit too far with this). Depending on the situation, how set the defense is, what the time on the clock is, it isn’t exactly a bad thing to have an extraordinary shot maker on your team and overall, well placed aggression as a scorer places tremendous pressure on the defense. With many centers and low post players, you can devise strategies to really limit their touches and get the ball out of their hands because they have less floor space to work with, and limited spots to start their offense from. This was less of a problem for Hakeem, because he was better at making adjustments to you, than you were to him (on both ends). So if he's being double teamed, he can step outside and spot up for midrange jumpers (or use his quickness to evade doubles altogether). He is also a more dynamic playmaker in the post, he doesn't necessarily have to wait for a double team to create a play like most centers and he can also attack facing up from the perimeter. Of course there’s a fine balance, but it didn't come at the expense of his teammates or his own efficiency, the Rockets role players thrived with Hakeem. Hakeem's offensive decision making was very good and he did use the defensive attention the right way to create countless looks for his teammates, that was the foundation of their entire half court offense, and Hakeem was lauded for how well he synchronized his game with rest of the team.
Okay, he's not Vlade or Sabonis or Walton, and Shaq probably is a bit better at passing, but to call him subpar? especially as a center? SUB-PAR? Against a focused/elite team defense, like the kind we've already seen him perform well against in the playoffs? Somehow his offensive decision making, which is excellent, has been turned into a weakness. If I don't have a star guard to give my offense the kind of dynamic playmaking that is important in the playoffs (ie. team is filled with role players/shooters instead of all-star guards), I would comfortably take Hakeem to lead my offense in the playoffs over Shaq. His dynamic form of playmaking is much more valuable and harder to plan around than the traditional, "wait for a double team" strategy (where the defense can make adjustments to control exactly when they double, who they double off and where they double from).
This is what often makes big men not so good solo offensive/volume scoring anchors in playoffs, their game is a lot more rigid, they can have problems syncing high volume scoring with keeping rest of the team involved and engaged. You just don't get big men averaging close to 5 apg while scoring 30+ ppg, they are just not dynamic enough as playmakers. Dude consistently averaged more apg in a volume scoring role than any other center, and somehow he's been turned into a subpar passer. '93-'95 Hakeem averaged more assists than '00-02 Shaq and turned the ball over less, has lower TO/TO% and higher ast/ast% numbers over their entire playoff career when the "defense is focused". Rockets even used to run a play with Otis Thorpe and Hakeem, where Hakeem would make a lob post entry feed to OT over the defense, rarely see that kind of a play run with a center making the feed. You can see him striking shooters all game, finding players who are cutting, consistently made the right pass in crunchtime to win huge playoff games. Hakeem was also a master at using a single dribble to collapse a defense, people need to take a note of this when they watch him play, one well used dribble and he creates a play on call. He might not be the GOAT passing big man, but to be critical of his passing and ability to read the defense, two things that are actually major strengths for his position, doesn't make much sense at all.
I think in a setting where there's no all-star guard to give your offense added variability, Hakeem is actually the better option to have in the playoffs. Also while efficiency and boxscore stats are usually used to point out Shaq's superiority, in the playoffs, Hakeem from '86-'95 (102 games) actually had a better TS% and O-Rating than Shaq did from '95-'04 (115 games), and higher scoring per 36. A lot of Shaq's regular season boxscore advantage over Hakeem basically disappears in the playoffs. Not that boxscore should matter that much anyways, but understandably it's important data for some.
Even if he's being triple teamed all game, at his peak he was better at affecting the game defensively and with his overall floor activity. Some of Hakeem's most dominant playoff games are ones where he didn't even break 25 points, instead he dominated in every way possible, especially defensively, altering countless shots, both in the paint and on the perimeter, forcing turnovers and disrupting plays with his floor activity, and igniting many fast breaks with his defense (some games that come to mind, G3, G4, and G7 vs. Sonics in '93, close out game vs. Jazz in '94 among others). Like this is a game where Hakeem had 22 points on less than 50% shooting , but his dominance is never in question.
Just because I really enjoy talking about Hakeem's defense, I'll write down some things that made him such a complete and impactful defender in my mind.
His post defense. He makes a swipe at the ball when the guy in the post is receiving it, which would be classified as "gamble defense" for most centers, but due to his quick feet, he recovers right away and then plays you straight up. This is such a nuisance for guys in the post because there's no time to gather yourself and get into your move, dude is ALWAYS pressuring you, on the post entry pass, then when you make your move he is reacting quickly with his feet to take that away, his quick hands are taking away the ball if you expose it and then uses his impeccable timing to contest your shot. Phenomenal defensive footwork, look at how much trouble Ewing had against him in the post because of this. Even when you see him against someone so physically dominant as a Shaq, he could still make a player like him have inefficient offensive games. No one is going to contain Shaq one on one or when he has position on you…he will score and he did against Hakeem. But in that series Hakeem used his quick feet (to get in position and draw offensive fouls) and hands to make Shaq very turnover prone (something that is NEVER mentioned when people post their respective ppg/FG% stats, Shaq averaged 5.3 TOs, more than he has in any playoff series of his career). His savviness depending on the opponent is an underrated part of his overall post defense. I read a post (bastillon’s I think) a while ago where performances of opposing centers were summed up and against Hakeem they saw the biggest drop (yes, aware that centers don't play each other straight up over a full game, but it's something to consider).
His pick and roll defense is KG like, except he has even quicker feet. Best I've seen at shutting down the most effective offensive play in basketball for most teams (Duncan's pick and roll D is a joke in comparison). As Kenny mentions in that open court clip, when you put into words what he's doing when defending the pick and roll, it sounds ridiculous, it IS ridiculous, but...he was actually doing it. This is of course one play and it's an example of how ridiculous his pick and roll and overall floor coverage was:
This is going to annoy some people because I’m highlighting one play (and I get why it would) but lets look at what he’s doing for a second here. Dude went out to the three point line to cover the pick and roll, made a clean swipe at the ball to pressure the guard (often stripped them like this), then recovers to shadow the guard and stays between him and the basket to intimidate him out of a layup, then gets in the paint and makes a shot block at the rim off the pass to a guy who thinks he's open, all while keeping the ball in play for a fast break opportunity. And the thing is, he did stuff like this in every game, and if you need to be convinced of that, watch his playoff games from ’93 and ’94. His pick and roll coverage from any spot on the floor was deadly, had the ability to defend basically every option that develops from it. Which other big man did it better?
His overall floor defense. No such thing as a “mismatch” exists if Hakeem was switched on to you, doesn’t matter if you’re a forward or a guard, he had the feet to stay in front of you. In the '93 series vs. Sonics who had all sorts of perimeter scorers, watch how well he stays in front of them. He clears up his teammates (and own) mistakes because his recovery defense and floor coverage is amazing. His instincts too, he's great at seeing offensive plays develop. I was watching the Jazz series a while ago, all these cute little plays those guys ran like pindowns for Malone and backscreens and what not, Hakeem would come in and just take that away from them (averaged 2.6 steals, 4.6 blks partly because of how he could read what they wanted). He would come up from somewhere above the foul line (illegal defense restrictions of the time) and come out of nowhere to take away those easy Malone baskets when he is pinning down the forwards (in game 5 Snapper Jones remarks “the problem for Karl Malone is he can’t find Hakeem Olajuwon”). He made so many game winning (and even championship winning) plays at the end of games when teams were running their bread and butter plays, because he was good at reading them (who does that remind you of?). It was that sort of cerebral ability to read his opposition which he combined with everything else he did (you can definitely argue he maybe didn't have in his younger years), that made his defensive impact so huge. Hubie Brown made a great remark about Hakeem regarding his understanding of the game given how late he learned it, "he has a PhD in basketball, but where did he get it?"
Then he could absolutely lock down the paint with his shot blocking and altering. King of surprise weak side blocks, could get his own man, challenge guards and make them have to shoot low percentage floaters in the lane. His timing, reflexes and the quickness of his jump are unparalleled at his position. Not many, if any shot blockers you can call better, and usually he kept the ball in play to trigger fast breaks.
His activity. If you watch playoff games from his prime, announcers are always asking "does this guy ever get tired?" He would wear down his opponent on offense and then not let up at all on defense. Nightmare matchup for opposing Cs because of this and it helped him win one on one matchups. His activity and stamina was on another level to everyone else on the court (prime MJ like, where the player makes you feel like he is "everywhere" and involved in every big play on both ends). Does such a great job of getting back on defense and covering people in transition too, the motor is always running.
His team stats. Since he came into the league, his team was top 5 in defense 8 of out 10 years. And when he was out, his teams generally saw a big decline. If that's your thing, ElGee’s post earlier in the thread sums it up.
If you want to hear what coaches and players who played against him or watched him thought of his defensive skills, hit up google and look at the awe they are in with how he is able to impact the game defensively. It’s a little bit of a shame that the ’95 run is his defining GOAT moment for a lot of people, because they miss out the better defense he is playing in previous years (not to say he wasn’t still among the best in ’95, but overall activity/rebounding wise he had taken a step back from the standard he set in earlier years).
Back to back defensive player of the years when Ewing was anchoring historical defenses, Mutombo was leading the league in blocks and D-Rob was his usual phenomenal self. Elevating him above KG and Duncan isn’t an insult to those guys, he could just do more than them, it's obvious to me from watching them play, kind of like KG’s overall floor defense with Timmy’s paint defense and shot blocking. Imagine everything you want out of a big man defensively and Hakeem basically gave that to you. You think Timmy and KG are better? Fine, I strongly disagree, but everyone has their opinion. But no need to act like Hakeem doesn’t warrant his position as the 2nd defensive GOAT. Based on watching him play, his skills, his well roundedness, his numbers, his team impact, opinion of people around the game, anyway you slice it, dude deserves the praise he gets on defense. There have been great big men who did some of the things I mentioned (Duncan/KG), some who did most of the things I mentioned (D-Rob), but did anyone do ALL of them at the level Hakeem did?
With such a high importance that good teams place on exploiting matchup weaknesses in the PS, a guy like Hakeem who a) shores up so many things for a team (from a reliable volume scorer, playmaking hub, to pick and roll d and overall floor defense, to shot blocking, etc etc, literally all major facets of the game), and b) is so good at making adjustments to his opponent, both in his individual matchup and against team strategies, peak Hakeem is the ultimate matchup ace to have heading into a playoff series. Even if you have LeBron or Jordan, your interior defense and rebounding might be getting killed (like it was for the Heat this year), even if you have Shaq, your pick and roll defense might be getting killed (among other things), with Hakeem, his impact is so versatile and expansive that he takes away a lot of the opponents' potential matchup advantages while presenting a set of his own to them.
If you value primes and playoff performance highly (two most important things for me personally), he has a very good case for top 5. You need to watch him play, need to see the situations he confronted, how he played on a game by game basis, how immensely valuable he was to his teams. The reason why many people think so highly of him because at his peak, he left you nothing to criticize because he did everything, won every big game, performed HUGE on the biggest stage, faced stiff competition and outplayed everyone. Did it like MJ did from ’91-’93, played in a way that left no doubt in anyone's mind. Now people are acting like putting Hakeem in the highest of highest leagues is revisionist history or overrating him, but take a closer look, the man played THAT well.
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I'm really not, though.
I have gestured to this before, but Garnett does not have the standouts of other players — those moments where he elevated and brought a team farther than its talent, like we see more consistently with Hakeem or Lebron. 1999 he does a good job of matching with Duncan and gives the Spurs one of their two losses. 2001 he has a respectable scoring performance and clearly outdoes Duncan on that front. 2003 you could argue he plays better than Shaq that series. 2004 he defeats an ostensibly strong Kings team (I am lower on that team’s realistic playoff ceiling but all the same) capped off with a legendary game 7, and then he looks like the best player on the court in the conference finals.
was that Wilt played 44% more minutes in the regular season and an extra 140 games (nearly two full seasons worth), so then we come back to the question of how much better Magic (or Shaq) needs to be to overcome that prime deficit.
