Offensive Legends Series from Ben | The "Official" Thread

[70sFan]

I think with the new series coming out, it will be nice to discuss Ben's amazing work on YT again. Especially, because he started with a very strong one...

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I mostly agree with things Ben stated in this video and as I said in the top 100, I am so glad that he was able to analyze uncirculating footage from the league. With more footage, Wilt becomes more of a basketball legend and less of a myth.

What are your thoughts?

[ZeppelinPage]

Highly recommend this video. I really enjoyed the analysis and overall tone Taylor had, really fantastic stuff here.

I found the portrayal of Wilt's offensive abilities to be accurate, and overall, it was a fair and positive assessment of his game. In the video, Taylor delves into aspects such as:

1. Offensive Fouls: He discusses the challenges Wilt faced in getting a position in the paint and how this impacted his game compared to players like Shaq.

2. Spacing: The era's spacing made it difficult to find passes and create opportunities for teammates, a problem evident in the 1964 footage that explains the teams offensive issues. His team was notably poor offensively, with the footage showcasing Hightower, Thurmond, and Guy Rodgers all on the court simultaneously, leading to some terrible spacing:

Spoiler:

3. Celtics' Defensive Strategy: Newspapers often mention teams doubling or tripling Wilt, especially in the playoffs. Although zone defense was theoretically illegal, the referees didn't enforce it. The Celtics would typically have a guard, usually K.C. Jones, fronting Wilt, while Russell covered him from behind. This ball denial strategy complicated the task of getting the ball to Wilt and reduced his shot attempts. Heinsohn or Jones would also sometimes drift from their man and disturb Wilt as he set-up in the post.

4. Monstrous Off-Ball Game: Wilt's status as one of the greatest offensive rebounders ever, combined with his ability to guide shots in for his team, made him virtually unstoppable around the paint.

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I do believe that the limitations in Wilt's dribbling that Taylor mentions, as well as the lack of scoring moves that create opportunities for teammates, are heavily influenced by the rules of the era in which he played. Such as harsher three-second calls, traveling violations, and dribble rules--this made offense significantly more challenging.

I agree with Taylor's analysis of Hannum's system in '67 taking better advantage of their talent. Players like Chet Walker and Hal Greer could also create their offense to take pressure off Wilt. Taylor is right to infer that Hannum's system didn't so much correct Wilt's approach but rather assembled the right players and structure to support him.

Taylor concludes by expressing a preference for the '64 version of Wilt. Wilt had the scoring and passing that season to anchor a team like the '67 76ers, but unfortunately, he lacked the offensive talent to achieve this.

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It's noteworthy to add that the '64 Warriors actually declined in relative Offensive Rating compared to the '62 (Wilt's 50 PPG) and '63 (missed playoffs) Warriors. The same offense that Hannum implemented, although perfect for the 76ers, didn't work as well on a team with poor shooters and limited offensive talent.

This is something I've mentioned before, but those early Warriors teams were solid defensively but lacking in offense. After all, they were the worst offense in the league in '59 before Wilt joined—and that was with Arizin and Gola both playing.

This aligns with Taylor's final (and correct) conclusion in the video: That the 1964 version of Wilt offers the best blend of his offensive strengths.

Yet, the '64 team was actually the worst offense that prime Wilt played on.

This leads me to conclude that Wilt's peak offensive performance in '64 was hampered by some truly dismal offensive talent—a recurring theme throughout his early career.

This is why I believe that, although it may seem sub-optimal, the '62 offense was more efficient for that team. Because Wilt was on a more defensively oriented team, him taking a large portion of his team's shots made the offense better because he was far and away the most efficient scorer on the Warriors. As Pat Riley states in the documentary Goliath:

"Was he selfish? I don't think he was selfish. I think he had to shoot as much as he could for his team to win."

During the '62 season the Warriors were:

32-13 (71%) when Wilt scored 50+ points.
28-14 (67%) when Wilt attempted 40+ shots.

Hannum's shift towards a more pass-oriented style with his 'wheel' offense ended up enabling less efficient scorers to shoot more frequently. This allowed Wilt to conserve energy for defense and was worth the risk that teammates might improve with more open looks.

When Hannum joined the 76ers in '67 and implemented the same wheel system, the team had the necessary skill set to thrive under this offense with Wilt.

Let me clarify that I completely agree with Ben Taylor that Wilt and his teams were better when he passed more. Hannum's wheel offense was more reliable and consistent under the right conditions than Wilt shooting 30-40 times. It was also advantageous that, now that he was taking fewer shots, Wilt had more energy for defense. Sharing the ball and keeping it moving is the optimal way to play basketball when you have the right offensive talent—but the Warriors lacked that during Wilt's time there.

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Overall, this was an impressive and well-researched video that I have few gripes about. Good work, Ben Taylor.

[SilentA]

Big fan of the channel and level of analysis. One of the few who goes super hard on both eye test + advanced stats, while providing the evidence too, and knows how to contextualize information in a reasonable way. Looking forward to the rest.

[rk2023]

Might be worth stickying this if it gains as much traction as the 2021 Greatest Peaks thread.

[rk2023]

My thoughts on the video:

• First, I’m very excited for a series like this - which rather than focusing on the best of the best , covers a larger range of innovative offensive talents and why they’re unique. I’ve become a huge fan of current season / league analysis Ben, Cody, and the TB team provide so I’m very intrigued for a more holistic player representation extrapolated historically. 70s, he cited you in this debut as well!

• Overall, I think Ben came off as much more positive a speaker regarding Wilt - providing objective analysis leading to opinion while reading as more informative than critical.

• I liked the Shaq contrast in terms of similarities and differences. While I certainly prefer Shaq as an offensive centerpiece, it was cool to see nuance for 60s vs 00s “bully-ball” provided. Despite being a naturally overwhelming specimen, there was certainly some bodily finesse (but here and there touch) to Wilt’s scoring game - as well as Shaq-like off-ball utility from paint gravity, a surreal catch radius/width, and rebounding acumen.

• I see some parallels between the discourse put forth in the video and current noise Wilt is garnering in the T-100 (he’s under heavy consideration for me at 7). The example of 1964 and how situation somewhat changed tactically serves as a good reinforcement of ‘fundamental attribution error’ played out in basketball. As far as I’m concerned, *some* merit is deserved for points on two sides made in the T-100 discussion so far (Wilt wasn’t great at empowering teammates per-se, his cast was offensively mediocre and reliant on ‘Save us Wilt’ offense as a better decision) - but Hannum being able to think of a brilliant add-on for Wilt’s scoring prowess served as a better global offense decision. Such was amplified in Philadelphia - where better shot creators highlighting the team’s support allowed Wilt to serve as a post-hub from farther out.

There still are some points I’m curious towards: his “WOWY” impact from 1965 / 1969 on both teams at each time span - and getting to the root reasons as much as possible, variance in offensive production and team offense in 1967-68 while scaling down, box production from Wilt’s different casts, some Laker Wilt analysis, etc. I wish Ben would have firmly answered what Wilt’s offensive peak was (I think 1964 was what he alluded to), but a very enjoyable video as a whole.

[rk2023]

Retired Players I would be ecstatic to see featured (mostly because they didn’t get a Greatest Peaks Video):

- West
- Robertson
- Wade
- Dirk
- Miller
- Allen
- Manu
- Iverson
- Nash
- Hardaway
- McGrady

[70sFan]

Retired Players I would be ecstatic to see featured (mostly because they didn’t get a Greatest Peaks Video):

- West
- Robertson
- Wade
- Dirk
- Miller
- Allen
- Manu
- Iverson
- Nash
- Hardaway
- McGrady

The one particular one I'd love to see (but have no reason to believe I'll ever see) is Dantley. Ben often uses AD as a negative example/analogy in a lot of situations, but I think a proper analysis of his games would be highly valuable (especially since we now have like 20 Jazz games from Dantley's prime).

[70sFan]

• First, I’m very excited for a series like this - which rather than focusing on the best of the best , covers a larger range of innovative offensive talents and why they’re unique. I’ve become a huge fan of current season / league analysis Ben, Cody, and the TB team provide so I’m very intrigued for a more holistic player representation extrapolated historically. 70s, he cited you in this debut as well!

I have been talking with Ben about this video for almost a month and I gave him some tracking numbers for that video (as well as the footage). It's an honor to contribute in such a great project even in a very small, unsignificant way.

• Overall, I think Ben came off as much more positive a speaker regarding Wilt - providing objective analysis leading to opinion while reading as more informative than critical.

Yeah, that's one of the main reasons I like the video so much - no narratives, mostly hard info.

• I liked the Shaq contrast in terms of similarities and differences. While I certainly prefer Shaq as an offensive centerpiece, it was cool to see nuance for 60s vs 00s “bully-ball” provided. Despite being a naturally overwhelming specimen, there was certainly some bodily finesse (but here and there touch) to Wilt’s scoring game - as well as Shaq-like off-ball utility from paint gravity, a surreal catch radius/width, and rebounding acumen.

I think the one thing Ben didn't underline enough (though he did mention it) is that Wilt looks on the tape like the best offensive rebounder ever - even better than Shaq or Moses. That's a huge part of why I became higher on his offensive profile after doing tracking work.

[PistolPeteJR]

Might be worth stickying this if it gains as much traction as the 2021 Greatest Peaks thread.

Gonna watch this later tonight.

But that Peaks series was so very needed during COVID lol.

[Icarus_prime]

This video is essentially Ben Taylor's first chapter of "Global Offense" from his Thinking Basketball Book back in 2016 in audiovisual form

[ceiling raiser]

Great breakdown by Ben and fantastic footage from 70sfan. I think I go with 67 as Wilt's offensive peak over 64. There was more talent and better spacing on the 67 team, however like the video outlined, Wilt got more sophisticated with his passing looks/fakes, he played a bit further from the rim, and the muscle made him a bigger threat off-ball.

Minor wish -- I would have liked to see a bit of a breakdown of what went wrong in 68. That was a logical extension of 67, and there was a fascinating quote in the top 100 project about defenses no longer respecting his scoring threat as much.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

One thing that really stood up to me from this video has been how limited his passing ability actually was.
There are people who were calling him the best big men passer of all time because he led th3 league in assists, but that clearly was not true.

[70sFan]

Great breakdown by Ben and fantastic footage from 70sfan.

Ben got some of his footage from the league (1962 and 1964 in particular). These clips are new for me and probably they come from full games silent tapes (the ones against thr Knicks).

Minor wish -- I would have liked to see a bit of a breakdown of what went wrong in 68. That was a logical extension of 67, and there was a fascinating quote in the top 100 project about defenses no longer respecting his scoring threat as much.

I think Ben didn't have enough footage from that season to reach a meaningful conclusion. Don't know if the league has anything substantial from that season either.

The quote was from the beginning of the season when Wilt was in a scoring slump. He finished the season with better scoring numbers actually than in 1967 and their offense seemed to look fine.

[70sFan]

One thing that really stood up to me from this video has been how limited his passing ability actually was.
There are people who were calling him the best big men passer of all time because he led th3 league in assists, but that clearly was not true.

He certainly wasn't the best big man passer ever, but what are you talking about in particular?

[Ryoga Hibiki]

One thing that really stood up to me from this video has been how limited his passing ability actually was.
There are people who were calling him the best big men passer of all time because he led th3 league in assists, but that clearly was not true.

He certainly wasn't the best big man passer ever, but what are you talking about in particular?

how deliberate he was and how he was not blending his scoring and passing to manipulate defenses.
Even his reads lopked really basic.
I might be missing the context if the era of course, but a guy like Alcindor looked at a very different level.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Great breakdown by Ben and fantastic footage from 70sfan. I think I go with 67 as Wilt's offensive peak over 64. There was more talent and better spacing on the 67 team, however like the video outlined, Wilt got more sophisticated with his passing looks/fakes, he played a bit further from the rim, and the muscle made him a bigger threat off-ball.

Minor wish -- I would have liked to see a bit of a breakdown of what went wrong in 68. That was a logical extension of 67, and there was a fascinating quote in the top 100 project about defenses no longer respecting his scoring threat as much.

just speculating, but what I saw could it be rhat he was too much scoring mode vs passing mode and teams understood that and started overplaying the one he was on at that moment?

[70sFan]

One thing that really stood up to me from this video has been how limited his passing ability actually was.
There are people who were calling him the best big men passer of all time because he led th3 league in assists, but that clearly was not true.

He certainly wasn't the best big man passer ever, but what are you talking about in particular?

how deliberate he was and how he was not blending his scoring and passing to manipulate defenses.
Even his reads lopked really basic.
I might be missing the context if the era of course, but a guy like Alcindor looked at a very different level.

But even in this video, there are examples of him mixing passing and scoring game. His reads are not very advanced, but that's in a huge part because more sophisticated reads weren't available back then, especially with 1964 Warriors spacing.

Would you like to show some examples from Kareem that makes you believe he was on another level?

[Ryoga Hibiki]

He certainly wasn't the best big man passer ever, but what are you talking about in particular?

how deliberate he was and how he was not blending his scoring and passing to manipulate defenses.
Even his reads lopked really basic.
I might be missing the context if the era of course, but a guy like Alcindor looked at a very different level.

But even in this video, there are examples of him mixing passing and scoring game. His reads are not very advanced, but that's in a huge part because more sophisticated reads weren't available back then, especially with 1964 Warriors spacing.

Would you like to show some examples from Kareem that makes you believe he was on another level?

I know they are less sophisticated, but he was looking extremely mechanical.
I don't want to compare him to Jokic ot even the Sabonises or Divac, and sure I have not the same idea of the 60s environment some of you have to have realistic expectarions, but definitely I was nit impressed.
I must now check for early Kareem footage, I will come back

[70sFan]

Second episode about Reggie Miller:

Watch on YouTube

[OhayoKD]