Retro POY '67-68 (Voting Complete)

[Doctor MJ]

In this thread we'll discuss and vote on the top 5 best player seasons of '67-68.

Trying something new now. Schedule will be Mon-Fri, and Thu-Mon. Typically this will be morning to morning.

Some things to start us off:

NBA
Season Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/lea ... _1968.html
Playoff Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... _1968.html
Award Voting http://www.basketball-reference.com/awa ... _1968.html
Final Box Score http://webuns.chez-alice.fr/finals/1968.htm

ABA
Season Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/lea ... _1968.html
Playoff Summary http://www.basketball-reference.com/pla ... _1968.html

Topics
Philly dominates again, and seemed poised to repeat
Celtics manage to capitalize on opportunity again.
Wilkins 2nd in MVP?

[bastillon]

I just said in '69 thread that we could wait a little longer for the next year. I feel like there's some unresolved issues regarding '69 that could've been overlooked. any chance ?

[ronnymac2]

What did you do Wilt Chamberlain? (seriously....I'm looking forward to reading about this year and learning what happened in game seven.)

[JordansBulls]

1968: The same Sixers (with Wilt winning season MVP) go 62-20 and lose to the 54-28 Celtics in 7 games after being up 3-1. In Game 7 Wilt did not attempt a field goal in the 2nd half

[Sedale Threatt]

What did you do Wilt Chamberlain? (seriously....I'm looking forward to reading about this year and learning what happened in game seven.)

As usual with Wilt, there is no easy answer. He didn't shoot at all, but at the same time, he didn't touch it either. Plus, he was injured. So...

I'm going to try to take an hour or so and see what kind of info I can did up in the archives at work. I'm going to guarantee they didn't publish the full boxes.

But I know the supporting cast played like stir-fried dog isht in that game (top five guys beyond Wilt were 22 for 74).

[semi-sentient]

I don't know if I can put anyone above Wilt this year. Bad game 7 or not, his regular season was incredibly dominant and I don't think anyone else did enough in the playoffs to overtake him.

Baylor is looking like a solid top 3 choice. He had a great all around season.

Jerry West was awesome again in the playoffs, but he missed 31 RS games. Not sure if it matters too much in this case because he made up a lot of ground for his work in the post-season. He'll be in the lower half of the top 5, more than likely.

Oscar Robertson had a fantastic season again, but missed 17 RS games and his team missed the playoffs. In his absence, Lucas put up some pretty ridiculous numbers. I'd be inclined to pick him over Robertson if push came to shove. Certainly two players from a team with a losing record can't possibly make the top 5.

Russell was rather poor on the offensive end, but the Celtics were once again dominant defensively and won the championship. Hondo's RS isn't that spectacular, but he definitely picked up his play in the post-season. That's going to hurt Russell, to a certain extent. Hondo was a really good defender and he deserves some credit for that.

Anyway, here's the candidates that I've been able to weed out so far...

* = led the league

Regular Season

Code: Select all

Player          GP   MIN    PTS    TS%    REB    AST    PER    WS
==================================================================
Wilt            82   46.8*  24.3   .557   23.8*  8.6   24.7*  20.4*
Greer           82   39.8   24.1   .529    5.4   4.5   17.1   11.2
Wilkins         82   38.6   20.0   .525    5.3   8.3   19.0   10.1
Baylor          77   39.3   26.0   .505   12.2   4.6   21.0    8.0
West            51   37.6   26.3   .590*   5.8   6.1   23.2    9.6
Robertson       65   42.5   29.2*  .588    6.0   9.7*  24.6   12.3
Lucas           82   44.1   21.5   .565   19.0   3.1   19.8   10.1
Russell         78   37.9   12.5   .461   18.6   4.6   17.0    8.2
Havlicek        82   35.6   20.7   .486    6.7   4.7   17.7    7.6

Post Season

Code: Select all

Player          GP   MIN    PTS    TS%    REB    AST    PER    WS
==================================================================
Wilt            13   48.5*  23.7   .511   24.7*  6.5   22.7    2.5
Greer           13   42.5   25.8   .512    6.1   4.2   17.6    1.7
Wilkins          6   39.5   18.3   .506    6.3   7.8*  16.8    0.5
Baylor          15   42.2   28.5   .503   14.5   4.0   23.0    1.9
West            15   41.5   30.8*  .596    5.4   5.5   25.1*   3.6*
Robertson       --------------------------------------------------
Lucas           --------------------------------------------------
Russell         19   45.7   14.4   .458   22.8   5.2   16.7    1.6
Havlicek        19   45.4   25.9   .521    8.6   7.5   19.9    2.8

Awards Recognition / Misc

Code: Select all

Player          MVP     All-NBA   Team Record
=============================================
Wilt            1st     1st       62-20
Greer           ---     ---       62-20
Wilkins         2nd     ---       56-26
Baylor          3rd     1st       52-30
West            ---     2nd       52-30
Robertson       5th     1st       39-43
Lucas           ---     1st       39-43
Russell         ---     2nd       54-28
Havlicek        ---     2nd       54-28

[Dipper 13]

What did you do Wilt Chamberlain? (seriously....I'm looking forward to reading about this year and learning what happened in game seven.)

Actually I'd be more interested in seeing what happened in the 6th game. However, in Game 7:



Gettysburg Times - May 9, 1968

According to Vince Miller after the game Chamberlain got five touches in the fourth. Whether it two touches or five in the final period, all accounts agree that he got 7 touches in the 2nd half. This after 23 touches in the 1st half.


"What would I have looked like if I had said, 'Hey, we lost because my teammates didn't get the ball into me? If Alex Hannum didn't have guts enough to lay it on the line and accept a certain amount of responsibility for the loss and name the reasons why, then I've lost a lot of respect for him, which I have and I will tell him that when I see him. You can't shoot the ball if you don't have the ball. But you know something, after the game, not one writer came up to me and said 'Hey, how come the ball didn't come into you?' Not one. But all of them did ask me, 'How come you didn't shoot more?'"






A Bill Russell interview from 2008:

http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/prin ... /rus0int-1

Before we leave 1968 altogether, can we talk about game seven for a minute? In 1968 you limited your friend Wilt Chamberlain to two shot attempts in the entire second half of game seven.

That's not true at all. That was a coach's decision. There was a forward on their team named Chet Walker, and he was hurting us badly, okay? So I had my backup center, it was a guy named Wayne Embry. Now Embry had been in the league seven or eight years, and he played against Wilt all those years. So at half time I said to him, "Wayne, I'm going to try something. It's not new. I want you to guard Wilt. Okay? I have to take care of Chet Walker." And see, when I made that substitution everybody thought it was trying to stay out of foul trouble, something like that, which was to me the best part of that because I made adjustments that they didn't know what I was doing. So they couldn't make a counter adjustment. You see if you make an adjustment, and they know what you're doing, well they can just counter it. But I made an adjustment, they thought it was to get off of Wilt. They didn't know it was to get on Chet. Now Wilt had a game plan, but his game plan was counting on me trying to guard him. When we put Wayne on him, he guarded him a completely different way.


He was used to you guarding him.

Yes. To me, the pretty part of it was -- I hate to use the word beauty -- is that Wayne had enormous experience guarding him. So it wasn't like you took some guy out of the stands and put him on Wilt. Here's a guy who's been guarding him for years. That adjustment was for Chet Walker, it wasn't for Wilt.


Can you talk us through the last minute of the 1968 Eastern Finals?

It was a close game, but we were in charge. So they got to the place where they've got to foul us. So they fouled, and we make free throws and they go down, and they score and make three fouls. So they get down to 12 seconds to go. That's when the thing with Sam came up. It was going to that series. After we got down three to one...

I'm the coach, okay, and so I'm talking to my guys before the fifth game. And I says, "We're going to beat these guys, and this is how we're going to do it." And we had a rookie on the team who's now a judge in Boston, because he had an ailment, he had to retire, but he told me a few years ago, he said, "You know, I was in the locker room when you said that. That's the most disciplined situation I've ever been in my life, because I had to discipline myself from falling out on the floor laughing, when you said we're going to beat these guys." He says, "They're going to kill us!" And he says, "We haven't got a chance!" And he sat there and watched the whole thing happen. And he says that's one of the wonders of his life, because I said it with complete confidence. And then I said, like I said earlier, "We don't have to win three games in a row. We've just got to win one." You see, after we won two of them, the pressure completely shifts. The pressure is on them. You're up three to one, and how do you lose three straight?

So it was basically routine.

I think that that move that I made at half time was the most important move I made as a coach in that series, because it worked, and we got accomplished what we wanted to get accomplished without them knowing what we were trying to accomplish. See everybody still talks about the fact that Wilt only took two shots. They still almost won the game, right? And the key was that Chet Walker had been killing us. And I knew that I could guard him. And the reason I knew I could guard him is his moves were very deliberate. As part of my teaching myself, I learned -- we had six plays and nowadays they number those positions. One is point guard, two is shooting guard, three is a small forward, four is a power forward, five is a center. Well, I made a point to learn how to play all those positions on all six plays. Now not that I ever wanted to or hoped to play in those other positions, but in knowing those positions I know the problems that go with that position. So that if my teammate needed help I can help. And on defense I watched these guys, how they play defense, and I know how to guard almost any position. And I physically took over Chet.




An except from The inside game: race, power, and politics in the NBA by Wayne Embry:















It appears as though Embry defended Chamberlain for the 2nd half of Game 5 and most of Game 6 & 7 as Russell noted he had to contain Chet Walker.

[Sedale Threatt]

My favorite quote is one from Hannum:

"I never had to ask him to shoot the ball before."

[Sedale Threatt]

--

[Doctor MJ]

Fascinating stuff Dipper. Thanks for sharing.

[Dipper 13]

Actually I'd be more interested in seeing what happened in the 6th game.

Greer went off for 40, Guokas apparently played well, and Russell played Wilt to a standstill, 17 points and 31 rebounds to 20 and 27 (on 6 for 21 shooting).

Said Russell after the game, "His leg is hurting him (he apparently had a strained hamstring, a torn calf and a "bum" toe, according to Cherry's biography). Everybody knows. A lesser man probably wouldn't be out there."

Wilt finished the series with a noticeable limp.

His knee must have been bothering him as well (same knee he ruptured in '69) as he was wearing a brace that year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kocq3D4zd-U#t=5m14s

[ElGee]

Dipper, amazing posts. Keep them coming. Some of those quotes really capture Russell's mental approach to the game and the camaraderie of those teams.

Estimated Pace-Adjusted Numbers 1968

ORtg

Code: Select all

1.  Los Angeles   102.8
2.  Cincinnati    101.9
3.  Philadelphia  99.1
4.  St. Louis     98.8
5.  New York      98.6
6.  Detroit       97.0
LEAGUE AVG.       97.0
7.  Baltimore     96.2
8.  Boston        95.8
9.  Seattle       95.5
10. San Francisco 93.7
10. Chicago       93.7
12. San Diego     91.3

DRtg

Code: Select all

1.  Philadelphia  92.1
2.  Boston        92.4
3.  San Francisco 94.2
4.  St. Louis     96.4
5.  Baltimore     96.5
6.  New York      97.0
LEAGUE AVG.       97.0
7.  Chicago       97.1
8.  Los Angeles   98.1
9.  San Diego     98.3
10. Detroit       98.7
11. Seattle       100.6
12. Cincinnati    102.7


Code: Select all

         Pts/75  Reb/75 Ast/75 Rel TS%
======================================
Oscar     21.6   4.4    7.2    9.0%
West      21.4   4.7    5.0    9.2%
Baylor    20.2   9.5    3.6    0.7%
Bing      19.7   3.4    4.6   -0.8%
Reed      17.9   11.4   1.7    3.9%       
Greer     17.6   4.0    3.3    3.1%
Havlicek  17.3   5.6    3.9   -1.2%
Lucas     15.3   13.6   2.2    6.7%
Wilt      15.1   14.8   5.4    5.9%
Russell   9.8    14.6   3.6   -3.7%


[Sedale Threatt]

His knee must have been bothering him as well (same knee he ruptured in '69) as he was wearing a brace that year.

Yeah, according to the book, the hamstring pull was right behind the knee, so there was probably some overlap. In essence, his leg was pretty well damaged. Just guessing, but maybe compensating for all the injuries led the knee to finally rupture. That's how those things tend to work. I want to say he injured his calf jumping center before the second or third game.

[Dipper 13]

Fascinating stuff Dipper. Thanks for sharing.

ESPN Classic also covered this briefly in a "Top 5 Reasons You Can't Blame" show.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4Vtw7fbktc#t=7m55s

[Sedale Threatt]

And of course, Billy Cunningham missed the entire series with a broken hand. Granted, they went up 3-1 without him. But that can't have helped matters.

[fatal9]

Great RS for Wilt but it was a historic choke against the Celtics in the playoffs. First team to ever blow a 3-1 lead and only two teams ever have blown a 3-1 lead with HCA. What happened was inexcusable.

Game 5: 28 pts, 30 rebs. 11/21 FG, 6/11 FT. Rest of the team struggled, Greer/Jones/Walker combined for just 12/44. Russell had 8 pts, 24 rebs.
Game 6: 20 pts, 27 rebs. Shot 6/21 FG, and 8/23 FT. Hal Greer had 40 pts on 15/24. Sixers should have closed it out here. There is no excuse when your teammate gives you 40 pts. Russell had 17 pts, 31 rebs.
Game 7: 14 pts, 34 rebs. 4/9 FG, 6/15 FT. Russell had 12 pts, 26 rebs. Dead even the whole away, and Wilt becomes mysteriously passive in the second half. "Wilt's failure to shoot a puzzle" http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=-3 ... 82,5371865

I don't know who gets credit for shutting down Wilt in the last two games, Embry or Russell, or maybe even Wilt himself. Hard to say when there is no footage.

One thing I do hate about this series is the revisionist history that is present in many documentaries about Wilt or interviews by Wilt himself. They wrongly use MLK's death as a factor which contributed to the Sixers losing and it's always painted as if his death happened in the middle of the series when Sixers were winning, and then in the aftermath they lost interest. Sixers won three straight right after the break the NBA had held for MLK's death, so it wasn't a factor for them at all. Here's an example of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTD8S0n5DGc&#t=1m55s (Wilt says MLK's death happened after Sixers were up 3-1 and acts like both teams weren't interested in the remaining games, and how the Sixers had lost their momentum. This is flat out lying by Wilt and I've seen it being used many times as an excuse for the Sixers loss).

[ThaRegul8r]

And of course, Billy Cunningham missed the entire series with a broken hand. Granted, they went up 3-1 without him. But that can't have helped matters.

See, I dunno if this can be used. They didn't have Billy Cunningham before the series began, so nothing changed as far as that. In fact, Alex Hannum said BEFORE the series: “I realize that Boston will be fanatical in trying to regain the championship from us as we were last year to take it away from them, but we should still win in six games.” Why would he say that? And once the series began, it wasn't like what we saw with Baltimore the last season we looked at—Philadelphia went up 3-1. They showed no sign whatsoever that they missed Cunningham at all. So my question is, if Cunningham's injury didn't matter the first four games, why did it suddenly matter for the last three, especially when they'd already come three-quarters of the way and only needed one more win? In this project we've seen Magic step up when Kareem—their best player—went down and deliver the one win they needed in 1980, and we've seen Walt Frazier step up when the league MVP (putting aside the question of whether he deserved it or not) went down, and deliver two wins the Knicks needed to win the title. Wilt said: “we still should have beaten them. We were a much better team.” So if they were “a much better team,” why didn't they win when they were already up 3-1?

[Sedale Threatt]

I'm not really saying it did matter. I'm just tossing it out in the name of taking a complete look at the entire situation.

EDIT -- For example, I see you have shooting figures, which are awesome. What were they for everybody else on the team? That makes a huge difference to me.

[Dipper 13]

Billy C injured himself in the NY series, where Johnny Green stepped in and helped spark the Sixers in the pivotal Game 5 to the victory. If I'm not mistaken Chamberlain led both teams in points, rebounds, and assists for the entire series.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTRjFYwF_RQ#t=6m41s

[fatal9]

I would like to hear more about Jerry West. He is a possible candidate for POY this year (I penalize players less for missing games especially if they come back and dominate in the playoffs). 31/5/6 on 53% in the playoffs, and led Lakers to finals. Wilt is definitely top 5 this year, I just don't know where to put him. Maybe looking into everyone else's year in detail can be the only way to determine this. Havlicek seems to have been great in the playoffs (26/9/8 on 45%, lead team in scoring, assists and second in rebounding).

If possible, can we see Oscar's team w/ him and w/o him as well? I'm not sure if this information was posted in the last thread.

Lenny Wilkens was second in MVP voting this year, which surprised me. Baylor was third and Dave Bing fourth.