Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967?

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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#21 » by Dipper 13 » Wed Jan 4, 2012 10:03 am

Perhaps because he had the best all around skills of any all time center (except at FT line). :nod:




"A superstar is always a special problem. A coach has to know how to use him to best advantage."

-Wilt Chamberlain, Oct. 1968




New York Daily News - Nov 3, 1996

Here's Wilt on:

The 100-point game

"I see now on TV where some company is saying you can buy a tape with that game on it. Let me tell you, the only camera that was ever in the arena that night was the one of me showing '100 points' on a sign," Chamberlain said. "When people see me, they say, 'There's the guy who scored 100 points.' It's a tag and I don't like that tag. It's not a putdown. But it's a simplification of how people see me. It doesn't exemplify what I tried to do in basketball. People forget, I had games where I only took one shot. Some games I didn't take any. I led the league in scoring seven straight years and then I was asked to do other things. That was a testament to how good I was."



Actually Russell, whose career roughly parallels Wilt in terms of era, had a reasonably significant edge in rebounding per 36 -- 19.1 to 18.


"I would have liked to have gone to war against (Bill) Russell with that boy at my side."

-Chamberlain on Barkley



What a duo these two would be on the glass.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#22 » by Dipper 13 » Wed Jan 4, 2012 10:41 am

Doctor MJ wrote:We don't have turnover stats from back then, but there's every reason to think that Wilt focused offenses struggled mightily on that front. Turnovers trying to pass the ball to Wilt. Turnovers as the defense swarmed Wilt. Turnovers as Wilt belatedly passed the ball out and the team had to act in haste.




:nonono:

This may be hard to believe given all the myths surrounding Chamberlain, but he was actually a smart player who would not deliberately choose to lead the league in turnovers. He had a higher IQ than say, Ricky Davis, who I'm sure a couple posters here would take over Wilt.




The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to The Sports Guy - Bill Simmons, Malcolm Gladwell

Too bad they didn’t keep track of TOs when Wilt played—that’s another record he would have gone out of his way to break. Can’t you hear Chick Hearn saying, “My God, what is the Big Dipper doing? He just intentionally sailed his tenth pass of the game into the stands!”





In '67 he was working to get the best possible shots for his (cutting) teammates & himself. The NBA changing the rules before the season on intentional fouls off the ball didn't hurt either. For example below we can see two fake passes followed by a power move to the basket, drawing four defenders and finding an open Billy C. We can also see the defensive players with their hands up denying the active cutters. If he forced the first pass or two then it would likely be a turnover.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1R9GatatVAg#t=4m28s


But it wasn't as much ball faking as it was to protect it from the defense, also with his beautiful hand offs. No center except perhaps Walton/Russell was ever better at hitting the cutters from the pivot. You may be thinking too much of 1970 playoffs, when his mobility was Bynum-esque, having just come off career a threatening knee injury. He was nowhere near the scoring threat he was in his younger years.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3jIemiXiPs#t=11m44s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DdX6bkVIk8#t=2m13s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpufnh4fmRk#t=16m57s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3jIemiXiPs#t=23m9s



Los Angeles Times - Dec 23, 1966

While Chamberlain's rebound and assist totals are a matter of record, two other departments in which he excels are not to be found on any statistic sheet. A prime rule of basketball is the setting of a "pick" or "screen" to enable a teammate to get off a shot free of his defensive man. Some teams use two or three players to set up a screen. But the 76ers can play big screen basketball with just Chamberlain, who weighs 275 pounds and, with arms extended out from the sides, measures 100 inches from fingertip to fingertip. The only way to get through a Chamberlain screen is to go between his widespread legs.

...

In addition, with some fine passing to go with his screening ability, he is keeping his teammates happy by seeing to it they get a number of easy shots. For once, the 76ers. are just one big, happy family.



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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#23 » by ThaRegul8r » Wed Jan 4, 2012 11:16 am

Dipper 13 wrote:
Doctor MJ wrote:We don't have turnover stats from back then, but there's every reason to think that Wilt focused offenses struggled mightily on that front. Turnovers trying to pass the ball to Wilt. Turnovers as the defense swarmed Wilt. Turnovers as Wilt belatedly passed the ball out and the team had to act in haste.




:nonono:

This may be hard to believe given all the myths surrounding Chamberlain, but he was actually a smart player who would not deliberately choose to lead the league in turnovers.


Obviously he isn't going to deliberately choose to lead the league in turnovers, so I don't know why I keep seeing that Simmons comment referred to. It isn't true, so it should be discarded with all other statements that are untrue, regardless who makes them.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#24 » by Dipper 13 » Wed Jan 4, 2012 2:23 pm

Obviously he isn't going to deliberately choose to lead the league in turnovers, so I don't know why I keep seeing that Simmons comment referred to. It isn't true, so it should be discarded with all other statements that are untrue, regardless who makes them.


Indeed. :clap:
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#25 » by C-izMe » Wed Jan 4, 2012 3:34 pm

Dipper 13 wrote:
[i]Los Angeles Times - Dec 23, 1966

While Chamberlain's rebound and assist totals are a matter of record, two other departments in which he excels are not to be found on any statistic sheet. A prime rule of basketball is the setting of a "pick" or "screen" to enable a teammate to get off a shot free of his defensive man. Some teams use two or three players to set up a screen. But the 76ers can play big screen basketball with just Chamberlain, who weighs 275 pounds and, with arms extended out from the sides, measures 100 inches from fingertip to fingertip. The only way to get through a Chamberlain screen is to go between his widespread legs.

Wilt Chamberlain: The man with the 8"4" wingspan.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#26 » by Jordan23Forever » Wed Jan 4, 2012 4:15 pm

Is that even possible? That would be a crazy outlier if true. 7'1"ish (maybe 7'2") with an 8'4" wingspan? A wingspan 14-15" greater than his height? Wow. Honestly, I don't think that's possible. I heard Manute Bol's wingspan was around 8'5", but he was 7'7", and even that's extreme.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#27 » by Dipper 13 » Wed Jan 4, 2012 4:38 pm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYEbga0XueA#t=5m50s


Apparently his reach was 7'8" (92 inches). But the video also shows Muhammad Ali at 78 inches, while his reach is recorded as 80". Perhaps Wilt was closer to 7'10". If anyone had an 8 foot wingspan it may be Thurmond.


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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#28 » by Chicago76 » Wed Jan 4, 2012 6:03 pm

Doctor MJ wrote:Also, as on offense, Wilt tended to focus on the tangible. He felt like if he blocked as many shots as Russell, he was doing as much as Russell on defense and he'd get miffed when a coach told him he was doing something "wrong", i.e. "Can you do more of X like Russell does?".


Getting back to the counterintuitive issue of a high efficiency player taking fewer shots and his team posting greater efficiency, I think what you said above is a major part of understanding Hannum's strategy.

The lost marginal efficiency of Wilt taking fewer shots was made up by the increased efficiency of his floormates, who are taking the majority of the shots even in a high usage Wilt scenario. That's the basic explantation of how this worked. In short, Wilt didn't gunk up the offense.

Maginal is the key word here. If we look at Wilt's FGM and FGA for 1966/67 and 1967/68, we see that he attempted 10.57 fewer shots per 48 and made 3.56 fewer shots per 48 (both rounded). His marginal FG% on those shots he surrendered was only .337. There were probably fewer turnovers involved as well due to fewer entry passes into Chamberlain. Even if turnovers were the same, the FG% for extra teammate attempts only needed to be .337 for this strategy to "break even", so it makes perfect sense.

Where it gets tricky is that the usage change was so great that we don't know if this was really the optimum solution. In other words, if Wilt gave up only 7 shots instead of 10.5, he might have shot .400 on those extra shots he retained. In the meantime those extra 3.5 shots distributed among teammates may have been the worst of the worst percentage shots...far below .400. We would need to know the usage curve of Wilt and his teammates to be certain. There was probably an "in between" usage decline that would have produced even better results.

So why didn't Hannum do this? Because like you said, Wilt was focused on the tangible. Hannum knew it would be an easier sell to get Wilt to surrender 10 or 11 shots in order to accrue a tremendous number of assists and rebounds. If he asked Wilt to surrender fewer shots, then that would come at the expense of his rebounding, FG%, and assists. If he was going to surrender the scoring duties, he needed the rebounding title (rpg and total reb). He needed to be number 1 at FG%. He needed to be far up the ranks in total assists and apb (3rd in both). If he was going to accept Hannum's suggestion, he was going to need to see tangible proof that he "out Russelled" Russell on the stat sheet: decisive apg and ast advantage, decisive rpg and tot reb advantage, etc.

In a nutshell, I don't think Wilt's touches per min needed to slip from 1st to 5th among starters to get the best results. He went from clear #1 to clear #5 in a year. It may have made more sense for his touches FGA+0.44xFTA) per 48 to decline by 5 or 6 per 48 rather than 10+. That would be put him on basically the same level as players 2-4, with only Cunningham being the clear leader. That was just a tougher sell and it would be better for the team to go big than to risk a smaller adjustment that Wilt may have abandoned midway through the year if his stat line couldn't show him he was the "best" at something.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#29 » by turk3d » Wed Jan 4, 2012 6:27 pm

C-izMe wrote:
Dipper 13 wrote:
[i]Los Angeles Times - Dec 23, 1966

While Chamberlain's rebound and assist totals are a matter of record, two other departments in which he excels are not to be found on any statistic sheet. A prime rule of basketball is the setting of a "pick" or "screen" to enable a teammate to get off a shot free of his defensive man. Some teams use two or three players to set up a screen. But the 76ers can play big screen basketball with just Chamberlain, who weighs 275 pounds and, with arms extended out from the sides, measures 100 inches from fingertip to fingertip. The only way to get through a Chamberlain screen is to go between his widespread legs.

Wilt Chamberlain: The man with the 8"4" wingspan.

I heard Jerry West on a recent interview (now with the Warriors) that Wilt was able to touch the top of the backboard so it's quite conceivable. And I believe that Dipper13 (apparently a Wilt aficionado) has it right. Wilt chose to stop shooting so much.

Since I was around at the time, I remember all the talk in the press about how Wilt was not as good as Russell (who had all those great Celtic teams surrounding him and kept winning rings) as his focus was on D and rebounding and not scoring (at that point Wilt had not won a ring) so he decided to change his game to satisfy his detractors.

And he was (by cutting down on his scoring) able to win a ring finally on that great 76er team (some claim might have been the greatest team in history). He later went on to win another ring with Lakers (a much older Wilt and with West, Baylor and Gail Goodrich who he deferred to as the primary scorers).

The next year in trying to repeat but thwarted by an unbelievable performance by the NY Knicks in the championship finals which they lost in 7 games by an inspirational but injured Willis Reed who hit his first two shots while limping onto the court, they lost.

However, that season Wilt shot an amazing 72.7% from the field. I think he could have taken on more of the scoring load if he wanted to. Wilt was always looking for challenges since he was so dominant for most of his career (decided to lead the league in assists one year just to show he could).

There's nothing that guy couldn't do on the basketball court and I'm amazed by how he gets slighted so often on this board and in general. The greatest player in the history of the game. I don't care that Jordan outscored him careerwise by a less than a percentage point.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#30 » by Chicago76 » Wed Jan 4, 2012 6:52 pm

ThaRegul8r wrote:
Chamberlain had 778 more rebounds than Russell in the same amount of games, but they came in 3,591 more minutes. Since they played the same number of games at that point, it can be seen that the difference is entirely due to the significantly more minutes played.

Contemporaries said that Russell was the better technical rebounder:


This isn't exactly correct. Per min, Russell was a better rebounder, but that doesn't account for four things:
-pace
-team FG%
-opp FG%
-their careers didn't precisely overlap, which normally isn't a big deal, but is in this case because FG% skyrocketed from Russell's first years. A look at lg FG% from their uncommon years will show this. In 71/72 it was .455 and in 57/58 it was only .383.

Boston tended to play faster, with relatively lower FG% and presumably with their great defense, more missed FGs for reb opportunities at the defensive end. We'll never know exactly because opp stats weren't tracked, but there is no other explanation...unless someone believes those great defenses gave up a league avg FG% but were just really good at forcing turnovers and not putting people on the FT line.

The numbers we have bear this out: on the offensive end, Russell's Off Reb opportunities per game were a bit more than 11% greater than Wilt's over their first 13 years. Defensively, I'd guess we're probably talking a disparity of 15 to 16% on account of Boston's D. If you net the per minute advantage of Russell against these factors, Chamberlain probably comes out ahead by 7 or 8%. There really is no question that Chamberlain was a better rebounder.

Technical rebounder is a different story. If two guys are pretty similar athletically but one is giving up probably 6 inches of reach and 40 or 50 pounds while posting similar board work, then that smaller guy is almost definitely a better technician.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#31 » by Doctor MJ » Wed Jan 4, 2012 7:13 pm

turk3d wrote:I heard Jerry West on a recent interview (now with the Warriors) that Wilt was able to touch the top of the backboard so it's quite conceivable.


We here this about various people in the past though. David Thompson, Earl the GOAT.

Given that we've seen the most athletic big of today, make a show of jumping as high as he possibly can and only reach halfway up the backboard, these legends to me are unrealistic until we see some shred of evidence.

And btw, not saying that I don't think Wilt could outjump Howard. I think he could. I don't think he could outjump him by 15-18 inches though.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#32 » by PostKeynesian » Wed Jan 4, 2012 7:16 pm

penbeast0 wrote:Actually Russell, whose career roughly parallels Wilt in terms of era, had a reasonably significant edge in rebounding per 36 -- 19.1 to 18. Wilt's statistical edge came from playing 3.5 more minutes/game than Russell. (Although it is certainly fair to guess that in those 3.5 minutes, Wilt outrebounds Russell's backup enough to make back the difference.)

Rodman deserves consideration as the rebounding GOAT too; but Wilt is certainly top 3.

This is due to pace, the pace slowed down considerably in the late 60s/early 70s and that brought down Wilt's rebounding per 36.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#33 » by Doctor MJ » Wed Jan 4, 2012 7:25 pm

Chicago76 wrote:
Doctor MJ wrote:Also, as on offense, Wilt tended to focus on the tangible. He felt like if he blocked as many shots as Russell, he was doing as much as Russell on defense and he'd get miffed when a coach told him he was doing something "wrong", i.e. "Can you do more of X like Russell does?".


Getting back to the counterintuitive issue of a high efficiency player taking fewer shots and his team posting greater efficiency, I think what you said above is a major part of understanding Hannum's strategy.

The lost marginal efficiency of Wilt taking fewer shots was made up by the increased efficiency of his floormates, who are taking the majority of the shots even in a high usage Wilt scenario. That's the basic explantation of how this worked. In short, Wilt didn't gunk up the offense.


Just stopping here for a second: If you're vastly more efficient than your teammates while you volume score, and the result is a mediocre offense that becomes fantastic the moment you let less efficient people become the focus, you are, by what might as well be definition, gunking up the offense.

We're talking about a result so counterintuitive that we have someone on here responding to us with "I'm sorry, I just can't believe you". I think choosing the verb "gunk" to describe the problem is putting it mildly.

I will grant though: It's not like I'm saying teams would have typically be better off without Wilt on offense by any means. So I would not say "Having Wilt kept teams from being good on offense", and if that's what you think of when you use "to gunk", fair enough.

Chicago76 wrote:Maginal is the key word here. If we look at Wilt's FGM and FGA for 1966/67 and 1967/68, we see that he attempted 10.57 fewer shots per 48 and made 3.56 fewer shots per 48 (both rounded). His marginal FG% on those shots he surrendered was only .337. There were probably fewer turnovers involved as well due to fewer entry passes into Chamberlain. Even if turnovers were the same, the FG% for extra teammate attempts only needed to be .337 for this strategy to "break even", so it makes perfect sense.

Where it gets tricky is that the usage change was so great that we don't know if this was really the optimum solution. In other words, if Wilt gave up only 7 shots instead of 10.5, he might have shot .400 on those extra shots he retained. In the meantime those extra 3.5 shots distributed among teammates may have been the worst of the worst percentage shots...far below .400. We would need to know the usage curve of Wilt and his teammates to be certain. There was probably an "in between" usage decline that would have produced even better results.

So why didn't Hannum do this? Because like you said, Wilt was focused on the tangible. Hannum knew it would be an easier sell to get Wilt to surrender 10 or 11 shots in order to accrue a tremendous number of assists and rebounds. If he asked Wilt to surrender fewer shots, then that would come at the expense of his rebounding, FG%, and assists. If he was going to surrender the scoring duties, he needed the rebounding title (rpg and total reb). He needed to be number 1 at FG%. He needed to be far up the ranks in total assists and apb (3rd in both). If he was going to accept Hannum's suggestion, he was going to need to see tangible proof that he "out Russelled" Russell on the stat sheet: decisive apg and ast advantage, decisive rpg and tot reb advantage, etc.


Insightful stuff, and I agree with you.

Chicago76 wrote:In a nutshell, I don't think Wilt's touches per min needed to slip from 1st to 5th among starters to get the best results. He went from clear #1 to clear #5 in a year. It may have made more sense for his touches FGA+0.44xFTA) per 48 to decline by 5 or 6 per 48 rather than 10+. That would be put him on basically the same level as players 2-4, with only Cunningham being the clear leader. That was just a tougher sell and it would be better for the team to go big than to risk a smaller adjustment that Wilt may have abandoned midway through the year if his stat line couldn't show him he was the "best" at something.


I feel like what you're doing though, when you do this, is inventing a player who didn't actually exist. If Wilt had the ability to sense the optimal flow of the offense, then it wouldn't have been necessary to make the change to begin with.

To be fair: I think recognizing optimal flow is something that is not at all easy. I don't think Jordan or Kobe are great at it either. I don't know if we've every seen someone with a tendency to volume score who also had great instincts along these lines. Oscar probably came closest.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#34 » by PostKeynesian » Wed Jan 4, 2012 7:25 pm

Doctor MJ wrote:
turk3d wrote:I heard Jerry West on a recent interview (now with the Warriors) that Wilt was able to touch the top of the backboard so it's quite conceivable.


We here this about various people in the past though. David Thompson, Earl the GOAT.

Given that we've seen the most athletic big of today, make a show of jumping as high as he possibly can and only reach halfway up the backboard, these legends to me are unrealistic until we see some shred of evidence.

And btw, not saying that I don't think Wilt could outjump Howard. I think he could. I don't think he could outjump him by 15-18 inches though.

I've done the math before here, Wilt would only have to jump 42 inches to reach the top of the backboard, 43 inches to get his finger above it. That is definitely in the realm of possibility considering Wilt himself said he had a 48 inch vertical, and even if he's exaggerating a little bit that's still a 6 inch cushion there.

By the way, a 48 inch vertical is outstanding but not out of the realm of possibility. Wilt was an athletic freak and at heart a track and field kind of guy. Plus, there's this egyptian dude that has a 60+ inch vertical, I'm sure you've seen his videos online.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#35 » by Doctor MJ » Wed Jan 4, 2012 7:33 pm

Dipper 13 wrote:
Doctor MJ wrote:We don't have turnover stats from back then, but there's every reason to think that Wilt focused offenses struggled mightily on that front. Turnovers trying to pass the ball to Wilt. Turnovers as the defense swarmed Wilt. Turnovers as Wilt belatedly passed the ball out and the team had to act in haste.


:nonono:

This may be hard to believe given all the myths surrounding Chamberlain, but he was actually a smart player who would not deliberately choose to lead the league in turnovers. He had a higher IQ than say, Ricky Davis, who I'm sure a couple posters here would take over Wilt.


Dip, I know we've all got things we're sensitive to. Clearly you're sensitive about people knocking Wilt, and I'm someone who makes it a point to point out Wilt's flaws. We're bound to be on opposite sides of some debates.

I will say it again though: I don't think Wilt was a scrub by any means. I think he's the most talented athlete in modern history. I think his peak impact was worthy of GOAT candidacy. I think his career was certainly on the all-time great level.

However, people make threads like this where they can't make sense of what happened in Wilt's turbulent career, and the answers they need to here unfortunately are not "It was all incredibly bad luck!". Wilt had some legit issues, and people who make threads on here want to know the truth, so it must be told.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#36 » by C-izMe » Wed Jan 4, 2012 7:46 pm

PostKeynesian wrote:
Doctor MJ wrote:
turk3d wrote:I heard Jerry West on a recent interview (now with the Warriors) that Wilt was able to touch the top of the backboard so it's quite conceivable.


We here this about various people in the past though. David Thompson, Earl the GOAT.

Given that we've seen the most athletic big of today, make a show of jumping as high as he possibly can and only reach halfway up the backboard, these legends to me are unrealistic until we see some shred of evidence.

And btw, not saying that I don't think Wilt could outjump Howard. I think he could. I don't think he could outjump him by 15-18 inches though.

I've done the math before here, Wilt would only have to jump 42 inches to reach the top of the backboard, 43 inches to get his finger above it. That is definitely in the realm of possibility considering Wilt himself said he had a 48 inch vertical, and even if he's exaggerating a little bit that's still a 6 inch cushion there.

By the way, a 48 inch vertical is outstanding but not out of the realm of possibility. Wilt was an athletic freak and at heart a track and field kind of guy. Plus, there's this egyptian dude that has a 60+ inch vertical, I'm sure you've seen his videos online.

Did your math by any chance have his wingspan at 8"4". It was probably around 7"7" and I can give him around a three inch distance within that. He would have to jump well over that to get it. Considering that Shaq had a recorded 38 inch vert; a 7"6" wingspan; and was 7"1"; and got halfway up the rim, Wilt having a 7"10" wingspan would have to jump at least 46 inches up. It is possible, but use common sense.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#37 » by Doctor MJ » Wed Jan 4, 2012 7:53 pm

PostKeynesian wrote:I've done the math before here, Wilt would only have to jump 42 inches to reach the top of the backboard, 43 inches to get his finger above it. That is definitely in the realm of possibility considering Wilt himself said he had a 48 inch vertical, and even if he's exaggerating a little bit that's still a 6 inch cushion there.

By the way, a 48 inch vertical is outstanding but not out of the realm of possibility. Wilt was an athletic freak and at heart a track and field kind of guy. Plus, there's this egyptian dude that has a 60+ inch vertical, I'm sure you've seen his videos online.


It's good you're getting into the math here. People can make their own decisions.

I'll say up front, that when you say it like that (42 inches), it doesn't seem so impossible.

On the other hand, the 48 inch vertical I think is a pure pipe dream. The NBA is dying to have guys who can jump like that, and we now have detailed draft measurements for the past decade or so. Not a single NBA prospect has existed who can jump that well, and the ones that break 40 inches are perimeter players.

And incidentally we also have their max vertical reach, and they're all stuck around the range Howard is (and Howard's claim to 12' 6" was an exaggeration).

I would also have people consider this image of Gilmore, who when he came into pro ball had people saying thay'd never seen anyone jump as high as him (and who refs WRONGLY called for goaltending early on simply because they couldn't believe someone could block a ball correctly that had been in the air that long):

Image

This is a dude about as big as Wilt, WAY high off the ground, and look how far away from the top of the backboard he is. In fact I've done calculations, and he's roughly where Howard & company max out at.

I'm fine with someone believing Wilt could get even higher than Gilmore, I'd probably be inclined to bet that way myself, but if he could jump another half a foot plus higher than what Gilmore was doing here, how the heck could anyone shake their head in disbelief & confusion when Gilmore came around more than a decade later?
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#38 » by Doctor MJ » Wed Jan 4, 2012 8:01 pm

C-izMe wrote:Did your math by any chance have his wingspan at 8"4". It was probably around 7"7" and I can give him around a three inch distance within that. He would have to jump well over that to get it. Considering that Shaq had a recorded 38 inch vert; a 7"6" wingspan; and was 7"1"; and got halfway up the rim, Wilt having a 7"10" wingspan would have to jump at least 46 inches up. It is possible, but use common sense.
I HATE when people listen to what those old players, and reporters say and take it literally. That's like 40 years from now, arguing that Jordan was the most athletic, because he could literately fly. I also heard that at a practice the Celtics were playing around the world and Russell blocked every single shot with no goaltends (going by modern rules).


Well to be fair, we've got guys in the league right now with a reach of about 9'6". I believe it would only take a vert of 42 inches to touch the backboard for them.

However,

Two of those guys are Javale McGee and DeAndre Jordan. Both of those guys are often called "freak athletes" because they are so much more athletic than your typical bigs. What are their vertical leaps? 32.5 & 30.5 respectively.

So basically, in the modern game, with all the incredibly borderline cheating advances we have today, if you're a big man who can jump 30, you are an extreme outlier who can make millions in the NBA with very little understanding of the game around you.

Does it really makes sense then that Wilt was so much of an outlier that he could jump 12-18 inches higher than that guys with 1 in 10,000,000 freakish fits? No, I don't think it does.
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#39 » by turk3d » Wed Jan 4, 2012 8:03 pm

Doctor MJ wrote:
turk3d wrote:I heard Jerry West on a recent interview (now with the Warriors) that Wilt was able to touch the top of the backboard so it's quite conceivable.


We here this about various people in the past though. David Thompson, Earl the GOAT.

Given that we've seen the most athletic big of today, make a show of jumping as high as he possibly can and only reach halfway up the backboard, these legends to me are unrealistic until we see some shred of evidence.

And btw, not saying that I don't think Wilt could outjump Howard. I think he could. I don't think he could outjump him by 15-18 inches though.

That's what Jerry said, and he both played with him and against him. He was pretty emphatic when he said it too.

Not sure if it's in this video, it's part 1. Not sure if it was in part 1 or part 2 where he discusses Wilt. Not sure if you can fast forward.

http://www.csnbayarea.com/sportsnetBayA ... part-1.htm
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Re: Why did Wilt stop shooting after 1967? 

Post#40 » by Dipper 13 » Wed Jan 4, 2012 8:20 pm

Doctor MJ wrote:I feel like what you're doing though, when you do this, is inventing a player who didn't actually exist. If Wilt had the ability to sense the optimal flow of the offense, then it wouldn't have been necessary to make the change to begin with.

To be fair: I think recognizing optimal flow is something that is not at all easy. I don't think Jordan or Kobe are great at it either. I don't know if we've every seen someone with a tendency to volume score who also had great instincts along these lines. Oscar probably came closest.



To what degree were his teams statistically "subpar" offenses affected by his poor foul shooting? Remember intentional fouling off the ball was banned before '66-'67. He had no other offensive weakness. I can see the "optimal flow" criticism for his early Warriors years, but how about the 1.5 seasons on the Sixers under Coach Schayes? Even Coach Auerbach and Hal Greer (as well as multiple articles) have stated he was an unselfish team player within the flow of a powerful roster. Then they made a hard push at the end of the season for the Eastern Division Championship, only to flame out in the playoffs in what is still perhaps the most disappointing Sixers loss ever. Believe me that club was much better than they showed in the EDF.




Red Auerbach:

When your big man, even a scorer of Wilt’s stature, is setting screens and picks and passing to the open man against the teams that collapse on him, his side is anything but a pushover. It is the diversified offense that kills you in basketball.

The big man is real trouble when he’s moving in and out with the play. He’s real trouble when he opens up the middle for a guard or forward who has shaken loose or can take a smaller man into the pivot on a switch. He’s real trouble when he is the integral part of an offense that makes all his teammates dangerous. Russell is the perfect example of this.

Chamberlain plays it that way only in spurts; when he does, you’re in a tough one. He played it that way all during the ’65-’66 and we’ll come to the results — for better or worse, for richer or poorer — in due course.






JANUARY 28, 1966

Hal Greer is the second leading scorer on the Philadelphia 76ers basketball team. He's knocked around the National Basketball Association for a half dozen years and believes he knows the ropes.

He also can handle a microphone. Greer didn't wear a football helmet or a bullet proof vest either. He took questions direct from the floor and responded with eyebrow lifting answers which pleased the 80 boys and coaches who attended the third annual greater Newtown Junior Chamber of Commerce Holiday Basketball Tournament banquet last night at the Golden Horse Inn, Route 1. Trevose.

"I love to meet kids and will answer any questions you have," Greer said in a deep tone. Then the barrage started.

What type of a player Is Wilt Chamberlain?

"When I played for the Syracuse Nationals I thought Wilt was a selfish player. But I've changed my ideas in the past year and a half which we have played together. He is the best all-around player in the league and is a team player. Without Wilt we wouldn't be anywhere."


Do the 76ers have a hard time getting "up" for the lower place teams in the league?

"Yes, it is one of our main weaknesses this year. We can't get up for teams like San Francisco, New York and Detroit. We seem to have a letdown against these teams. "But lately we've been beating them. Boston really puts it on the lower teams. They (Boston) get up for every team."


Are there any problems which face all players in the NBA?

"Yes, the traveling, lack of sleep and proper eating is rough on everyone."

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