I’m not really buying into the “the game is different now!” argument made against Russell (or for any other player). I though Doctor MJ knocked that down fairly eloquently. IMO, great artists and scholars (and I’m going to put the greatest basketball players of all time in that group) aren’t necessarily great because of what they did, but because they showed the ability to make a type of leap outside the existing hegemony and function at an extraordinary level there. I don’t diss Isaac Newton because he didn’t invent the internal combustion engine. If Newton was around today, I think he’d come up with all sorts of amazing, nutty, crazy, brilliant stuff. He’s still be brilliant today. There’s an assumption of portability there that some people don’t agree with. I get that—but I’m with the people that say that stylistic changes don’t negate value and impact, both historic and general.
And there’s all sorts of things that affect the game that are pretty much never discussed. Every walk on a really badly installed floating floor? The clicking sound? The slickness? The hardness when you jump and land? You just described every basketball arena court until—and through--the mid 1970s. What about poor lighting—some older arenas were marginally lit. I love Chuck Taylors. I wear them to pretty much every concert/show I go to (which is a lot) partly because they give me a nostalgic rush about punk shows I saw in the late 70s and early 80s, partly because they are simply Cool as F$@#. They are, however, Not Good in terms of being useful, modern basketball shoes. No arch support. Little ankle support. No midsole build up to cushion landings. Poor traction. Virtually non-existant cushioning. These affect basketball play not just basketball players. So I’m also inclined to think that some era differential is equipment an d environmentally based.
I appreciate the work done by fplii and ElGee to attempt to quantify Bill Russell’s impact. I don’t think that’s possible—I think it’s very difficult today, and simply impossible for a game that we don’t have advanced statistics for. But I think this gives us a cloudy, murky idea. (I’m saying that as a compliment and hope it’s taken as such.) Still, given these issues, I think for older players, you have to take what you have in terms of stats and rely more heavily on observation. If you’re not okay with that, that’s your right … but that’s a form of bias.
Anyway, to get to the players.
Bill Russell is both the easiest and most problematic. Bill Russell has results, and results echo an extraordinary level of value. Russell won 11 titles—might have won 12 if he hadn’t sprained his ankle in Game 4 of the finals in 1958. OTOH, Russell also got some luck … a fortuitous goal tending call against the opposing team in the final minutes of game 7 1962, Havlicek’s steal (following Russell’s turnover!) in game 7 in 1965, the 1968 EC Finals which was just a clusterf%@# by and for the Sixers, Butch Van Breda Kopff’s coaching miscues in Game 7 of the Finals. But part of greatness is taking advantage of luck, and Russell did that in spades. There’s also the issue of sustained brilliance .. yes, Celtics had lots of great players on their team and a great coach. But the team had one constant during their 11 titles, and that constant was Bill Russell. He was always the best player on the team. There were two times when Russell’s team won less than 56% of their games—the first and final title years. And that shows something else … I do think playoffs count for more—and the playoffs were Bill Russell’s time. 11 titles worth.
But.
As others have noted—how much credit gets shared around? The Celtics had a ton of great players. We can argue about their value and portability, but the fact is that people who watched other Boston players thought Gee, these guys are really good. Between 1957 and 1966, the Celtics had a player in the top 10 of MVP voting not named Bill Russell every year. Five times, the other player was in the top 5 of voting. Twice they had two other players in the top 10. These are the individual stars—Cousy, Sharman, Heinsohn, Jones, Havlicek. The role players were pretty great too—Satch Sanders and Frank Ramsey and K.C. Jones and Bailey Howell and Don Nelson and Larry Siegfried. That’s a lot of great play. So how does the value get divvied up? Russell gets the Lion’s Share … but what does that mean? I think the Celtics rotation was the best in the league for a good 75-80% of the time Russell was in the league. You have to account for that.
And, yeah, Red. Red Auerbach was great. And he was consistent. Russell played for two coaches in his career—one of whom was William Felton Russell. How much does that sort of consistency help? Ask the Spurs. Ask the Showtime Lakers. Ask Phil Jackson’s three peat teams. You have to give Red some of the juice too. The question is … how much?
Well, I rate Russell over Michael Jordan. It’s very close. I don’t think you can go wrong in the top three. And I absolutely do not downgrade Jordan for his teams often being mediocre in his first 5 years. I think Jordan was about as good or Magic or Larry in those years. Nobody in history could have taken the 1987 Bulls to 50 wins. MJ’s sustained brilliance is statistically verifiable and continued throughout his 11 year peak (1985, 1987-93. 1996-98). He won six rings in two sets of three. He was, and is, in every way amazing.
Some of the issues with Russell you can also state about Jordan, though. Coaching consistency—when Phil showed up, the Bulls started winning titles. A top 10 player alongside in most every championship year. Great rotations…I’d actually say the Russell Celtics had better rotations overall than the Jordan/Jackson Bulls most of the time. But not all the time … and Russell won more. And I think Phil is better than Red, though it’s pretty close.
And while I don’t ding MJ at all for occasionally playing on weaker teams, I’m more and more displeased about the baseball hiatus. We often hear about Jordan’s incredible will to win and dominate. So, what, it went away? He took a break? Really? I’ve never heard of such a thing. Bill Russell didn’t look around in 1962 and say, “You know, I could train and win a Gold Medal in 1964!” and bolt from the Celtics. After the 1985 season, Kareem didn’t say “Wow...that’s my fourth ring, and I got the Finals MVP, and I’m 37 and I’ve played the second most minutes in NBA history. I think I’ll call it a day.” He wanted more. If Jordan had continued to play in those two seasons, he may or may not have won two more titles. We don’t know. But we know that he chose not to—and that is not something that is subject to era differential or teammates or portability. That’s walking away. I drop him down for that—not much, but enough to slide under Russell.
That leaves Kareem. Kareem won “only” as many rings as MJ, in a much longer career. He didn’t win nearly as much as Russell. And like MJ, he was on some mediocre teams from 1975-79. Really, when you get down to it, I can’t say that Kareem from 1970-80 was better than Jordan in 1985, 1987-93, and 1996-98. We don’t have a full enough set of statistics to do a full comparative analysis, but both players played about the same amount of time in those 11 seasons runs. MJ has about 5% more win shares, and is (therefore) about 5% higher in WS/48. There are other analytic tools that bring them closer together, or separate them slightly more. But I’m comfortable with saying Jordan was slightly more valuable. Very slightly.
But Jordan took two seasons off in the middle. Part of value is consistency. This is the ultimate inconsistency. On this alone, I’d drop MJ down to Kareem’s level.
Then there’s Kareem’s back 9. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar did not stop playing basketball after 1980, his sixth MVP season. He played nine more seasons at a lesser level. But how much lesser—and how long was he at a lower but still very valuable state? There has been a lot of discussion about Tim Duncan’s value in recent years, and I expect there will be a lot more. How much does Duncan’s play from 2010 to 2014 up his ranking and overall value? IMO, it isn’t a whole lot … not because his play was bad, but because TD had built up such an impressive resume in those first 12 years. But it’s worth something; TD has three MVP top 15 finishes, one Top 10 finishes, and some All-NBA team placements in the last five years.
Well, that’s Kareem from 1981 to 1986…except Kareem was slightly better. Part of that is just playing more; TD played 2438 minutes in 2010 and has been around 2000 minutes a season since. In every season between 1981 and 1986, Kareem played more than TD played in 2010. He played about 20-25% more a year than TD played in those seasons. That’s a lot of court time. And Kareem was still great. Not good, but great. Sure, Kareem “only” averaged a little over 11 win shares a year with a WS/48 of .199—and those number represent a dropoff from his 11 season peak period. But he played 79 games a year and averaged 34 mpg at that lower but still extremely high level. He was in the Top 10 of MVP voting every year; in the top 5 four times. Was that sort of a “beloved player, belated nice guy” vote result? Well, if it was, it would be odd since:
1) Kareem already had six MVPs; what, everyone was “being nice” to him now after he’d won more of the awards than anyone else?
2) Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, beloved player. Mmmm. That doesn’t sound right either.
In terms of WS, WS/48, and PER, these players that played between 2009 and 2014 have similar totals/averages to Kareem
Code: Select all
G MPG WS WS/48 PER
Kareem 473 34.0 66.8 .199 23.3
Dwight Howard 440 35.9 64.7 .197 23.5
Dirk Nowitzki 430 34.8 57.8 .185 22.7
Tim Duncan 430 30.2 50.2 .186 23.3
Kevin Love 364 32.8 47.0 .189 23.2
I’ll say it again … I find statistical analysis to be imperfect. Kareem leads this group pretty clearly … he played the most games, the most minutes, has the most win shares, and the highest WS/48. He’s 0.2 behind Dwight in PER. But I don’t think that means Kareem was “better” than these players. The stats don’t give us a correct or perfect assessment. And all of these players had better and lesser seasons during their six season runs. But I do think that this gives a pretty good idea of Kareem’s comp group from 1981-6. And it’s very impressive.
And that’s enough to put Kareem at #1 for me. He may or not have been the best at his extremely long peak. But there’s too much there there. Dependability. Peak. Success. Statistical impact. Longetivity. Russell makes it hard for me, but I’m still in the minority of having KAJ at #1. I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it one more time.
If I knew nothing about all the players in history going into their rookie year, I would select Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. He was the greatest college player of all-time by a very slight amount (Walton and Russell). His game had no flaws. He won titles every year. He’d be my #1 pick.
If I knew everything about all the players in history going into their rookie year, I would select Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. I would know that I would get extraordinary peak play and unbelievable longetivity. I would be aware of his overall playoff quality/dominance. I would know about the complete game. I would know about the MVPs. I know how long I would have that. He’d be my #1 pick.
