dhsilv2 wrote:
Walton was healthy for the playoffs in his prime once. It just takes a lot of luck on having quality teammates around you to turn that into a title. I've been in favor of shorter careers in multiple cases, but all the players gave me a multiple year window to win. Walton gives me 80% of a year to win in. Walton's prime is 175 regular season games (unless you count his rookie year). The guy only played over 60 games once in that run.
Anyway, that's my struggle with Walton. If a guy can't play, I just can't vote for him. The 1 title and MVP are just not enough for me with walton. I also have to admit I'm not as high on his peak as others. I admit I haven't seen much, there isn't much to see, but he was great, but not this transcendent potential GOAT guy that people make him out to be.
I'm not sure if I'm generally agreeing or marginally disagreeing wrt Walton's peak, though I do agree with the gist as it pertains to his whole career.
To summarize my stance on his peak: I think Walton was likely a top 15 peak of all-time (if somewhat ignoring or at least "dampening" any consideration of missed games). Imagine someone with the length and rebounding/defensive presence of Rudy Gobert, the passing of Pau Gasol, and the scoring of ~'13 Brook Lopez all rolled into one player (except yes: expect him to miss 15-20 games in the rs).......that's basically peak Walton. Even with the missed games, assuming he's relatively healthy in the playoffs (which he was in '77), that's a helluva player.
I think Walton's passing sometimes gets overstated. He was an excellent big-man passer from the high-post, elbow, or low-block, and also an excellent outlet passer. But he also had a limited handle and was a bit turnover-prone. These things have perhaps occasionally been glossed over when posters award him the distinction as the GOAT big-man passer/playmaker. I think someone like Pau Gasol is a fair comparison wrt passing/playmaking (which is still high praise).
The other aspect of peak Walton that is sometimes exaggerated, imo, is his scoring. I've read people suggesting he could have gone for 30 ppg with no relevant drop in his efficiency if he or his team wanted him to; but I'm not buying that. From a practical standpoint, increasing scoring by 60-70% without a noteworthy drop in efficiency for just about ANYONE is fairly unrealistic; I'm also just not seeing the scoring repertoire necessary for that. Not that I've seen a ton of Walton, but I have watched like 3 games from the '77 Finals, at least 1-2 game(s) from his series against Kareem's Lakers in the '77 playoffs, part of a game from '78, and a few games of the '86 Finals.....I feel that's enough to render an opinion on the topic of his scoring prowess.
I otherwise don't think his quality as a player [at his peak] is exaggerated (and sometimes I think his defense is perhaps not appreciated enough).
But as to his career whole........I agree with dhsilv2. I just don't think there's enough of it to provide adequate value for this spot. I've even started looking at "championship odds" (utilizing Elgee's graph and odds/chances associated with various player qualities, but using my own assessment of player quality season-to-season)......and Walton doesn't shape out too well there, even though I think so highly of his peak. Even players with limited longevity like Kawhi Leonard and Tiny Archibald ended up rating out slightly ahead of him.
His career recap (not chronological) is kinda like this:
'77: top 15 peak ever when he's playing; missed 20% of the rs (which is going to seriously damage your title chances with many teams), but managed to hang in thru the playoffs.
'78: again playing at top 15 peak ever during rs.....but misses 30% of said rs, and basically [mostly] missed the playoffs entirely.
'75-76: not yet up to peak form, but is a very good player [when playing] both years......but misses more than half the season in '75 and nearly 40% of the season in '76. With most rosters, that's going to mean missing the playoffs (which both teams did).
Meanwhile, let's not forget that he's eating up salary space by demanding top dollar (more on that in a moment).
'79-'85: he's again demanded (and received) massive amounts of salary space (for Portland in '79, the Clippers after) while missing THE ENTIRE YEAR in '79, '81, and '82. The other four years ('80, '83-'85) he's a merely decent/good player who misses 15-68 games each and every year.
'86: Manages to string together one solid healthy (albeit <18 mpg) season as a crucial role player for an all-time great team.
'87: a grand total of 112 minutes of ineffectual play.
We've held off-court intangible issues against other players thru the course of this project (e.g. Dennis Rodman, Wilt Chamberlain). Walton should be no different. He commanded a lot of salary while basically not showing up to play (for YEARS on end)......this essentially crippled multiple teams: they didn't have him, and they didn't have the means to get decent talent to fill the void. In light of all the missed games (with at least a modicum of consideration for the salary situation), I don't see that '75-'76 and '79-'85
collectively add hardly any meaningful value to his career. I think they add hardly any more than Steve Nash added to his career POST-2011.
The bulk of Walton's career value comes from '77-'78 and '86 (missed 41 rs games between '77-'78 and most of the '78 playoffs, and played <18 mpg in '86).
As highly as I think of him as a player at his peak, I cannot vote for that.
"The fact that a proposition is absurd has never hindered those who wish to believe it." -Edward Rutherfurd
"Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities." - Voltaire
