RealGM 2017 Top 100 #98 (Bill Walton)

[pandrade83]

We're at the point where you're deciding to go with players who were outstanding for short periods of time (Walton, Davis, Hawkins, Tiny, Daniels) or guys who were very good for a long time but it's hard to argue they were ever great (Divac, Bellamy, etc).

I've decided to go with the first group (and fwiw - if you're going the other way, I don't think it's unreasonable).

Now the first decision point is made, let's look at the candidates.

Daniels, & Hawkins achieved their fame in the ABA at a point where professional basketball was extremely diluted. When Daniels won his final title, there were 27 teams in pro hoops - that's as many as there were 20 years later. That's also when Tiny peaked - who never won a series except for the time he got to play with Bird, Parish & rookie McHale.

While I'm aware that the ABA was better in the 70's, this tape of the '68 ABA Finals leaves some things to be desired.

Watch on YouTube

If you're going with a guy who had a very high but short lived peak - why not go with the guy who had the best of it? Through these discussions, I think we've established that there is some value (how much is debatable) outside of '77.

With Walton, we're getting a guy who we know can carry mediocre squads to a title - because he actually did this. And in fact, he's the only guy in the post merger era who did this that's still on the board.



As to the 2nd choice - achieving a PER of 30+ puts you in rare territory. Here's the list of guys who have done this in the post-merger era.

MJ
Lebron
Robinson
Shaq
Steph
McGrady
Wade
Davis
Westbrook
Harden

Davis has 4 very strong years under his belt - which by the standards of this group is not bad.

Now, the knock on him is that he's never even won a playoff game - but the time he did make it, he delivered 31-11 & 3 blocks on 61% TS!

He played great - I don't put that loss on him.

Watch on YouTube

Primary: Bill Walton
Alternate: The Brow

[pandrade83]

It's not just the defense. His style doesn't translate to winning (and to be fair - I wasn't around to watch him - if I didn't have live experience watching Davis, would I say the same thing?)

-His best year coincided with a 60 game loser ('62)
-Even when he had some teammates who aren't good enough to be part of this project but still had worthwhile careers like the '64 Baltimore team - they still were bad.
-In New York, he & Willis Reed "anchored" defenses that were the worst in the league for 3 straight years.
-Upon his trade to Detroit for Dave D, the Pistons get worse (10 games worse) - the Knicks have a confounding variable named Walt Frazier - but on the Pistons side, the impact is less muddy.
-Then he goes to the Hawks where he has a useful post-prime but is the 2nd-4th best player depending on year & how you value players on some .500 squads in a pretty diluted era.

When I look at this guy's career, I keep coming back to this question: Where did he contribute to winning? I just don't see it in a way that is meaningful enough for this project.

[HeartBreakKid]

Since this year doesn't count for AD.

Why AD over Daniels, Hawkins, Alex Groza (google if you need to here, totally a career we were robbed from history), Walt Bellamy, Neil Johnston, Amar'e Stoudemire (i mean AD had defensive issues early on and Amar'e had better playoff results), Anfernee Hardaway (still not in and had more playoff and some peak stats are better). Love and Gobert also have better peak WS stats that AD...AD only made the playoffs once. Also why AD over Cousins? Was 15 really that great for you?

Why does him making the playoffs matter? He's just as good in 16 and 17 for the most part.

His defensive woes were fixed up last season, and offensively he is a better scorer than all those guys except STAT. He was probably a top 5 player in 2015, and was a top ten player in 16 and 17 - I'm not sure if STAT was ever a top ten player.

Connie Hawkins never really put together a season that looks that great to me. If his ABA seasons were in the 70s it'd be a lot more credible.

I don't know much about Alex Groza.

Neil Johnson is just not a spectacular player to me.

Love flat out just isn't as good as Davis, and never has been - and he hasn't been a star for that much longer either since he had really serious injuries (Davis misses a lot of games, but his game doesn't seem to get affected like Love's does). Gobert? Gobert been good for like 2 seasons, and he wasn't better than Davis last year. He's highly impactful which is why he was a beast in DWS but just having a higher WS doesn't really indicate he is a better player.

I'd consider Mel Daniels and Walt Bellamy. I actually have not thought about Penny, but I suppose I am just convinced that if Davis played with a player as good as Shaq he'd have pretty stellar results. What Penny did in that one season where he didn't have Shaq wasn't anything Davis didn't do.

The playoffs matter in that if a player is having an all time great peak (and I assume you're basing your vote for davis on his peak), I'd expect the team to at least make the playoffs. Certainly he has had team issues and his coach imo is a moron, but none the less since this year is no part of the project, 15 is the only year Davis seemed to have the kind of impact needed to really move wins and losses. All the other players I listed imo at least seemed to do that more so in their peak seasons. That isn't to say they are better choices here, but that they had peaks that lead to more wins.

We're talking about rank 98 - there are guys who are ranked in the top 20 like Abdul-Jabar, Garnett and Bryant who have missed the playoffs in the middle of their primes. We already know Davis is good enough to anchor a team into the playoffs, why would it matter if he missed the post season the next year? You said it yourself, his team is really bad.

[trex_8063]

Thru post #23:

Bill Walton - 4 (pandrade83, Outside, HeartBreakKid, euroleague)
Mel Daniels - 1 (penbeast0)
Tiny Archibald - 1 (Clyde Frazier)
Walt Bellamy - 1 (trex_8063)
Connie Hawkins - 1 (Doctor MJ)

About 23 hours left till runoff.

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[dhsilv2]

Why does him making the playoffs matter? He's just as good in 16 and 17 for the most part.

His defensive woes were fixed up last season, and offensively he is a better scorer than all those guys except STAT. He was probably a top 5 player in 2015, and was a top ten player in 16 and 17 - I'm not sure if STAT was ever a top ten player.

Connie Hawkins never really put together a season that looks that great to me. If his ABA seasons were in the 70s it'd be a lot more credible.

I don't know much about Alex Groza.

Neil Johnson is just not a spectacular player to me.

Love flat out just isn't as good as Davis, and never has been - and he hasn't been a star for that much longer either since he had really serious injuries (Davis misses a lot of games, but his game doesn't seem to get affected like Love's does). Gobert? Gobert been good for like 2 seasons, and he wasn't better than Davis last year. He's highly impactful which is why he was a beast in DWS but just having a higher WS doesn't really indicate he is a better player.

I'd consider Mel Daniels and Walt Bellamy. I actually have not thought about Penny, but I suppose I am just convinced that if Davis played with a player as good as Shaq he'd have pretty stellar results. What Penny did in that one season where he didn't have Shaq wasn't anything Davis didn't do.

The playoffs matter in that if a player is having an all time great peak (and I assume you're basing your vote for davis on his peak), I'd expect the team to at least make the playoffs. Certainly he has had team issues and his coach imo is a moron, but none the less since this year is no part of the project, 15 is the only year Davis seemed to have the kind of impact needed to really move wins and losses. All the other players I listed imo at least seemed to do that more so in their peak seasons. That isn't to say they are better choices here, but that they had peaks that lead to more wins.

We're talking about rank 98 - there are guys who are ranked in the top 20 like Abdul-Jabar, Garnett and Bryant who have missed the playoffs in the middle of their primes. We already know Davis is good enough to anchor a team into the playoffs, why would it matter if he missed the post season the next year? You said it yourself, his team is really bad.

Where do you rank AD's peak? I'd assume you have it top at least 40 for him to be a top 100 all time guy. Likely top 25. Am I off on that mark?

[HeartBreakKid]

The playoffs matter in that if a player is having an all time great peak (and I assume you're basing your vote for davis on his peak), I'd expect the team to at least make the playoffs. Certainly he has had team issues and his coach imo is a moron, but none the less since this year is no part of the project, 15 is the only year Davis seemed to have the kind of impact needed to really move wins and losses. All the other players I listed imo at least seemed to do that more so in their peak seasons. That isn't to say they are better choices here, but that they had peaks that lead to more wins.

We're talking about rank 98 - there are guys who are ranked in the top 20 like Abdul-Jabar, Garnett and Bryant who have missed the playoffs in the middle of their primes. We already know Davis is good enough to anchor a team into the playoffs, why would it matter if he missed the post season the next year? You said it yourself, his team is really bad.

Where do you rank AD's peak? I'd assume you have it top at least 40 for him to be a top 100 all time guy. Likely top 25. Am I off on that mark?

Without thinking too deeply about it, top 30-35. Not including this year.

[dhsilv2]

We're talking about rank 98 - there are guys who are ranked in the top 20 like Abdul-Jabar, Garnett and Bryant who have missed the playoffs in the middle of their primes. We already know Davis is good enough to anchor a team into the playoffs, why would it matter if he missed the post season the next year? You said it yourself, his team is really bad.

Where do you rank AD's peak? I'd assume you have it top at least 40 for him to be a top 100 all time guy. Likely top 25. Am I off on that mark?

Without thinking too deeply about it, top 30-35. Not including this year.

For me that means you think the pelicans are historically bad outside of him over the last 3 years? I haven't really thought about it, but if that's the case it helps but still last year they won 34 games. Mind you I'm supporting Tiny here, but he has some great post injury vet on a good team moments to build on, I can see AD's peak being better than Tiny's...though i'm not sure I believe it.

[HeartBreakKid]

Where do you rank AD's peak? I'd assume you have it top at least 40 for him to be a top 100 all time guy. Likely top 25. Am I off on that mark?

Without thinking too deeply about it, top 30-35. Not including this year.

For me that means you think the pelicans are historically bad outside of him over the last 3 years? I haven't really thought about it, but if that's the case it helps but still last year they won 34 games. Mind you I'm supporting Tiny here, but he has some great post injury vet on a good team moments to build on, I can see AD's peak being better than Tiny's...though i'm not sure I believe it.

Honestly, I didn't even think they'd make the playoffs this year when they had both Cousins and Davis. I thought they were really dreadful last season.

[dhsilv2]

Without thinking too deeply about it, top 30-35. Not including this year.

For me that means you think the pelicans are historically bad outside of him over the last 3 years? I haven't really thought about it, but if that's the case it helps but still last year they won 34 games. Mind you I'm supporting Tiny here, but he has some great post injury vet on a good team moments to build on, I can see AD's peak being better than Tiny's...though i'm not sure I believe it.

Honestly, I didn't even think they'd make the playoffs this year when they had both Cousins and Davis. I thought they were really dreadful last season.

Where do you think Cousins is as a player? I'm pretty high on him vs many here though he's not in my top 100 (I could see him around 125 though).

[HeartBreakKid]

For me that means you think the pelicans are historically bad outside of him over the last 3 years? I haven't really thought about it, but if that's the case it helps but still last year they won 34 games. Mind you I'm supporting Tiny here, but he has some great post injury vet on a good team moments to build on, I can see AD's peak being better than Tiny's...though i'm not sure I believe it.

Honestly, I didn't even think they'd make the playoffs this year when they had both Cousins and Davis. I thought they were really dreadful last season.

Where do you think Cousins is as a player? I'm pretty high on him vs many here though he's not in my top 100 (I could see him around 125 though).

I'd say he's usually a borderline top ten guy - he was probably 12th or 13th best player in the league last year.

At least with Davis we got to see one winning season and a playoff series - with Cousins there is a lot more mystery I think.

[dhsilv2]

Honestly, I didn't even think they'd make the playoffs this year when they had both Cousins and Davis. I thought they were really dreadful last season.

Where do you think Cousins is as a player? I'm pretty high on him vs many here though he's not in my top 100 (I could see him around 125 though).

I'd say he's usually a borderline top ten guy - he was probably 12th or 13th best player in the league last year.

At least with Davis we got to see one winning season and a playoff series - with Cousins there is a lot more mystery I think.

If i thought davis peak is good enough to be here, and Cousins is a top 15 guy...I'd expect playoffs. No way is Jrue THAT bad a 3rd option.

[HeartBreakKid]

Where do you think Cousins is as a player? I'm pretty high on him vs many here though he's not in my top 100 (I could see him around 125 though).

I'd say he's usually a borderline top ten guy - he was probably 12th or 13th best player in the league last year.

At least with Davis we got to see one winning season and a playoff series - with Cousins there is a lot more mystery I think.

If i thought davis peak is good enough to be here, and Cousins is a top 15 guy...I'd expect playoffs. No way is Jrue THAT bad a 3rd option.

Jrue Holiday was not good at all before this year and was/is heavily injury prone.

Their team composition is also poor. If Jrue wasn't decent this year they'd have no good perimeter players.

[dhsilv2]

I'd say he's usually a borderline top ten guy - he was probably 12th or 13th best player in the league last year.

At least with Davis we got to see one winning season and a playoff series - with Cousins there is a lot more mystery I think.

If i thought davis peak is good enough to be here, and Cousins is a top 15 guy...I'd expect playoffs. No way is Jrue THAT bad a 3rd option.

Jrue Holiday was not good at all before this year and was/is heavily injury prone.

Their team composition is also poor. If Jrue wasn't decent this year they'd have no good perimeter players.

He was ok enough for this scenario last year with about 60 games played.

[trex_8063]

We're talking about rank 98 - there are guys who are ranked in the top 20 like Abdul-Jabar, Garnett and Bryant who have missed the playoffs in the middle of their primes. We already know Davis is good enough to anchor a team into the playoffs, why would it matter if he missed the post season the next year? You said it yourself, his team is really bad.

Where do you rank AD's peak? I'd assume you have it top at least 40 for him to be a top 100 all time guy. Likely top 25. Am I off on that mark?

Without thinking too deeply about it, top 30-35. Not including this year.

fwiw, in the peaks project of two years ago, Davis ('15) was voted in 29th all-time.

I personally don't have him particularly close to the top 100 for the same reason I don't have Walton in my top 100 (longevity---and its relation to total career value---is lacking); but I can kinda see how someone might go there. I just think there are other fairly high peak guys with a bit more prime-level playing career to better warrant consideration before Davis (e.g Connie Hawkins, Yao Ming, and Tiny Archibald).

[trex_8063]

Connie Hawkins career was destroyed by drugs. The drop off wasn't related to the NBA or ABA. He was a cocaine addict in the 70s and drank too much, because he was constantly screwed over by the nba because he was Involved with unsavory people.

Source? I've never heard anything about Hawkins and addiction issues. Even doing an internet search for "Connie Hawkins addiction" I can't find any info about that. Are you sure you're not mixing him up with another star (David Thompson, perhaps?)?

Hawkins' drop-off was [as far as I've ever known] related to a knee injury about midway thru the '69 ABA season and subsequent surgery, from which he never recovered to his prior form (as was typical with that type of injury in that era of medicine).

Read some biographies on google. His knee injury was also a factor

Hmm, I may keep after you to provide a link, because I truly think you're mistaken/mis-remembering. I've done a bunch of google searches:

Connie Hawkins addiction
Connie Hawkins drugs
Connie Hawkins drug abuse
Connie Hawkins alcohol
Connie Hawkins cocaine

.....And I have turned up exactly zero indication or evidence of drug abuse. Not even an unsubstantiated accusation (outside of yours, that is). In my searches I turned up this thread about cocaine addicts in the ABA/NBA, and no one else mentions Hawkins within the context of drug abuse. So among all the well-read and knowledgeable posters in the RealGM community, you're the only one who has suggested it.

And though Hawkins is dead, this is a pretty slanderous accusation if it's not true.

[Owly]

Where do you rank AD's peak? I'd assume you have it top at least 40 for him to be a top 100 all time guy. Likely top 25. Am I off on that mark?

Without thinking too deeply about it, top 30-35. Not including this year.

For me that means you think the pelicans are historically bad outside of him over the last 3 years? I haven't really thought about it, but if that's the case it helps but still last year they won 34 games. Mind you I'm supporting Tiny here, but he has some great post injury vet on a good team moments to build on, I can see AD's peak being better than Tiny's...though i'm not sure I believe it.

This isn't anti-Tiny as a candidate but ...
both PER and BPM see Archibald peaking at league average during his Boston spell. He has one year where WS/48 sees him as significantly above average and there's a fair case (based on those on those other numbers for instance) that's WS liking team performance (and in effect misdistributing credit for the team's goodness), and him playing minutes on a good team. Then, too, his Boston playoff numbers look worse (i.e. I think a greater than normal dropoff from those RSes). And the largest aspect of the game that's non-boxscore, (most of) defense, isn't exactly an Archibald strength. Maybe you have reason to think otherwise, but it's hard for me to see much value in Boston Archibald.

There's been a lot of "team performance" stuff here (anti-Davis here, and Archibald before) and it feels like ... have you looked at those teams - looked really closely and tried to parse out what could be expected from them. It's fair enough if people have (I haven't - my at a glance/recall response in both cases would be colour me underwhelmed), it's just hard to do.


On Davis vs Ming, Hawkins, Archibald ... "with a bit more prime-level playing career" ... Davis has 4 (albeit somewhat incomplete) seasons with a PER at or greater than 25 (whilst being less driven by usage than seasons typically in that range - especially that 30 PER season). Hawkins has one and a half seasons dominating (and I do mean dominating) a dreadful league. Then ... three quality but not outstanding (All-Star-ish?) seasons in Phoenix. But then metrics-wise those seasons are worse than Davis's rookie season. The gap's down to circa 2200 minutes and Hawkins in the NBA wasn't dominant as Davis is.

On Archibald ... the case for Archibald (in general in terms of the range where he goes, more than specifically here) depends on how you estimate/interpret his impact. Without really knowing about it, it seems like people are feeling more that a PG isn't so much boxscore measured, that people can be dynamic playmakers beyond the boxscore like Nash. I don't know if Nash is just a crazy outlier. But Archibald might fit the dynamic playmaker archetype whose ability to get anywhere on the floor makes things happen. I don't know whether the data supports that. Numbers wise though, Archibald has 3 star years ('72,'73 and '75) then a kinda maybe year in '76 and a part season of a similar level in '77. Buying anything outside that as "prime-level", by the boxscore at least, seems like a reach. And his peak metrics aren't close to Davis's - a sympathetic view might point to a lower range at that time and intepret in such a way as to stretch it up, or see it as positional - a possible negative view might see that the absence of turnovers may have inflated those numbers. Anyhow for needle moving minutes I'm not sure this one is pro-Archibald.

Yao's probably the best box-score numbers case (overall, and especially if taking early ABA at somewhat of a discount). Mixed year-on-year impact numbers (at least on-off) are a tad confusing, though some odd situational stuff happening (McGrady injuries, for instance). -97-14 RAPM isn't bad, but maybe slightly less than you'd like from someone with those boxscore numbers? Not sure I have a good head for these numbers though, certainly not bad. BPM is a huge cynic because he's often a non-passer though this varies year-to-year (dreadful in '05 - one of his three best boxscore years, but really bad on-off, otherwise maybe between adequate and bad - might be being harsh, overly influenced by single-digit career assist percentage). 06 and 07 level numbers (impact and boxscore) over full seasons would really help. As it is I'd probably take something like the 7 prime Kemp (or Marques) years and the extra minutes that avails. I think there's quite a big case of "what ifs" with Yao (not that his case at this point hinges on a sympathetic view on this) ... what if he hadn't started getting injured as he was peaking, what if China weren't playing him every summer and associated "more rest" questions, but perhaps also what if his first couple of NBA years were spent in a ball movement system, rather than one that saw Francis and Mobley take turns iso-ing and eating up the clock? That free-throw percentage makes me wonder if he couldn't have developed more as an outside shooter (not nescessarily a three or that you want to take him away from the basket a lot, but occasionally for spacing and because you could probably get it off easily enough as a set shot). Anyhow, enough rambling, he more so than the others I see the case for vs Davis, (though Davis maybe gives you better spacing and more flexibility e.g. positionally, defensively).

Oh and fwiw, I too have not seen anything on Hawkins and drugs (not that I've been searching for it now - just, you know in terms of knowing of these things).

[Doctor MJ]

For me that means you think the pelicans are historically bad outside of him over the last 3 years? I haven't really thought about it, but if that's the case it helps but still last year they won 34 games. Mind you I'm supporting Tiny here, but he has some great post injury vet on a good team moments to build on, I can see AD's peak being better than Tiny's...though i'm not sure I believe it.

Honestly, I didn't even think they'd make the playoffs this year when they had both Cousins and Davis. I thought they were really dreadful last season.

Where do you think Cousins is as a player? I'm pretty high on him vs many here though he's not in my top 100 (I could see him around 125 though).

I don't think Cousins has actually done anything in his career.

He's talented to be sure and has developed skills, but Sacramento didn't actually benefit from him, and New Orleans just got better when he got hurt.

It won't shock me at all if Cousins finally puts it together and actually helps a team be good, but it hasn't happened yet.

[euroleague]

Source? I've never heard anything about Hawkins and addiction issues. Even doing an internet search for "Connie Hawkins addiction" I can't find any info about that. Are you sure you're not mixing him up with another star (David Thompson, perhaps?)?

Hawkins' drop-off was [as far as I've ever known] related to a knee injury about midway thru the '69 ABA season and subsequent surgery, from which he never recovered to his prior form (as was typical with that type of injury in that era of medicine).

Read some biographies on google. His knee injury was also a factor

Hmm, I may keep after you to provide a link, because I truly think you're mistaken/mis-remembering. I've done a bunch of google searches:

Connie Hawkins addiction
Connie Hawkins drugs
Connie Hawkins drug abuse
Connie Hawkins alcohol
Connie Hawkins cocaine

.....And I have turned up exactly zero indication or evidence of drug abuse. Not even an unsubstantiated accusation (outside of yours, that is). In my searches I turned up this thread about cocaine addicts in the ABA/NBA, and no one else mentions Hawkins within the context of drug abuse. So among all the well-read and knowledgeable posters in the RealGM community, you're the only one who has suggested it.

And though Hawkins is dead, this is a pretty slanderous accusation if it's not true.

It's literally the first result on google. If you read the biography and not just titles... this 'accusation' of a 70s player doing drugs is not slander at all even if I were mistaken.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nba.com/amp/league/article/2017/10/10/despite-interrupted-nba-career-connie-hawkins-fondly-remembered-peers

[penbeast0]

Source? I've never heard anything about Hawkins and addiction issues. Even doing an internet search for "Connie Hawkins addiction" I can't find any info about that. Are you sure you're not mixing him up with another star (David Thompson, perhaps?)?

Hawkins' drop-off was [as far as I've ever known] related to a knee injury about midway thru the '69 ABA season and subsequent surgery, from which he never recovered to his prior form (as was typical with that type of injury in that era of medicine).

Read some biographies on google. His knee injury was also a factor

Hmm, I may keep after you to provide a link, because I truly think you're mistaken/mis-remembering. I've done a bunch of google searches:

Connie Hawkins addiction
Connie Hawkins drugs
Connie Hawkins drug abuse
Connie Hawkins alcohol
Connie Hawkins cocaine

.....And I have turned up exactly zero indication or evidence of drug abuse. Not even an unsubstantiated accusation (outside of yours, that is). In my searches I turned up this thread about cocaine addicts in the ABA/NBA, and no one else mentions Hawkins within the context of drug abuse. So among all the well-read and knowledgeable posters in the RealGM community, you're the only one who has suggested it.

And though Hawkins is dead, this is a pretty slanderous accusation if it's not true.

Hawkins' actual playing career was derailed by his knee injuries; I've never heard any allegations of substance abuse when he was playing (and from your citation, I am apparently wrong). There was scandal that kept him out of the NBA for a decade, but that was a charge of associating with gamblers (right after the game fixing scandals in college basketball that forced Alex Groza out of the league). I never heard that he shaved points or threw games, but his mother apparently hooked up with a gambler who probably was looking to influence Hawkins; he already had a rep as the next Elgin Baylor. So he was associating with gamblers even if he didn't choose to and that was enough in a reputation sensitive NBA to ban him until they changed their ruling to try to hurt the ABA by stealing the league's brightest star.

The cited article does indeed claim: "But Hawkins, due to knee surgery and drug and drinking habits, 'had some mileage on him' by age 31, Colangelo said." By the time he went to the Lakers, he was no longer a superstar though.

[trex_8063]

Read some biographies on google. His knee injury was also a factor

Hmm, I may keep after you to provide a link, because I truly think you're mistaken/mis-remembering. I've done a bunch of google searches:

Connie Hawkins addiction
Connie Hawkins drugs
Connie Hawkins drug abuse
Connie Hawkins alcohol
Connie Hawkins cocaine

.....And I have turned up exactly zero indication or evidence of drug abuse. Not even an unsubstantiated accusation (outside of yours, that is). In my searches I turned up this thread about cocaine addicts in the ABA/NBA, and no one else mentions Hawkins within the context of drug abuse. So among all the well-read and knowledgeable posters in the RealGM community, you're the only one who has suggested it.

And though Hawkins is dead, this is a pretty slanderous accusation if it's not true.

It's literally the first result on google. If you read the biography and not just titles... this 'accusation' of a 70s player doing drugs is not slander at all even if I were mistaken.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nba.com/amp/league/article/2017/10/10/despite-interrupted-nba-career-connie-hawkins-fondly-remembered-peers

Apologies. fwiw, I WAS reading thru articles a bit, not just the titles. Not sure if I saw that one and just missed it (only seems to come up anywhere on the first page with the "Connie Hawkins drugs" search).

Still, this is a relatively brief and ambiguous mention of problems:

".......But Hawkins, due to knee surgery and drug and drinking habits, “had some mileage on him” by age 31, Colangelo said."

This vague mention of "habits" is a potentially a far cry from "he came into the NBA a coke addict".

The abrupt [and SEVERE] drop-off seen in the latter 11 rs games and playoffs of the '69 ABA season----just back from knee surgery----have me leaning more toward the injury/surgery as the primary cause of drop off.

Either way, the cause of decline isn't much of a factor in my criteria anyway; his career is what it is, and that's what I look at. I just wanted to make sure the accusation had some basis. Thank you for providing the link.