How would the modern day perceptions or rankings of Russell and Wilt change if they didn't have each other to deal with.

[coastalmarker99]

In a non Wilt universe.

Russell now ends his career with.

6 MVPs-

11 ALL NBA first team

11 rebounding titles-

12 rings including 11 straight from 1959 to 1969

to go along with his other accolades



Pros to his goat case.

one more ring and a extra MVP

8 more first team nods.

Now seen as the undisputed best player of his era.

Russell's stats now would also be viewed more of a outlier as with no Wilt.

his rebounding numbers would look even more impressive as he would own every single record basically in that category.





Cons to his legacy would be that with no Wilt people would argue.

Weak era such as the early 1950's.

played on stacked teams

He faced a lack of any real teams that could have given him a run for his money.

Had no rival at his position besides Nate and Walt

His main rival was a white guard in Jerry west and another guard in Oscar both of whom lacked the help to take him down.




In a non Russell universe.

Wilt with his 80% winning percentage against Non Celtic teams in the playoffs.

now ends his career with.

6 MVP's

8 to 9 titles

13 rebounding titles

10 first team All NBA


Pro's to his goat case.

Would have the ultimate combo of individual success and team success in NBA history.

Is seen as both the best offensive and defensive player of his era

Is seen as the undisputed best player of his era.

His playoff stats don't take the Celtics hit.

Has a higher playoff PPG and finals average due to his stats not taking the Celtics hit.

would own a lot of records in the finals such as rebounding and scoring due to facing LA who he put up god-like numbers against

His stats are now seen as even more of a outlier without Russell's rebounding dominance as nobody would have even come close to putting up the RPG that Wilt did.



Cons would be that with no Russell to play against.

people would argue.

Weak era

Team's lack of good offensive ratings

He played against midgets and white guys

played on stacked teams such as the 76ers and Lakers.

He faced a lack of any real teams that could have given him a run for his money outside of the Knicks and Kareem's bucks.

Had no rival at his position besides Nate and Walt both of whom were put in bad team situations

His main rival in the finals was a white guard in Jerry west.

He could also be seen as a vulture especially if he struggles to win more rings once Kareem came into the NBA

[dygaction]

Russell will be richman Mikan Jr, and people will talk about modern nba starting from merger time.

[coastalmarker99]

Russell will be richman Mikan Jr, and people will talk about modern nba starting from merger time.

I don't think so as I think people in that case would talk about the modern NBA starting with Kareem.

People would also say how convenient it was for Russell to just retire just before Kareem came into the NBA so that he could duck him.

[D.Brasco]

Wilt would be seen as the Babe Ruth of the NBA and potentially undisputed GOAT. Only non era specific slam Wilt gets is he "only" finished with 2 rings, which overall is not bad but it doesn't help when you keep getting compared to the guy who won 11 of them.

[No-more-rings]

Significantly obviously, but that’s what makes “relative to era” stuff sort of problematic. I guess it’s sort of like ranking a video game as the goat based on how much better it was than all the others at the time, despite it being obviously worse in graphics and so forth compared to newer ones. It’s just a complicated approach. Wilt only beat Russell, what once? Russell’s ranking shouldn’t change.

[coastalmarker99]

Wilt and Russell were complete outliers on the boards. They averaged six more rebounds than anyone else has for their career in the regular season, and nine more in the postseason.

Nobody else matched their career average in a single season, that is crazy.

Take the other guy out of the picture and I think at lot more credit would be given to that aspect of their game nowadays.

As Wilt would have been winning RPG titles over his peers by margins of 5 to 8 RPG in some seasons.

Likewise for Russell.

Furthermore even other goat rebounders such as Rodman would not have that kind of consistent rebounding dominance.

Over his peers for his entire career as the other two would have.

[70sFan]

As I always said - facing better competition makes you a better player.

[penbeast0]

I would think that Russell's accomplishments would be even more discounted without having beaten the Goliath that was Wilt. Even as it is, a lot of people still try to claim it was mainly stacked teams or the like because you can't be a real superstar without being among the great scorers. Rebounding and defensive dominance isn't enough for the casual fan.

Wilt with 6+ titles and consistent playoff wins added to his ridiculous stat lines would still be in the GOAT discussion and without the playoff loser tag. Also, he would probably not have accepted a low scoring, focus on defense role nor would coaches ask it if he was winning titles consistently so he would probably have finished with around a 35ppg scoring average for his career.