Why Only Wilt?

[Psileas]

You know the boxing adage "a good big man always beats a good smaller man"? In basketball height is the only constant, no amount of training will increase it.

It's not 100% the only thing that defines a player specially in rebounding but it is one of the most important attribute.

Do you know another important attribute? Athleticism.
I don't know what your favorite all-time great is or who you list as the GOAT, but it's probably someone who had it at a higher or even much higher degree than his contemporaries and I bet you never scoffed at his advantage. Instead, you probably laughed at his weaker opponents. If you belong in this category, don't worry, you're just among the 90% of Wilt bashers who can't see the double standard unless someone blatantly points it out.

The boxing adage "a good big man always beats a good smaller man" is obviously b.s as well, as are most phrases containing "always" or "never". I'd have no problem with it if it used "usually" instead. Which is the case in basketball as well. Usually the bigger man is the better rebounder, but with lots of exceptions. Wilt was far from the only guy in his era who was bigger than Russell, yet he was the only guy who could consistently outrebound him. This says a lot about both Russell and Wilt.

[CavaliersFTW]

Wow! Wilt was the man, he outrebounded a guy 4 inches smaller than he. Great achievement! Russell is overrated!

Here's some anthropomorphic measurements that totally supports your assumption

Dennis Rodman 6-6 TRB 23.4%
Charles Barkley 6-4.75 TRB 18.2%
Bill Russell 6-9.63 TRB <20%
Dwight Howard 6-9 TRB 21%
Ben Wallace 6-7 TRB 18.9%
Kevin Love 6-7.75 TRB 21.4%

vs

Yao Ming 7-5.5 TRB 16.5%
Zydrunas Ilgauskas 7-2 TRB 15.7%
Shawn Bradley 7-5.5 TRB 15.0%
Hasheem Thabeet 7-1.25 TRB 15.1%
Shaquille O'Neal 7-0.88 TRB 17.8%
Pau Gasol 7-0 TRB 14.6%

Go ahead and cherry pick whatever 7 foot players you want, shorter guys of their same era tend to dominate them on the boards. Except if your name was Wilt Chamberlain. For some reason Wilt out rebounded all the helpless short rebounders of his era. Guess it was simply cuz he was tall right? What the hell is wrong with all the other tall players in NBA history, why do they let the little guys rape them so bad on the boards? Either Wilt is very very good and deserves praise for his stellar rebounding abilities, or hundreds and hundreds of other players are very poor and aren't doing what they should be doing. Which conclusion makes more sense.

[Owl]

Here's some anthropomorphic measurements that totally supports your assumption

Dennis Rodman 6-6 TRB 23.4%
Charles Barkley 6-4.75 TRB 18.2%
Bill Russell 6-9.63 TRB <20%
Dwight Howard 6-9 TRB 21%
Ben Wallace 6-7 TRB 18.9%
Kevin Love 6-7.75 TRB 21.4%

vs

Yao Ming 7-5.5 TRB 16.5%
Zydrunas Ilgauskas 7-2 TRB 15.7%
Shawn Bradley 7-5.5 TRB 15.0%
Hasheem Thabeet 7-1.25 TRB 15.1%
Shaquille O'Neal 7-0.88 TRB 17.8%
Pau Gasol 7-0 TRB 14.6%

Go ahead and cherry pick whatever 7 foot players you want, shorter guys of their same era tend to dominate them on the boards. Except if your name was Wilt Chamberlain. For some reason Wilt out rebounded all the helpless short rebounders of his era. Guess it was simply cuz he was tall right? What the hell is wrong with all the other tall players in NBA history, why do they let the little guys rape them so bad on the boards? Either Wilt is very very good and deserves praise for his stellar rebounding abilities, or hundreds and hundreds of other players are very poor and aren't doing what they should be doing. Which conclusion makes more sense.

Danny Fortson 6'7 20.4%
Reggie Evans 6'8 21.1%
DeJuan Blair 6'6 18.3%
Kenneth Faried 6'7 19.8%

Manute Bol 7'7 12.2%
Rik Smits 7'4 13.3%
Brad Sellers 7'0 8.6%

Height is all for rebounders.

Seriously beyond a certain (minimum) height, rebounding seems to have very little to do with height. Certainly there are many elite rebounders who seem undersized at the big man positions, whilst the very tallest players have frequently been poor-adequate rebounders.

[Asukal]

You guys are taking it far out of the topic, this is strictly about Wilt in comparison to Russell, I merely gave an example. My initial post was against gaylauber's claim that Wilt's performance against Russell in their h2h matchup's GREATLY diminishes Russell's accomplishments.

Also, don't compare slow unathletic bigs vs athletic forwards. Take note it says "GOOD big man vs GOOD smaller man". In the case of rebounding, a good rebounder has to be athletic, do you really believe that Rodman as great as he is could outrebound Wilt?

[Shaquille O'Neal]

First of all, the "pace" has been way over-blown. At it's highest, in the 61-62 season, the NBA averaged 118.8 ppg (on .426 shooting.)

Could Wilt himself have single-handedly raised the PPG that season since he averaged 50 himself? I wonder if you just completely subtract his scoring output what the 61-62 average PPG would be.

[LosBulls]

Well said.

Wilt > 99.9% of the league today.

Which one of today's "modern" professional athletes could compete as a high jumper in the olympics?

They can compete as high jumpers in the 60s.

[TheMarkMadsen]

Honestly if you never saw wilt play, you shouldn't be commenting about his career. OP is obviously knows A LOT this topic than anyone here, I don't have an opinion on wilt (outside of his stats I can access) and if you've never seen him play how can you have an opinion?

Everybody wants to hate on wilt and devalue his career, but how many of you have actually seen more than 10 games of his?

[CavaliersFTW]

They can compete as high jumpers in the 60s.

In high school and college, sure some of today's players could if they put their mind too it. Would they be winning D1 and setting school records like Wilt and Russ? No (save for maybe someone like young VC). And they especially wouldn't be World class (ranked 7th) with potential to set new records like Russ (I doubt even VC could be that good). And no center in the league today save for Dwight Howard/Javale McGee/Ryan Hollins are even capable of the elevation + body control to plausibly compete in the face-first no-cushioned high-jump of the 60s.

[CavaliersFTW]

Honestly if you never saw wilt play, you shouldn't be commenting about his career. OP is obviously knows A LOT this topic than anyone here, I don't have an opinion on wilt (outside of his stats I can access) and if you've never seen him play how can you have an opinion?

Everybody wants to hate on wilt and devalue his career, but how many of you have actually seen more than 10 games of his?

I have

[Owl]

You guys are taking it far out of the topic, this is strictly about Wilt in comparison to Russell, I merely gave an example. My initial post was against gaylauber's claim that Wilt's performance against Russell in their h2h matchup's GREATLY diminishes Russell's accomplishments.

Also, don't compare slow unathletic bigs vs athletic forwards. Take note it says "GOOD big man vs GOOD smaller man". In the case of rebounding, a good rebounder has to be athletic, do you really believe that Rodman as great as he is could outrebound Wilt?

Your implication was that Wilt's achievements were invalid because he was tall.

Wow! Wilt was the man, he outrebounded a guy 4 inches smaller than he. Great achievement! Russell is overrated!

The fact is that basketball is a game in which height is a natural advantage. But why would you hold it against someone in evaluating what they have achieved. Basketball fundamentally requires height, athleticism, and body control/coordination, all things we have limited control over. We don't hold these things against players. If we held height against a player than this forum would be full of Bogues vs Webb vs Boykins vs Keith Jennings vs Greg Grant threads and those guys would be GOAT contenders. People might consider Calvin Murphy but dismiss him as too darned big.

But for rebounding height really isn't a great advantage we've shown the rebound rates for some of the biggest men to range between
Okay-ish Ming, Bradley, Mark Eaton (15%)
to the downright terrible for a big man
Bol, Smits.
Amongst the very tall, who, if height really were a very significant factor in rebounding would be expected to be very good indeed, only Gheorge Muresan seems particularly good at it (17%) and even that is hardly exceptional.
Meanwhile lets look at elite rebounders.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/...der_by=trb_pct
Here's the 7 footers amongst that group
http://www.basketball-reference.com/...der_by=trb_pct
and here's those that aren't
http://www.basketball-reference.com/...der_by=trb_pct
As I noted by highlighting Blair, Faried, Fortson, Evans (and earlier raised with regard to Barkley and Rodman) height, beyond a basic minimum requirement, isn't significantly affected by height (unlike say blocks or to a lesser degree fg%).

In any case Russell's standing reach was very high indeed, which I would care more about than the height of the top of his head. This fact is not only in books covering Russell but has been documented on this very site.

Now I would agree that JLaubers phrasing of the post was provocative (that Russell being outrebounded was "damaging"). And if you read the early pages of the thread I (amongst others, ShaqAttack was another) argued against casually dismissing Elgin Baylor's 38 point season because of missing games due to military service, or pretending that pace isn't a real thing, even though Wilt's 50 season coincided an unprecedented 5 players breaking the 30 point barrier (plus Baylor), and Wilt, Walt Bellamy, Bob Pettit, Richie Guerin all had career highs in ppg average by a substantial margin.

So if you want to argue real things there are topics to be tackled. But dismissing a rebounder because they're tall makes no sense, and calling people names won't win people over to your argument.

[Asukal]

The fact is that basketball is a game in which height is a natural advantage. But why would you hold it against someone in evaluating what they have achieved. Basketball fundamentally requires height, athleticism, and body control/coordination, all things we have limited control over. We don't hold these things against players. If we held height against a player than this forum would be full of Bogues vs Webb vs Boykins vs Keith Jennings vs Greg Grant threads and those guys would be GOAT contenders. People might consider Calvin Murphy but dismiss him as too darned big.

But for rebounding height really isn't a great advantage we've shown the rebound rates for some of the biggest men to range between
Okay-ish Ming, Bradley, Mark Eaton (15%)
to the downright terrible for a big man
Bol, Smits.
Amongst the very tall, who, if height really were a very significant factor in rebounding would be expected to be very good indeed, only Gheorge Muresan seems particularly good at it (17%) and even that is hardly exceptional.
Meanwhile lets look at elite rebounders.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/...der_by=trb_pct
Here's the 7 footers amongst that group
http://www.basketball-reference.com/...der_by=trb_pct
and here's those that aren't
http://www.basketball-reference.com/...der_by=trb_pct
As I noted by highlighting Blair, Faried, Fortson, Evans (and earlier raised with regard to Barkley and Rodman) height, beyond a basic minimum requirement, isn't significantly affected by height (unlike say blocks or to a lesser degree fg%).

In any case Russell's standing reach was very high indeed, which I would care more about than the height of the top of his head. This fact is not only in books covering Russell but has been documented on this very site.

Now I would agree that JLaubers phrasing of the post was provocative (that Russell being outrebounded was "damaging"). And if you read the early pages of the thread I (amongst others, ShaqAttack was another) argued against casually dismissing Elgin Baylor's 38 point season because of missing games due to military service, or pretending that pace isn't a real thing, even though Wilt's 50 season coincided an unprecedented 5 players breaking the 30 point barrier (plus Baylor), and Wilt, Walt Bellamy, Bob Pettit, Richie Guerin all had career highs in ppg average by a substantial margin.

So if you want to argue real things there are topics to be tackled. But dismissing a rebounder because they're tall makes no sense, and calling people names won't win people over to your argument.

Again you totally missed the whole point..... That sarcastic post was never intended to dismiss Wilt's accomplishments and abilities. If you know any better, I just love to troll gaylauber's ass for being such a biased stan. Its disgusting how he will either diminish or prop up Russell's accomplishments to make Wilt look good in an argument.

And yeah sure I agree, height is not everything in rebounding. Other factors affect rebounds like positioning, pace, matchups, ATHLETICISM (this one is actually more important for rebounding but in Russell vs Wilt, imo height is the difference maker), etc.

[CavaliersFTW]

Again you totally missed the whole point..... That sarcastic post was never intended to dismiss Wilt's accomplishments and abilities. If you know any better, I just love to troll gaylauber's ass for being such a biased stan. Its disgusting how he will either diminish or prop up Russell's accomplishments to make Wilt look good in an argument.

And yeah sure I agree, height is not everything in rebounding. Other factors affect rebounds like positioning, pace, matchups, ATHLETICISM (this one is actually more important for rebounding but in Russell vs Wilt, imo height is the difference maker), etc.

I see where your coming from now, my bad

[jlauber]

Again you totally missed the whole point..... That sarcastic post was never intended to dismiss Wilt's accomplishments and abilities. If you know any better, I just love to troll gaylauber's ass for being such a biased stan. Its disgusting how he will either diminish or prop up Russell's accomplishments to make Wilt look good in an argument.

And yeah sure I agree, height is not everything in rebounding. Other factors affect rebounds like positioning, pace, matchups, ATHLETICISM (this one is actually more important for rebounding but in Russell vs Wilt, imo height is the difference maker), etc.

First of all, I have never read a post of your's in which you credit Wilt with anything.

Secondly, your so-called attempt at "trolling" me obviously fooled SEVERAL other posters here, as well.

In any case, does this now mean that virtually any of your responses to my posts can now be blown off as "trolling", ...since most all of them have no research or facts to back them up anyway?

[LBJMVP]

Had Wilt not played in the 14 seasons of the Wilt-era, the high ppg season would have been Barry's 35.6 ppg.

The high FG% season in that period would have been Johnny Green's .587.

There would have been a total of FIVE 60+ point games (four by Baylor and one by West.) Wilt had 32.

Aside from Wilt, there were 18 30-30 games IN the Chamberlain-era. Wilt had 103.

There were four 40-30 games in the Chamberlain era...other than Wilt's 55.

There were no other 40-40 games in the Wilt era, but Wilt had EIGHT.

Obviously, there were no other 50-40 games, but Chamberlain had FOUR himself.

I added quite a few other facts as well, but you get the gist.

Why ONLY Wilt?

some great points right there.

[jlauber]

Now I would agree that JLaubers phrasing of the post was provocative (that Russell being outrebounded was "damaging"). And if you read the early pages of the thread I (amongst others, ShaqAttack was another) argued against casually dismissing Elgin Baylor's 38 point season because of missing games due to military service, or pretending that pace isn't a real thing, even though Wilt's 50 season coincided an unprecedented 5 players breaking the 30 point barrier (plus Baylor), and Wilt, Walt Bellamy, Bob Pettit, Richie Guerin all had career highs in ppg average by a substantial margin.

I agree that "damaging" was the wrong term. Russell's post-season rebounding still stands. My points, though, were, that IN their 10 H2H seasons in the league together, Wilt was actually outrebounding Russell's marks by a considerable margin. Once again, when Russell retired in 1969, with his 24.9 rpg mark, he was well behind Wilt's 26.3 rpg, which came in Wilt's first ten seasons.

Secondly, ...and this is really the "clincher" in terms of who was the better rebounder,... was that Chamberlain outrebounded Russell in all eight of their post-season H2H series. And some by huge margins, too. Margins of 30.2 rpg to 26. 2 rpg; 31.4 rpg to 25.3 rpg; and an incredible 32.0 rpg to 23.4 rpg series.

As for the 61-62 season...yes, I have already acknowledged that it was SLIGHTLY higher than even today's pace. Wilt's '62 season was at 118.8 ppg on .426 shooting. Once again, MJ's '87 NBA averaged 109.9 ppg on .480 shooting. This past NBA season, in a "compressed schedule" season (and not even as compressed as Chamberlain's '62 BTW)...was at 96.3 ppg on .448 shooting. Go back to 2011, and in a more normal schedule, and the marks were 99.6 ppg on .459.

I have shown the "advanced" math before...reducing Wilt's '62 seasonal FGAs and FTAs down to MJ's '87 levels. Without adjusting for FG%, Wilt would have averaged 41.5 ppg in '87. BUT, if you are reducing Wilt's FGAs and FTAs down to MJ's levels, you HAVE to ELEVATE his FG% to MJ's levels, as well. Why? Because if you don't, those teams that averaged 118.8 ppg in '62, would be down to around 90 ppg in '87....in a league that averaged 110 ppg. AND, if you adjust Wilt's .506 FG% in '62, up to MJ's levels, he would have shot about .575, which would have resulted in TWO more FGM in '87. After adjusting Wilt's '62 numbers to MJ's '87 levels, Wilt would have averaged 45.5 ppg in '87.

Of course, you can do the SIMPLE math, as well. MJ's '87 season of 109.9 ppg was at 92.5% of Wilt's '62 season of 118.8 ppg. Reduce Wilt's '62 season average of 50.4 ppg down to 92.5%, and Wilt would have averaged 46.6 ppg in '87.

BTW, take a look at the shooting percentages of the CENTERS in the 80's. They were thru the roof. Kareem had, BY FAR, his highest seasons, even as late as 37 years old he was shooting .599 (and he could barely get off the floor.) And Gilmore, in his prime years in the 70's, had a high season of .575. How about the 80's? Artis had SEVEN seasons of over .600, with high's of .670 and .652. Hell, at age 35 he was scoring 19.1 ppg on .623 shooting! Meanwhile, how about IN the Chamberlain era? Take Wilt out of the equation...and the next best season, in those 14 years, was Johnny Green's .587. And keep in mind that Kareem played FOUR years in the Chamberlain era and never sniffed a .600 season.

BTW, how brutal were the shooting percentages in the early 60's? Johnny Green shot .436 in Wilt's 61-62 season (Chamberlain's 50.4 ppg year on .506 shooting.) Jerry West shot .445 (and the year before, in 60-61, he shot .419.) Darrell Imhoff, who shot .540 in the 69-70 season, shot .386. I could go on, but CLEARLY there were SEVERAL factors which contributed to the relatively poor shooting of that period. And yet Chamberlain was scoring 50.4 ppg on .506 shooting in 61-62, and 44.8 ppg on .528 shooting in 62-63 (as well as 33.5 ppg on .540 shooting in 65-66...in a league that shot .433.)

Think about that. For those that disparage Wilt's scoring because of his high number of FGAs in the early 60's...how about this? In Hakeem's highest scoring season, he averaged 27.8 ppg on .517 shooting, and in a league that shot .466. (And BTW, his HIGH season of .538, came in his rookie season...and in the 80's, in a league that shot .491.) And how about David Robinson? In his highest scoring season, he averaged 29.2 ppg on .507 shooting...in a league that shot .466.

So, CLEARLY, a Wilt in the 80's would have shot a MUCH HIGHER FG% than he did in HIS era.



Even in the CURRENT season, Chamberlain's '62 numbers are impressive. This past season was at 81.1 % of Wilt's '62 season. Which means that Wilt's numbers translate to 40.9 ppg!


As for the five players who averaged over 30 ppg in '62. Aside from Chamberlain's 50.4 ppg, the NEXT highest FULL-TIME average was Bellamy's 31.6 ppg. Pettit was at 31.1 ppg. West and Oscar were at 30.8 ppg (which, incidently, were NOT their best seasons.)

Here again, throw out Wilt's 50.4 ppg, and those numbers are not overly sensational. Bellamy's 31.6 ppg ranks 27th all-time, and there were 24 other seasons SINCE, in which that mark was bettered.

And how about this? In the '05-06 season, Kobe averaged 35.4 ppg in a league that averaged 97.0 ppg. Iverson averaged 33.1 ppg that season, and James was at 31.4 ppg. And Arenas was at 29.3 ppg.


Baylor's 38.3 ppg. No WAY should that season count. It was in 48 games in an 80 game season. And using the ridiculous 1400 point barrier...well, as Pointguard pointed out, Chamberlain had 28 games, covering two separate 14 game streaks, that would have shattered that mark. Can you imagine the uproar by virtually EVERYONE today, if Wilt had been injured in game 28, and missing the rest of the season...and that 54 ppg mark being considered the record...and coming in ONE-THIRD of the games played that season?

Baylor never came close to that mark again, nor did he have to deal with fatigue and injuries that the full-timers had to endure. And, in fact, given Baylor's propensity to injuries, it would have been doubtful that he could have played a full season, anyway.

And one more time, if we take the three separate streaks that Chamberlain had in '62, of 14, 14, and 5 games, in which he averaged 53 ppg, 54 ppg, and an astonishing 70.1 ppg...or 33 games, Chamberlain was at 56 ppg. Then, add the first 20 games of the next season, when Wilt was averaging 53 ppg...and you have 53 games in which Chamberlain was at around 55 ppg...and in only FOUR separate streaks.

And, here again...had Wilt not ever stepped on the court, and Baylor's 38.3 ppg in 48 games would the highest ever. BUT, do you honestly believe that anyone would consider that the record over Barry's 35.6 ppg in '67, and then MJ's 37.1 ppg in '87?


One more time...in this so-called era of "high pace", why was it ONLY Chamberlain who was putting up 37, 38, 38, 45, and 50 ppg seasons? Why were there only five 60+ point games in the Chamberlain era...by someone other than Wilt, and yet, Chamberlain had 32 himself?

Why ONLY Wilt?