Beckett Basketball Ranks the 50 Greatest Players
How did "50" Become a Magic Number?Beckett--a company best known for producing sports card price guides--has become the latest organization to make a list of the 50 greatest basketball players of all time, issuing a Summer 2010 magazine titled "Beckett Presents Basketball Greats."
Since 1996, when the NBA officially selected
The 50 Greatest Players in NBA History, "50" has been the magic number when someone decides to rank basketball's greatest players. The 1996 list included 50 players simply because the league was then celebrating its 50th anniversary; there is no logical reason that such a list must be that size and the NBA's first two official All-Time Teams were actually much more exclusive: the Silver Anniversary Team, selected in 1971, consisted of just 10 players, while a decade later the 35th Anniversary Team honored 11 players while also naming Red Auerbach as the league's greatest coach and the 1967 76ers as the greatest team ever.
The NBA's 1996 list received criticism for several reasons:
1) Some people felt that players from the 1950s and 1960s--particularly members of the Boston Celtics--were overrepresented.
2) Others argued that Shaquille O'Neal had not been active long enough to justify being ranked as an all-time great.
3) There were some particularly glaring omissions, most notably
Bob McAdoo, the only NBA regular season MVP winner not chosen.
It is very difficult to fairly compare players who played several decades apart, so the best way to assess the players from the league's early days is to look at how they ranked among their contemporaries: players who won MVPs, dominated their position and/or consistently made the All-NBA/All-Star teams certainly deserved consideration for the 50 Greatest Players List; younger fans may not be fully aware of the accomplishments and talents of "old school" players but that would not justify leaving worthy players off of the list.
O'Neal had only played four seasons by 1996 but he was already a four-time All-Star, a three-time All-NBA selection and a one-time scoring champion who had led the Orlando Magic to the 1995 NBA Finals; a good case could clearly be made that he was already a Top 50 player and it seemed pretty obvious that he would rank significantly higher than that by the time his career had finished.
While I hesitate to single out a player to be removed from the 1996 list, it is obvious that McAdoo should have been included. The real problem is that even back in 1996 "50" was an arbitrary number chosen more for marketing reasons than anything else; based on what one could infer about the selection criteria, at that time there were probably about 10 other players who were just as qualified as whoever you might consider to be the "last" 10 players on the official list (the NBA did not rank the 50 players).
Now that another decade and a half has passed, it makes even less sense to try to shoehorn just 50 players on a list that should either be cut down to 10-20 truly elite players or else expanded to about 75 very great players. In 2003, Slam Magazine actually did a Top 75 list that was pretty solid; you could quibble a little about the order in which they ranked those 75 but Slam did a good job of honoring players who many people thought should have been on the 1996 list--including McAdoo and Dominique Wilkins--while also making room for a new generation of stars such as Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan and Kevin Garnett. Unfortunately, Slam took a step backward in 2009, as I explained in
Slam Top 50 is a Typically Sloppy Production; Slam restricted the list to 50 players and many of the accompanying thumbnail articles were poorly written.
Slam's 2009 list replaced 12 players from the NBA's 1996 list--Nate Archibald, Paul Arizin, Dave Bing, Dave DeBusschere, Hal Greer, Sam Jones, Pete Maravich, Robert Parish, Bill Sharman, Bill Walton, Lenny Wilkens and James Worthy--with these dozen players: Walt Bellamy, Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett, Allen Iverson, LeBron James, Jason Kidd, Bob McAdoo, Steve Nash, Gary Payton, Dennis Rodman and Dominique Wilkins.
Similarly, Beckett's 2010 list replaced 11 players from the NBA's 1996 list--Archibald, Arizin, Bing, Dave Cowens, DeBusschere, Greer, Jones, Sharman, Nate Thurmond, Walton and Wilkens--with these 11 players: Bryant, Duncan, Garnett, Iverson, James, Kidd, Reggie Miller, Nash, Dirk Nowitzki, Payton and Wilkins.
The Slam and Beckett lists are very similar: they agreed about the removal of nine of the 1996 players and they also agreed about nine players who should be added. Not surprisingly, all of the nine players who were removed by both Slam and Beckett had their best seasons prior to 1980 and most of them had their best seasons prior to 1970; I seriously doubt that the writers at Slam or Beckett could string together three intelligent sentences about any of those players without doing serious research, so it is very important to provide some idea about why those players were honored in 1996 and why every one of them is a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame (Wilkens, Sharman and John Wooden are the only three people to be inducted in the Hall of Fame as both players and coaches):
* Archibald, a 6-1 guard, made the All-Star team six times, earned All-NBA Team honors five times and is still the only player in NBA history to win the scoring and assist titles in the same season, averaging 34.0 ppg and 11.4 apg in 1972-73. Despite his diminutive stature, Archibald fearlessly drove into the lane, leading the league in free throws made three times. He ranked in the top 10 in assists eight times and was the starting point guard for Boston's 1981 championship team. An Achilles tendon injury during his prime cost him a season and a half of his career and robbed him of some of his trademark quickness but he persevered to earn three of his All-Star appearances--and his championship ring--after that setback.
* Arizin, a 6-4 forward, made the All-Star team in each of his 10 seasons, earned All-NBA Team honors four times, won two scoring titles and was the leading scorer in the 1956 playoffs (28.9 ppg) when the Philadelphia Warriors won the NBA championship; he ranked in the top ten in field goal percentage five times, leading the NBA in that category the first time that he won the scoring title and placing seventh in that department the second time that he led the league in scoring. Military service during the Korean War cost him two seasons early in his career but he did not miss a beat upon returning to the league. Arizin was one of the first deadly jump shooters and he was also a good rebounder and well regarded defensive player.
* Bing, a 6-3 guard, made the All-Star team seven times, earned All-NBA Team honors three times, won the 1968 scoring title and ranked in the top ten in assists eight times. Bing suffered a serious injury to his left eye as a child and then overcame a serious injury to his right eye during the prime of his NBA career. I wrote an
article about Bing that appeared in the January 2007 issue of
Basketball Times.
* DeBusschere, a 6-6 forward, made the All-Star team eight times, earned All-NBA Team honors once and made the All-Defensive First Team six times. He averaged at least 10 rpg for 10 straight seasons and he started for two New York championship teams (1970, 1973). In 2006, I did a
piece about his classic battles with fellow Hall of Famer Gus Johnson.* Greer, a 6-2 guard, made the All-Star team 10 times, earned All-NBA Team honors seven times and was the fifth leading scorer in NBA history (21,586 points) when he retired in 1973. He was the second leading scorer--and leading playoff scorer--for the 1967 Philadelphia team that set a record (since broken) for most regular season wins; those Sixers ended Boston's record eight year streak of winning championships and were selected in 1981 as the greatest team in league history. In January 2006, Hoop magazine editor Ming Wong experienced a rare moment of lucidity and actually published a well written and well researched long form article: my
profile of Greer (Under Wong's direction, Hoop now prefers to publish
short articles that are poorly written and
sloppily researched; Wong's Hoop also
"borrows" other people's work without proper attribution).
* Jones, a 6-4 guard, made the All-Star team five times and earned All-NBA Team honors three times. He played on 10 NBA championship teams--more than any player other than Bill Russell--and he helped the Celtics to go 9-0 in seventh games by averaging 27.1 ppg in those contests, including a 47 point outburst versus Oscar Robertson's Cincinnati Royals. When Jones retired he was the third leading playoff scorer in NBA history behind only Jerry West and Elgin Baylor. My
profile of Jones appeared in the December 2004 issue of
Basketball Digest.
* Sharman, a 6-1 guard, made the All-Star team eight times and earned All-NBA Team honors seven times. He led the NBA in free throw shooting seven times, a record that has stood for nearly 50 years, and he still ranks 11th on the career free throw percentage list (.883), just a few tenths of a point behind two of the most renowned marksmen in basketball history, Larry Bird and Reggie Miller. During his 11 year career Sharman ranked in the top ten in scoring seven times and he ranked in the top ten in field goal percentage six times. Sharman played on four championship teams.
* Walton, a 6-11 center, made the All-Star team twice, earned All-NBA Team honors twice, made the All-Defensive Team twice and won one regular season MVP, one Finals MVP and one Sixth Man of the Year award during his injury-riddled career. He played on one championship team as a dominant force early in his career and then earned a second championship ring late in his career as a very productive sixth man.
* Wilkens, a 6-1 guard, made the All-Star team nine times. A potent scorer who averaged at least 18 ppg in six different seasons, Wilkens led the NBA in assists in 1969-70 and he ranked in the top 10 in that category 12 times, tied with Mark Jackson for fifth most in NBA history behind John Stockton, Jason Kidd, Bob Cousy and Oscar Robertson.
Slam and Beckett concur that the above nine players no longer rank among the NBA's top 50 players of all time--but it is far from obvious that this is true. I have already made it clear that the "50" number is poorly chosen but if we are going to stick with that figure then it is inevitable that some players who deservedly made the cut in the past would have to be dropped after some even greater players emerged: I think that there would be a general consensus among informed observers that Bryant and Duncan not only are Top 50 players but that they are at least Top 20 players. If O'Neal deserved the Top 50 honor in 1996--and he certainly did--then James is likewise an easy choice now. Kidd's prowess as a playmaker, defender and leader make him a worthy Top 50 selection.
I had always believed that all regular season MVPs should make the Top 50 cut (at least until some point far in the future when the league has honored more than 50 MVPs), which would mean that Iverson (2001), Garnett (2004), Nash (2005, 2006) and Nowitzki (2007) should be included (obviously, O'Neal, Duncan, Bryant and James are also post-1996 MVP winners)--but after Nash first was given the 2005 MVP over Shaquille O'Neal and then received the 2006 MVP despite Kobe Bryant's historic performance that season I started to reconsider: Nash is a legitimate Top 50 candidate but he is hardly a Top 50 lock. Leaving out Nash's MVPs for a moment and just looking at his skill set, is it really clear that he is greater than Archibald, Bing, Greer, Jones, Sharman and Wilkens? Comparisons of raw numbers across decades during which rules and playing conditions drastically changed are very difficult but the "old school" guards listed above were each very dominant in their respective eras: Archibald was at one time the league's best scorer and passer, Bing was at or near the top in both scoring and assists for many years, Greer's career scoring was only eclipsed during his era by titans named Chamberlain, West, Baylor and Robertson, Jones has to be considered one of the great clutch players of all-time, Sharman was one of the most efficient scoring guards of the 1950s and Wilkens--like Archibald and Bing--was a great scorer/passer in an era when assists were not handed out as liberally as they are now. I am still
not convinced that Nash is significantly better than Mark Price, let alone that Nash is better than the guards listed above. Nash is a great player but he is thriving in an era during which the rules favor perimeter players and during which the media award voters give more credit to passers than they do to finishers (the opposite was the case when Karl Malone and John Stockton teamed up during the same time period when Price played).
I am sure that to some people--particularly the "stat gurus"--including Iverson on any Top 50 list is much more questionable than including Nash but Iverson was amazingly productive and durable, winning four scoring titles, ranking in the top ten in scoring 11 times (tied with Dolph Schayes and Michael Jordan for third all-time; only Karl Malone and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar did so more frequently) and ranking in the top ten in minutes played 11 times (tied for third all-time with Bill Russell and Elvin Hayes; only Wilt Chamberlain did so more frequently). Yes, Iverson was not always the most efficient player but he still somehow managed to carry the 76ers to the 2001 NBA Finals and in 2008 he led the league in mpg, ranked third in scoring and finished ninth in assists to help the Nuggets post their best win total since 1988.
I do not have a huge problem with either Iverson or Nash being on a "new" Top 50 list but I do object to the way that it seems like the accomplishments and skill sets of some of the "old school" players are just blithely cast aside. Both Slam and Beckett should have explained the rationales justifying the players that they dropped and the players that they added.
It is very difficult to make a good case that Reggie Miller should have supplanted any of the "old school" guards that Beckett evicted. During an 18 year career, Miller made the All-Star team five times, earned three All-NBA Third Team selections (never once making the Second or First Team) and only received MVP votes in two seasons, finishing 13th in 2000 and 16th in 1998; Miller was never close to being the best player at his position during his career and he was a very one dimensional player, contributing little other than his shooting prowess. Miller deserves credit for being a clutch player who hit many big shots and who increased his productivity during the playoffs but he was not better/more productive/more dominant during his time than the "old school" guards mentioned above. Miller is probably a Top 75 player but he is definitely not a Top 50 player.
Beckett and Slam disagree most vociferously about Pete Maravich: Slam left him off of their list entirely, while Beckett ranked him as the 11th greatest NBA player of all-time! Even though I like Pete Maravich so much that I
wrote a poem as a tribute to him shortly after his premature death I cannot agree with putting Maravich just ahead of Hakeem Olajuwon, Julius Erving and Elgin Baylor and several spots in front of--among others--Tim Duncan and Bob Pettit. Maravich has to be placed on the short list of the greatest collegiate players of all-time but as an NBA player he falls short of what I would consider
Pantheon level. Maravich is a solid Top 50 choice--so Slam messed up in that regard--but it is ridiculous for Beckett to assert that Maravich is among the dozen best players in NBA history.
As for the forwards and centers, Slam and Beckett are correct to add McAdoo to the list. Nowitzki will probably always receive criticism for what happened to the Mavericks in the 2006 and 2007 playoffs but he has been an extremely productive and consistent player and he has actually performed even better in the postseason than he has in the regular season. Garnett has had some questionable performances in clutch situations but his consistency as a rebounder/defender is undeniable.
The bottom line is that there have been so many great NBA players that any Top 50 list assembled from this point forward will inherently be problematical; while there may be a certain degree of consensus about the Top 10-20, there is a logjam of equally worthy (or nearly equally worthy) players from about 20-75: picking Michael Jordan over Nate Archibald or Steve Nash is pretty easy but choosing among Archibald, Nash, Iverson, Greer and many other guys who played guard in different eras under vastly different conditions is extremely difficult, as is juggling the merits of frontcourt players whose career trajectories and playing styles are as disparate as Paul Arizin, Dave Cowens, Dave DeBusschere and Bill Walton, who is the NBA's Gale Sayers--a brilliant player whose career numbers were truncated by injuries. Since Beckett's list is apparently intended as an update to the 1996 list, it would have been great if Beckett had included some thumbnail sketches (like the ones I provided above) to remind readers about the greatness of the "old school" players.
Beckett Canonizes JordanLike Slam's 2009 list/accompanying articles, the "Beckett Presents Basketball Greats" magazine features writing that is average at best--no style, no flair, no passion and no real insight into what made these players great. The magazine is also poorly edited, containing numerous typographical, spelling and factual errors: to cite just two examples, on page 20 there is a reference to Jerry West's famous game-tying shot in the 1970 Finals taking place when "the three point shot was still decades away"--but in fact the ABA had already been using the three point shot for several years and the NBA first used the three pointer in the 1979-80 season, less than a decade after West's heave versus the Knicks; on page 78, it is asserted that Julius Erving's 76ers only defeated Larry Bird's Celtics one out of four times during their playoff matchups--but the Sixers actually prevailed in both 1980 and 1982.
While the pedestrian writing is disappointing and the errors and general sloppiness are distracting, what immediately catches one's eye is that Beckett acts as if it is a foregone conclusion that Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player ever: the cover boldly asks "Will anyone ever surpass Jordan?", one article headline declares "Michael Jordan is, without question, the greatest basketball player of all time" and another article headline says "It's easy to select Michael Jordan as the greatest player of all time."
Longtime NBA writer Bob Ryan has repeatedly made the excellent point that any serious discussion about ranking the greatest players has to separate the big men from the perimeter players: how can one really compare Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Michael Jordan, Oscar Robertson and Magic Johnson? The first group of players impacted the game in a different way than the second group of players: big men patrol the paint and provide a forceful physical presence, while the great perimeter players operate from more areas of the court but are usually less overpowering.
I have never published my own Top 50 list but my five part
Pantheon series discussed 10 retired players who each could arguably be called the greatest player of all-time plus four active players who seem to be well on course to join that Pantheon. Although I did not rank the players within my Pantheon, I looked at their careers from two perspectives: durability and peak value, terms that I define in the following manner: "Durability means sustaining a long career (at least 10 years) at or near the top of the game and peak value refers to the top level that the player reached, even if he stayed there only briefly in the midst of a longer career during which he performed at a lower but still exceptional level." By either of those standards, an excellent case can be made that Jordan is the greatest player ever--but an excellent case can also be made on behalf of each of the other players in my Pantheon. Jordan was the most productive and most accomplished player of the 1990s but there is no objective way to compare his individual scoring/defensive prowess in that era to, say, Russell's individual rebounding/defensive abilities during the 1960s.
Jordan may very well be the greatest player of all-time but I am just not sure how one really proves (or disproves) this; repeatedly trumpeting him as "without question" the greatest player of all-time is nothing but a gimmick to sell more magazines.
Beckett Selects the NBA's Greatest in Various Categories"Beckett Presents Basketball Greats" includes an article purporting to rank the NBA's greatest in seven different categories, selecting one player as "the best" in each category and then listing four others (not in any particular order) as "the rest."
Miller is anointed as the greatest shooter, followed by Ray Allen, Drazen Petrovic, Glen Rice and Steve Nash. If "greatest shooter" is defined purely by the ability to hit uncontested shots then Ted St. Martin (who holds the world record with 5221 consecutive free throws made) has to receive consideration; obviously, in terms of pro basketball the "greatest shooter" should be determined not just by shooting percentages but also by the ability to create one's own shot (either off of the dribble or by deftly using screens) and the ability to hit shots against a certain amount of defensive pressure. Steve Kerr, Hubert Davis and Jason Kapono rank 1-2-3 in career three point shooting percentage; they may be better "pure shooters" than Miller, Allen, Petrovic, Rice and Nash but they are not greater shooters in terms of having the complete package of accuracy, shot creation and ability to hit shots against defensive pressure.
Miller is the all-time leader in three pointers made, though Allen will probably catch him next season. Miller ranks 40th in career three point field goal percentage (.395), but many of the players ahead of him on that list were role playing catch and shoot specialists, not All-Star scorers. Miller ranks 26th all-time in effective field goal percentage (.544), a statistic that adjusts field goal percentage to take into account the extra value of a three point shot; most of the players ahead of Miller on the EFG% list are big men who mainly attempted dunks and layups, with a few exceptions (most notably, Steve Nash and John Stockton). Miller ranks ninth all-time in career free throw percentage, though the difference between ninth (.888) and third (Peja Stojakovic, .895) is minuscule.
Beckett's list is not bad, though
Mark Price deserved serious consideration: Price not only could create his own shot both off of the dribble and by coming off of screens but he is the all-time free throw percentage leader (.904) and he ranks 20th in career three point field goal percentage (.402). Larry Bird's shooting percentages are not quite on par with the players mentioned above but he had the complete package: size, touch, the skill to create his own shot and the ability to hit clutch shots with defenders draped all over him.
Bill Russell is Beckett's choice as the greatest defender of all-time, with Dikembe Mutombo, Michael Cooper, Sidney Moncrief and Michael Jordan receiving honorable mentions. Russell's defensive impact is unquestioned and unparalleled and was the major reason that the Boston Celtics transformed from being a good team into being the greatest dynasty in the league's history. The other four players are each great defenders in their own right but, keeping in mind Bob Ryan's comment about separating big men and perimeter players when making comparisons, how can one lump Mutombo and Cooper into the same category? They played completely differently. For that matter, was Cooper really a better defender than Wilt Chamberlain or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar? Furthermore, whatever criteria were used it was a grave omission to not mention Scottie Pippen; Pippen could play lock down one on one defense versus point guards, shooting guards and small forwards plus he also was probably the best help defender in league history: when he did not have a lock down assignment he could guard "one and a half men" better than anyone. Kobe Bryant carries a much greater scoring load than Pippen, Moncrief and Cooper did but his defensive skill set is on par with theirs. I suspect that if we had defensive statistics for Jerry West's entire career his steals and blocked shots numbers would be astounding. Beckett really should have had at least two separate defensive categories, honoring Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain, Hakeem Olajuwon, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Dikembe Mutombo among big men and recognizing Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Sidney Moncrief, Michael Cooper and Kobe Bryant as the best wing defenders (Jerry West and/or Bruce Bowen also could be included). A possible third defensive category would honor players like Dave DeBusschere, Bobby Jones and Dennis Rodman who were neither perimeter players nor were they intimidating shot blocking big men (though the lanky Jones did block a lot of shots).
Beckett selected Magic Johnson as the greatest passer, ahead of John Stockton, Bob Cousy, Jason Kidd and Oscar Robertson. I cannot argue with those choices.
Wilt Chamberlain is Beckett's choice as the greatest rebounder, followed by Bill Russell, Elvin Hayes, Moses Malone and Dennis Rodman. Again, I cannot argue about that list, though Jerry Lucas would also have been a worthy choice.
Leadership is obviously a very subjective trait. Beckett taps Magic Johnson as the NBA's greatest leader, while also mentioning Bill Russell, Larry Bird, Oscar Robertson and Tim Duncan. It is not clear what criteria Beckett used; these five players are great leaders but I am not sure how to determine who was the best leader. My subjective choice would be Russell first and Johnson second. Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant are also great leaders because they set standards of individual and collective excellence on their respective teams; they worked hard on their own skills/conditioning and they forced everyone around them to also work hard and to accept a standard that anything less than winning a championship is not acceptable.
Beckett honored Jerry West as the best clutch shooter, ahead of Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Kobe Bryant and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. That is a very good list; some people probably forget--or may not even know--how many clutch shots Abdul-Jabbar made during his career. Younger fans may feel like Reggie Miller should be on this list but if you are only going with five players I cannot see bumping one of those guys in favor of Miller.
Beckett chose Michael Jordan as the best winner, followed by Bill Russell, George Mikan, Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. I do not understand this one, much like I do not understand Beckett's insistence that Jordan is "without question" the greatest player ever. Russell won 11 championships in 13 seasons. Jordan won six championships in 15 seasons. What am I missing here? I would be the last person to say that players should be evaluated solely by numbers but what context justifies elevating Jordan above Russell as a winner when Russell won nearly twice as many championships? There is actually more justification for saying that Jordan was a better individual player than Russell: that case rests on the fact that Jordan did not have any skill set weaknesses, while Russell was a poor free throw shooter and not a big time scorer (the counterargument would be that Russell's dominance as a defender and rebounder nullified his weaknesses and enabled him to have even more impact than Jordan did with his scoring/all-around excellence). Jordan simply cannot be ranked as a better NBA winner than Russell.
PostscriptThe NBA, Slam and Beckett lists all fail to explicitly mention the ABA but each list includes several players who played in both leagues (including Julius Erving, Rick Barry and Moses Malone); however, the
ABA's Unsung Heroes--including some great players who spent most or all of their careers in the ABA, like
Roger Brown and Mel Daniels--were passed over in favor of contemporary NBA players whose resumes were, at best, no better than those of their ABA counterparts. I have complained about this kind of injustice many times--including this
2007 piece that I wrote for NBCSports.com when that site (briefly) provided serious coverage of pro basketball--so even though the ABA is not a focal point of this particular article I do not want anyone to think that I have given up the good fight to obtain proper recognition for the ABA collectively and for that league's great players individually.
Labels: Beckett Basketball, Bill Russell, Earvin Johnson, Elgin Baylor, Jerry West, Julius Erving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Oscar Robertson, Slam, Wilt Chamberlain
posted by David Friedman @ 4:11 AM
The Pantheon: An Examination of Basketball Greatness, Part IV
Although many people would probably define the 1980s NBA by the Bird-Magic rivalry, it is worth noting that for the first part of the decade Bird's biggest rival was actually another Pantheon member, Julius Erving. Bird and Erving played the same position and their teams annually battled for Eastern Conference supremacy while they competed for MVP honors. Bird and Magic only faced each other twice a year until the Celtics and Lakers met in the 1984 NBA Finals. The next season, Jordan entered the league and as Erving's career drew to a close a new triangle of elite players formed, culminating in 1987 when Magic won the MVP, Jordan finished second and Bird finished third; the next year, Jordan won his first MVP, Bird finished second and Magic finished third.
Chamberlain-Russell, Ali-Frazier and Yankees-Red Sox are great rivalries but few names in sports are more inextricably linked than Bird-Magic. They first battled each other in the 1979 NCAA Championship Game, when Magic Johnson’s Michigan State Spartans defeated Larry Bird’s Indiana State Sycamores, 75-64. Magic scored 24 points on 8-15 field goal shooting, grabbed seven rebounds and had five assists. Bird led Indiana State with 19 points and a game-high 13 rebounds but he shot just 7-21 from the field and only passed for two assists.
Even though Bird and Magic joined the NBA together the next season, Bird is actually almost three years older than Magic; Bird did not play as a freshman at Indiana, sat out one year after transferring to Indiana State and then played three collegiate seasons, while Magic turned pro after his sophomore year. It is surely the NBA’s good fortune that fate conspired to bring them together in such a heralded NCAA Championship Game right before their rookie seasons. Bird won the 1979-80 Rookie of the Year award after playing a major role in helping the Boston Celtics improve from 29-53 to 61-21. Bird averaged 21.3 ppg (16th in the NBA), 10.4 rpg (10th in the NBA) and ranked third in the league in three point field goal percentage (.406) in the first year that the NBA used the home run ball that had been popularized years earlier by the ABA. The L.A. Lakers were already good before Magic arrived (47-35 in 1978-79) but he turned them into bona fide title contenders who went 60-22, the best record in the West. Magic averaged 18.0 ppg, 7.7 rpg, 7.3 apg (sixth in the NBA) and 2.4 spg (fifth in the NBA).
It looked like the 1980 NBA Finals might become a rematch of the previous year’s NCAA Championship Game. Magic and the Lakers did their part, breezing through the Western Conference playoffs, but in the East Julius Erving and the Philadelphia 76ers had other ideas, routing the Celtics in five games in the Eastern Conference finals. Erving made one of the most spectacular shots in NBA history during the Finals, his famous reverse layup in game four that has been replayed countless times and never ceases to amaze, but the Lakers prevailed in six games. Lakers’ center Kareem Abdul-Jabbar won the regular season MVP and averaged 33.4 ppg and 13.6 rpg in the first five games of the Finals, but he sprained his ankle late in game five and was unable to play in game six. That set the stage for the most famous performance of Magic’s career: he jumped center, played every position and had 42 points, 15 rebounds and seven assists as the Lakers routed the 76ers 123-107 in Philadelphia. It has been suggested that the initial Finals MVP vote by the media went to Abdul-Jabbar but with the Lakers’ center convalescing thousands of miles away that CBS strongly urged that the honor instead go to Magic so that the network could present the award on air. Magic averaged 21.5 ppg, 11.2 rpg and 8.7 rpg during the series, ranking second on the team in scoring and rebounding to Abdul-Jabbar while leading the Lakers in assists.
In his first several seasons, Bird was a slightly different player than the one who fans probably most clearly recall from the mid-1980s. Other than his rookie year, he rarely utilized the three point shot from 1981-84 (attempting less than one three pointer per game in each of those four seasons) and he did not shoot it accurately, connecting at less than a .300 rate each of those years. He was a very good scorer but not the elite level (25-plus ppg) one that he became in 1985-88. Bird averaged fewer than six apg in each of his first four seasons and at least six apg in each of the subsequent five seasons. His free throw shooting steadily improved from .836 as a rookie to .888 by 1984, when he led the league in that department for the first of four times. Bird never shot worse than .882 after that season. Perhaps the most consistent part of his game during his first six seasons was rebounding: Bird averaged at least 10.1 rpg in each of those seasons and he averaged at least 11.0 rpg in each of his first five playoff appearances. Bird’s supposed lack of athleticism was extremely overstated; his anticipation and hand eye coordination were unparalleled and, though he lacked broad jumping ability, his vertical leap was more than adequate, as indicated not only by his rebounding prowess but also by the fact that he blocked 755 shots in 897 regular season games, more than renowned high flyers Clyde Drexler (719 blocks in 1086 games) and Dominique Wilkins (642 blocked shots in 1074 games).
Magic’s game also evolved. His free throw percentage steadily improved, peaking at a league-best .911 in 1988-89. He was never considered a great defender but he did lead the NBA in steals in his second and third seasons. From his second to fourth seasons he averaged at least 8.6 rpg and 8.6 apg each year, coming closer to averaging a triple double than anyone had since Oscar Robertson did it in 1961-62; in 1981-82, Magic averaged 18.6 ppg, 9.6 rpg and 9.5 apg. Magic shot at least .522 from the field in each of his first eight seasons. Later in his career, he attempted three pointers with much greater frequency, becoming an adequate if not exceptional shooter from that range; those long distance attempts pulled down his overall field goal percentage. Magic did not average double digit assists in his first three seasons and then averaged at least 10.5 apg for nine straight years, winning four assists titles in a five season span before John Stockton became the perennial leader in that department. Other than an injury-shortened second season, Magic did not average 20 ppg until 1986-87 but then he did it three times in four years while scoring 19.6 ppg in the other season; that was just a matter of gradually picking up the slack as Abdul-Jabbar’s role decreased.
Although in retrospect people focus on the Bird-Magic rivalry when thinking about the NBA during the 1980s, Bird’s biggest rivalry for his first four NBA seasons was with Erving, who played the same position and whose team annually battled the Celtics for Eastern Conference supremacy. The 76ers or the Celtics represented the East in the NBA Finals every year from 1980-1987 and Bird and Erving squared off in the Eastern Conference Finals four times (1980-82, 1985), winning two times each. Bird and Erving also annually battled for the MVP award, with Erving placing second, first, third, fifth and sixth from 1980-84, while Bird finished fourth, second, second, second and first.
After Magic won his first championship at Erving’s expense, Bird and the Celtics responded in 1981 by beating Erving and the 76ers in a thrilling seven game Eastern Conference finals in 1981. However, Magic missed more than half of that season due to a knee injury and the Houston Rockets upset the Lakers in the first round of the playoffs. The Celtics beat the Rockets in six games in the NBA Finals. Bird played well in the decisive game (26 points on 11-20 field goal shooting, 13 rebounds, five assists) but he shot just 39-93 from the field (.419) in the series and only averaged 15.3 ppg, second on the team to Finals MVP Cedric Maxwell (17.7 ppg) and barely ahead of Robert Parish (15.0 ppg), each of whom shot much better than Bird did. As I mentioned, Bird’s strong suit at that time was rebounding and during the series he nearly matched Houston center Moses Malone, that season’s rebounding leader; Malone averaged 16.3 rpg in the Finals, while Bird averaged 15.3 rpg.
The 1982 season was essentially a replay of 1980 in terms of the Erving-Bird-Magic triangle: Erving’s Sixers beat Bird’s Celtics in the Eastern Conference finals only to lose to Magic’s Lakers in six games in the NBA Finals. Magic had 13 points, 13 rebounds and 13 assists in the clinching game, earning his second Finals MVP. In 1982-83, the Sixers acquired Moses Malone and stormed to a 65-17 regular season record. The Milwaukee Bucks upset the Celtics in the playoffs but nothing would have stopped the Sixers that year: they went 12-1 in the playoffs, sweeping the Lakers in the Finals.
The Bird-Magic NBA rivalry did not really kick into gear—at least from the standpoint of head to head matchups--until their fifth season. Prior to the 1984 NBA Finals, Bird and Magic faced each other just twice a year in the regular season. In 1984, the New Jersey Nets stunned the defending champion Sixers in the first round, helping to pave the way for the much anticipated Bird-Magic Finals showdown. Both players excelled, with Bird averaging 27.4 ppg, 14.0 rpg and 3.6 apg and Magic averaging 18.1 ppg, 13.6 apg and 7.7 rpg. Game four in Los Angeles turned out to be pivotal: the Lakers missed several golden opportunities to take a 3-1 series lead and Boston’s eventual 129-125 victory regained home court advantage for the Celtics, who won the series in seven games. Bird received his first Finals MVP to go along with his first regular season MVP.
Bird and Magic made up for lost time by facing each other again in the 1985 and 1987 Finals (Boston won the 1986 championship against the Rockets after Houston upset the Lakers in the playoffs for the second time in the decade). The Lakers won both of those matchups, with Abdul-Jabbar becoming the oldest Finals MVP (38 in 1985) and Magic winning his then-record third Finals MVP in 1987. The Lakers became the first NBA team in two decades to repeat as champions by winning the 1988 title over the Detroit Pistons, who beat the Celtics in the Eastern Conference finals. Bird never made it back to the NBA Finals, while Magic returned once more in 1991, his final full season, when the Lakers lost to the Chicago Bulls.
Bird’s peak value season was probably 1984-85, when he won the second of his three straight MVPs, averaging 28.7 ppg (second in the NBA), 10.5 rpg (eighth in the NBA) and 6.6 apg while shooting .522 from the field and .427 from three point range (second in the NBA). Magic’s peak value season was probably 1986-87, when he won the first of his three MVPs in a four season span, averaging a career-high 23.9 ppg (10th in the NBA), 12.2 apg (first in the NBA) and 6.3 rpg. I say “probably” in both cases because there are many other excellent seasons to choose from for both players. Bird and Magic both displayed excellent durability as elite players; each made the All-NBA First Team nine times. In the currency that matters the most to such competitors, Magic came out ahead, winning five NBA championships and three Finals MVPs compared to Bird’s three championships and two Finals MVPs.
When Michael Jordan entered the NBA in 1984-85, Bird and Magic were at the absolute height of their powers; in fact, that was the only season in which they finished 1-2 in the MVP voting. Jordan finished sixth in the balloting, a very impressive showing for a rookie on a mediocre (38-44) Chicago Bulls team—but Jordan was no ordinary rookie: he averaged 28.2 ppg (third in the NBA) while leading the Bulls in rebounding (6.5 rpg) and assists (5.9 apg) from the shooting guard position. He also ranked fourth in the NBA in steals (2.4 spg).
Jordan missed most of his second season due to a broken foot but he came back in time to play in a first round playoff series against Bird and the eventual NBA champion Boston Celtics. This is when Jordan began to establish that he was not just a very good player but that he was destined to be an all-time great. Jordan scored 49 points in a 123-104 game one loss but that was just a prelude to his game two masterpiece, when he set the all-time single-game playoff record by scoring 63 points in a 135-131 double overtime loss. The Bulls were completely overmatched but Jordan almost led them to victory anyway. This performance prompted Bird to utter his famous tribute saying that it was “God disguised as Michael Jordan.” Jordan only scored 19 points in game three as the Celtics won 122-104 to sweep the series but Jordan was already on his way to becoming a transcendent figure not just in the NBA but globally.
Jordan’s encore to his playoff heroics was a season-long assault on the NBA record book. In 1986-87, while the high flying Erving embarked on his “Farewell Tour,” Jordan posted the highest non-Wilt Chamberlain single season scoring average in NBA history, 37.1 ppg. He shot .482 from the field, .857 from the free throw line and also averaged 5.2 rpg and 4.6 apg while getting 236 steals and 125 blocked shots, the first of his two 200-100 seasons; he is the only player to ever have two 200-100 campaigns (the ABA started officially tracking those numbers in 1972-73 and the NBA followed suit a year later). Jordan finished second to Magic in the MVP voting and he never again ranked lower than third in MVP voting after a full season of play until he came out of retirement to play for the Washington Wizards. In 1988, Jordan captured his first MVP as he, Bird and Magic finished 1-2-3 in the voting; that year, Jordan won the scoring title and the Defensive Player of the Year award, something that had never been done before and has not been accomplished since.
Although Jordan is now almost reflexively referred to as the greatest player of all-time, in the mid to late 1980s many people seriously entertained the notion that he shot too much to ever lead a team to a championship. Of course, the real problem in Chicago was that his supporting cast was much weaker than the ones on the championship teams from L.A. and Boston—or, as Jordan indelicately put it whenever it was suggested that he did not make his teammates better the way that Bird and Magic did, “You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken (bleep).” The arrival and quick maturation of Scottie Pippen and Horace Grant meant that the “chicken (bleep)” days were over in Chicago. The Bulls lost some epic battles with the Detroit Pistons before sweeping them aside in the 1991 playoffs en route to a 4-1 Finals victory over Magic’s Lakers. Jordan beat out Magic for regular season MVP honors and after he defeated him to win his first championship it was clear that the torch had been passed. The Jordan-Pippen duo, ably coached by Phil Jackson, went on to put together two “three-peats” wrapped around Jordan’s first retirement.
Jordan won six championships, one more than Magic and twice as many as Bird. He won five MVPs and could easily have won a couple more that went to Charles Barkley and Karl Malone when it seemed like the voters had tired of simply giving Jordan the award every year. Jordan won 10 scoring titles, shattering Wilt Chamberlain’s record (seven), and he made the Alll-NBA First team 10 times. Jordan’s durability as an elite player is self evident and picking a peak value season for him is simply a matter of taste: you could go with his 37.1 ppg campaign or perhaps you prefer his MVP/DPoY double or maybe you favor one of the four seasons in which he won the regular season and Finals MVPs, including 1995-96, when the Bulls set a single-season record by going 72-10. Bird and Magic had set a new standard for basketball greatness but then Jordan came along and surpassed them not only in individual accomplishments but also as a winner. Whether or not Jordan was really a greater player than Russell, Chamberlain, Robertson or the other Pantheon members is a fascinating question to discuss but one thing is clear: any conversation about the greatest basketball player ever has to include his name.
Part V will discuss which active players are most likely to earn their way into the Pantheon.
Links:
1) Part I of this series can be found here, Part II is here and Part III is here.
2) This article adapts and slightly modifies ideas that I first explored in the following two posts:
The Greatest Basketball Players of All-Time, Part I
The Greatest Basketball Players of All-Time, Part II
3) The NBA 50th Anniversary Team, including the list of voters and links to biographies of each player: The NBA's 50 Greatest Players
Labels: Bill Russell, Earvin Johnson, Elgin Baylor, Jerry West, Julius Erving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Oscar Robertson, Wilt Chamberlain
posted by David Friedman @ 5:46 PM
The Pantheon: An Examination of Basketball Greatness, Part III
The basic premise of the Pantheon series is that instead of crowning one player as the greatest of all-time we should look at and appreciate the body of work produced by 10 players who could legitimately claim that title. Those players, who were the top finishers in the AP's 1999 vote to select the greatest player ever, are Michael Jordan, Oscar Robertson, Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell, Earvin Johnson, Larry Bird, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Elgin Baylor, Jerry West and Julius Erving. The Pantheon series examines the careers of each of these players, focusing on peak value and durability; the final part will assess the accomplishments of several active players who may soon be Pantheon-worthy, if they are not already.
Sticking with my idea of not ranking players within the Pantheon, the series proceeds roughly in chronological order (with some shifting done for certain thematic purposes and also to make sure that each article is roughly the same length): Part I looks at Russell and Baylor, while Part II talks about Chamberlain and Robertson.
Part III discusses West, Erving and Abdul-Jabbar. West and Erving each won only one NBA title (Erving also claimed a pair of ABA championships) but they rang up some of the greatest Finals performances ever and their individual numbers at that level of competition were consistently excellent. West is the only player from the losing team to win an NBA Finals MVP, while Erving's exploits in the 1976 ABA Finals represent some of the finest all-around basketball that has ever been played. Abdul-Jabbar is the standard bearer for basketball durability; his numbers and accomplishments after the age of 35 alone measure up favorably with the complete careers of some Hall of Famers. What many people have forgotten--or never realized--is how dominant he was as a scorer, rebounder and shot blocker during the first decade of his career.
Younger fans know Jerry West primarily as “the logo” (his silhouette is displayed in the ubiquitous NBA logo) and as the Lakers executive who drafted Kobe Bryant and signed Shaquille O’Neal. However, they may not be aware of just how great West was as a player. There are many reasons that he became “the logo,” that he earned the nickname “Mr. Clutch” and that for many years he and Oscar Robertson were considered to be, without question, the two greatest guards in pro basketball history.
West was a prolific scorer, a skilled passer and a great defensive player. He scored 25,192 points in 932 regular season games (27.0 ppg). He ranks 18th all-time in NBA/ABA career regular season points and he is fifth all-time in career scoring average, trailing only Michael Jordan (30.12 ppg), Wilt Chamberlain (30.07 ppg), Allen Iverson (27.8 ppg) and Elgin Baylor (27.4 ppg). When West retired in 1974 he ranked third on the career scoring list behind only Chamberlain and Robertson. His playoff scoring resume is even more impressive: West ranks sixth all-time in NBA/ABA career playoff points (4457), trailing only Jordan (5987), Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (5762), Shaquille O’Neal (5045), Karl Malone (4761) and Julius Erving (4580). West’s career playoff scoring average ranks third all-time behind Jordan (33.5 ppg) and Iverson (30.0 ppg). West still holds the record for highest scoring average in a playoff series (46.3 ppg versus Baltimore in 1965) and most consecutive playoff games with at least 40 points (six).
Bill Russell (11) and Jordan (six) each won many more championships than West (one) and may be the greatest defensive and offensive players respectively in NBA Finals history, but West’s Finals performances were quite extraordinary. West ranks first in career Finals points (1679), third in career Finals scoring average (30.5 ppg, trailing only Rick Barry—36.3 ppg—and Jordan—33.6 ppg) and fourth in career Finals assists (306). He scored at least 20 points in 25 straight Finals games, a record that stood for more than two decades before Jordan (35) surpassed it. West scored at least 20 points in all seven games of a Finals series three times; no one else has done that more than once. West and Jordan are the only players who scored at least 45 points in three different Finals games; West has the most 40 point games in NBA Finals history (10; Jordan had six). West also had 18 assists in a Finals game, just three short of the record in that department. West remains the only player who ever won the Finals MVP despite playing for the losing team; he had 42 points, 13 rebounds and 12 assists in the Lakers’ 1969 game seven loss to the Celtics.
West amassed 6238 regular season assists (6.7 apg), ranking 24th all-time in total assists and 31st in assists per game. West ranked fourth in total assists when he retired. Assists averages have gone up in recent seasons even though overall scoring is much lower than it was when West played, a strong indication of how liberal the definition of an assist has become; West’s assists average was very high for his era.
West’s defensive prowess is difficult to quantify because steals and blocked shots were not officially recorded until his final season (1973-74), during which injuries limited him to just 31 games. However, considering that he was a banged up 35 year old by that time, West’s 2.6 spg and .7 bpg give a strong indication of what kind of defender he was. He made the All-Defensive Team every year after its creation in 1969 except for his abbreviated final season.
Injuries caused West to miss a lot of games during his career but he had enough durability to make the All-NBA First Team 10 times. He never won a regular season MVP, but he did finish second on four different occasions (1966, 1970, 1971, 1972). West’s peak value season was probably 1965-66 when he averaged a career-high 31.3 ppg, 7.1 rpg and 6.1 apg during the regular season while setting a record for free throws made (840) that still stands; in the playoffs he averaged 34.2 ppg, 6.3 rpg and 5.6 apg while shooting .518 from the field, an amazing percentage for a 6-2 guard who took the volume of shots that he did. Late in his career, West won a scoring title (31.2 ppg in 1969-70) and an assists title (9.7 apg in 1971-72), a feat matched only by Nate Archibald, who amazingly captured both crowns in the same season (34.0 ppg, 11.4 apg in 1972-73).
One of the greatest peak value seasons in pro basketball history has never received the attention it deserves because it took place in a now-defunct league. In 1975-76, the New York Nets’ Julius Erving ranked first in the ABA in scoring, fifth in rebounding, seventh in assists, third in steals and seventh in blocked shots. He also placed eighth in two point field goal percentage and seventh in three point field goal percentage. Incredibly, Erving actually increased his production in the postseason, culminating in these numbers in the 1976 ABA Finals versus the Denver Nuggets: 37.7 ppg (including 45 points and the game winning shot on the road in game one), 14.2 rpg, 6.0 apg, 3.0 spg and 2.2 bpg. The Doctor led both teams in all of these categories during the series—and he was putting up these unbelievable numbers against high quality opposition. Guided by Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown, the Nuggets finished 60-24 that season, featuring two Hall of Famers (Dan Issel and David Thompson) and one of the best defensive forwards of all time (Bobby Jones). After trying in vain to stop the Doctor, Bobby Jones offered this appraisal of Erving’s heroics: “He destroys the adage that I’ve always been taught—that one man can’t do it alone.”
One could make a case that no one has ever played basketball better than Dr. J did in that season, particularly his playoff performances against deep, talented San Antonio and Denver teams; in fact, Newsweek’s Pete Axthelm, in a May 1976 article titled “Sky King,” suggested that Erving was indeed the greatest player the game had seen at that time. ABA Commissioner (and Hall of Fame forward) Dave DeBusschere offered this oft-repeated summary of Erving’s impact: “Plenty of guys have been ‘The Franchise.’ For us, Dr. J is ‘The League.’”
Erving did not quite reach that level of statistical dominance combined with championship winning performance before or after that campaign, but he made the All-Star team in each of his 16 seasons and won three other regular season MVPs. Erving’s career combines high peak value with impressive durability; he ranked among the best players in the game for most of his career, as indicated by his 12 combined All-NBA and All-ABA selections (including nine First Team nods, five in the NBA and four in the ABA). Erving was an outstanding clutch performer who generally played his best in the biggest games; he averaged 24.2 ppg in his regular season career but increased that number to 28.1 ppg in 33 NBA/ABA Finals games, winning three championships in six appearances. Erving’s career scoring average of 25.5 ppg in the NBA Finals is the eighth best all-time and he scored at least 20 points in 21 of his 22 Finals games, including his first 19, a streak that still ranks among the longest ever. In his two trips to the ABA Finals, Erving averaged 33.4 ppg, scored at least 20 points in 10 of 11 games, topped 30 points eight times and had three 40 point games. His output in Finals games mirrors West’s in many ways—and he won more championships than West did—but because Erving’s two most spectacular Finals’ performances happened in the ABA (and his third best happened in 1977 in a losing cause) many people don’t realize just how well Erving performed in those situations.
Erving’s 1981 NBA MVP ended the nearly two decade long stranglehold that centers had over that honor and paved the way for other non-centers to win the award. Erving was the first NBA/ABA, NFL, MLB or NHL player to be a member of 16 straight playoff teams, a record since broken by Karl Malone (19) and John Stockton (19).
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is perhaps the ultimate example of basketball durability: he holds the career regular season records for minutes played (57,446) and points (38,387), he won a record six regular season MVPs and he earned the 1985 Finals MVP as a 38 year old. Early in his career he battled Wilt Chamberlain in the playoffs and by the end of his career he faced Hakeem Olajuwon, who was born 27 years after Chamberlain. Abdul-Jabbar averaged at least 21.5 ppg in each of his first 17 seasons; the first time he failed to reach that mark he was 40 years old. He played in his final All-Star Game when he was just shy of 42 years old, he was a 14.6 ppg scorer on a championship team at 41 years old, he made the All-NBA First Team at 39 years old (ranking 10th in the league in scoring at 23.4 ppg) and he made the All-Defensive Second Team at 37 years old. Like Jerry Rice, he put up good “career” numbers after the season in which he turned 35, including eight All-Star selections, four championships won, four All-NBA Team selections, one All-Defensive Team selection and one Finals MVP.
Abdul-Jabbar’s career ended in 1989, which means that today’s high schoolers had not even been born by the time he played his last game. Although his late career achievements are impressive, his prime years took place over three decades ago, which means that even some people who are approaching 40 years old may have only vague memories of when Abdul-Jabbar was dominant, particularly considering the sparse television coverage that the NBA received at that time. During Abdul-Jabbar’s first 11 seasons he won six MVPs, two scoring titles, one rebounding title and led the league in blocked shots four times in the seven years that those numbers were officially tracked. After his first six seasons he had the highest career scoring average in NBA history (30.4 ppg; to be fair, Chamberlain had a much higher scoring average than that in his first six seasons before “settling” for a 30.1 ppg career average). Abdul-Jabbar averaged at least 14.0 rpg in each of his first seven seasons--a level that Shaquille O’Neal never once reached--and he averaged at least 10.3 rpg each year until he was 35. People who only saw the second decade of Abdul-Jabbar’s career might be under the mistaken impression that he was not a dominant rebounder or defensive player but those numbers clearly put that fiction to rest. He was also a gifted passer, a good ballhandler and a decent free throw shooter.
Abdul-Jabbar was a versatile player who could score in a number of ways but he also had perhaps the most deadly signature shot in the history of the sport: the skyhook, which he could deliver with deadly precision from either baseline and which was unblockable and unguardable once Abdul-Jabbar got post position. Even in his early 40s, Abdul-Jabbar’s skyhook still confounded defenders.
Considering his peak value and his extended dominance, one could definitely make the case that Abdul-Jabbar was the greatest basketball player ever (and we have not even talked about his amazing collegiate career). Erving has repeatedly said that Abdul-Jabbar was the greatest player he ever played against; Erving would almost certainly own a couple more NBA championship rings if not for Abdul-Jabbar’s commanding presence in the paint for the Lakers in the 1980 and 1982 Finals.
Part IV will discuss Magic Johnson, Larry Bird and Michael Jordan.
Links:
1) Part I of this series can be found
here and Part II is
here.
2) This article adapts and slightly modifies ideas that I first explored in the following two posts:
The Greatest Basketball Players of All-Time, Part I
The Greatest Basketball Players of All-Time, Part II
3) The NBA 50th Anniversary Team, including the list of voters and links to biographies of each player:
http://www.nba.com/history/players/50greatest.htmlLabels: Bill Russell, Earvin Johnson, Elgin Baylor, Jerry West, Julius Erving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Oscar Robertson, Wilt Chamberlain
posted by David Friedman @ 4:15 AM
