Sports change over time. This makes it difficult to make comparisons between players from different generations. Rickey Henderson stole 1,406 bases. If his career started in 2009 instead of 1979, he most likely would not steal half as many bases in his career. Joe Montana threw 273 touchdown passes in his career. If his career started in 2009 instead of 1973, he would probably end up with at least 450 touchdown passes.
And basketball is no different. Stephen Curry has averaged 309 three-pointers per 82 games in his career. Since 1984 was the year I was born and the Celtics won the championship that year, let’s look at the NBA in the 1983-1984 season. The leader in three-pointers that year made 101 threes. And when I say the leader, I mean the team that led the league. Stephen Curry’s career average for threes per 82 games is more than the top three teams in 1983-1984 combined. If Stephen Curry played back then, he would not be making 300 threes in a season. He might make 100. Maybe. Darrell Griffith led the league in 1983-1984, making 91 of the Jazz’s 101 threes (Michael Cooper was second in the league with 38).
So that brings me to the point of this post. There’s been some slander against some all-time great players who played for the Celtics recently and I don’t like it. J.J. Redick took exception with Christopher “Mad Dog” Russo saying that Chris Paul is not better than Bob Cousy. I’ll preface this by saying that obviously I never saw Bob Cousy play (other than watching his final game back in April 2020 when we didn’t have sports), but I absolutely agree with Mad Dog. Chris Paul has never won anything. If he wins the championship this year, that would be big for him. But Chris Paul is not somebody who I have ever feared. The Suns are really good. The Suns beating the Celtics in the NBA Finals this year is a possible outcome for the playoffs. But I’m much more afraid of Giannis Antetokounmpo than I am of Chris Paul. Chris Paul is better than Rajon Rondo, but Rondo always used to outplay him when Rondo was on the Celtics and he faced Chris Paul. Redick pointed out that Bob Cousy never shot 40%. That’s true. If you could take Bob Cousy and make him a modern basketball player, he absolutely would shoot well over 40%. He also said that Bob Cousy “was being guarded by plumbers and firemen.” That’s fine, but that doesn’t mean he would be the same player if his career started in 2005 instead of 1950. All you can do is compare guys against the guys they played with and Bob Cousy was the best point guard of his generation. Chris Paul is the second best point guard of his generation. Curry is number 1. It’s not ridiculous to say that the second best point guard of one generation could be better than the best point guard of another generation, but it’s also not ridiculous to make the case that Bob Cousy was better than Chris Paul.
But what really annoyed me was when I heard somebody say on a podcast that Bill Russell would be just a guy if he played today. And the reason for that was pretty much J.J. Redick’s “plumbers and firemen” logic. I’m pretty sure Bill Simmons currently has Bill Russell ranked third all time behind Michael Jordan and LeBron James. I think it’s absurd to put anybody other than Michael Jordan ahead of Bill Russell (Jordan and Russell would never have a series where they were outplayed by somebody like Rajon Rondo or be part of a team that was as terrible as the Lakers this year). Simmons obviously doesn’t consider Russell “just a guy” if he played today, but I’m pretty sure his logic for not putting Russell higher than third was the “plumbers and firemen” logic also. I think I remember him saying that he didn’t know what Russell would do against more modern centers like Shaquille O’Neal. I know what he would do. He would be Bill Russell. Bill Russell faced Shaquille O’Neal. His name was Wilt Chamberlain back then. Wilt Chamberlain was 7-1 and 275 pounds and he was the most dominant scorer ever. He wasn’t some white guy who was playing center at 6-8 and 200 pounds and smoking two packs of cigarettes each day. Wilt Chamberlain was Joel Embiid, except much better. And Bill Russell dominated him.
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| Bob Cousy and Bill Russell are two of the best five players in the history of the franchise that has won more NBA Championships than any other team in NBA history. |
Wilt Chamberlain was a rookie during the 1959-1960 season and his first ten years in the NBA overlapped with Bill Russell. Chamberlain was clearly at his best for his first seven years (when he led the NBA in scoring each year). During those ten years, Bill Russell won nine championships. Let’s look at how Russell did against Chamberlain individually. Russell was 57-37 (.606) against Chamberlain in the regular season. He averaged 14.2 points per game against Chamberlain (slightly less than his overall average of 14.8 during those ten seasons). Of course, Russell was known for his defense more than his offense. Wilt Chamberlain averaged 29.9 points per game against Russell in the regular season, but that was down significantly from his overall average of 34.4 during those seasons.
But it’s the playoffs that matter. They met in eight of their ten years together in the NBA. Bill Russell won seven of those eight series. And Wilt Chamberlain scored significantly less against Bill Russell in the playoffs compared to what he was doing to everybody in the regular season:
I’ve heard the argument about Russell playing on more talented teams. Chamberlain had plenty of talent around him. I think Bill Simmons addressed that one in his book. The biggest difference between the teams was Russell and Chamberlain. Wilt Chamberlain was traded twice. If I remember correctly from Simmons’s book, one of those trades happened because his teammates wanted him traded. Russell’s teammates never would have wanted him traded and the Celtics never would have considered it. But Chamberlain played on plenty of good teams. In his first ten seasons, he played in 98 playoff games. Exactly half of them were against the Celtics and half were against everybody else. He did very well against everybody who wasn’t the Celtics, going 31-18 (.633), but he was only 20-29 (.408) against Russell and the Celtics.
Wilt Chamberlain was not as good as Bill Russell, but he definitely wasn’t just a guy either. He absolutely dominated the NBA, as long as he wasn’t going against Russell. To discredit Russell because of his competition is ridiculous. If he played in the NBA today, he would dominate the way he dominated the most dominant scorer in the history of basketball.
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