So I was looking at wilts stats and the year Wilt averaged 50 pts he took 40 shots. He only had a fg% of 50.6. For comparison shaq in his prime average 21shots@57%. What would people think now days of a player who took 40 shots? Would people call Wilt the rudy gay of centers? If kobe put up 40 shots what would he average? And if he did would be blasted in the media. He already is but hey 5 rings is 5 rings.
Wilt was a ball hog and because he couldn't shoot free throws, he ate up a lot of possessions for his team without getting efficient output from those possessions. This is the main reason why Russell punked him over and over.
That season the coach asked him to score more because he thought it was the only way they could beat Boston.
Tell you what... if you can bring Wilt back as a zombie and put him on the Rockets I'll take him. Wilt would be better walking dead than anyone on our team is alive.
To be fair, the pace in those days were a little less than 1.5 times the pace it is these days so it was more the equivalent to 25-30 shots a game these days, which is comparable to both Michael Jordan and Kobe's most ball-hogging seasons.
except that didn't happen. wilt had 7 50+ points and 7 40+ rebounds games versus russell. russell only had 3 30+ games and just 1 40+ rebounds games against wilt. yeah, russell has won way more championships than wilt but obviously russell had the better team around him (while still just having a 88-74 record versus wilt's teams). bill russell had more success with his teams (for various reasons) and could definitely limit wilt 1-on-1 but he never stopped him or even punked him. and btw, 50 % on fgs in the 60s is not the same as 50 % on fgs now. those legendary celtics teams had not a single player coming close to 50 % shooting. bill russell has a career average of 44 % on fgs and 56 % on fts.
Russell punked him for a career. 11-2. Throw out all the stats you want. There's a reason why Wilt was rarely on a good team. And there's a reason why Bill won over him all the time. Ws and rings. Those are the true stats.
Wilt's scoring drew crowds. The team's owner/management likely told the team that they needed to keep feeding Wilt the ball. It was more about making money than building a winning team. When Wilt moved on to the 76ers under a management that was serious about winning championships, his scoring went way down and his team won 60+ games. That's not to say that Wilt didn't care about his individual stats. He was hung up on stats probably more than any other player in history. But I think its unfair to call him a ball-hog, if his team was purposely trying to force-feed the ball into him.
Lol Wtf is wrong with people on this board? Acting like being a ball hog is the worst thing ever. A player who can score at will (Chamberlain) has all the rights to be a ballhog. Kobe is a ball hog, MJ was a ball hog, KD is a ball hog, what's the matter if they score? Wilt scored more than 1/2 stop acting like 52% is BAD. It's GOOD. What y'all want? A player who scores 30ppg on 47% FG and can take over a game or a player who could score 30ppg but instead passes the ball a lot and ends up with 19ppg and without the guts the takeover a game by keeping the ball. A ball hog who scores and makes his team win is a good ball hog, a ball hog who doesn't score and make his team loose is a bad one.
Yeah. They said he was a ball hog so he lead the league in assists, practically out of spite. What a legend. Most statistically dominant player ever.
The Celtics had how many hall of fame players on their roster, while how many times do you think Russell seriously outplayed Chamberlain. I do think Bill Russell is one of the most important players in NBA history. Though, he's not best player or center of all time. I often ask people what advantages in actual skills and individual production did Bill Russell have over Wilt, and for better measures I'll Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Hakeem Olajuwon, and Shaquille O'Neal. Take into an account, that most great centers have started off on bad to mediocre teams. Most fans, analysts, and writers would have to agree would Russell win 11 titles on a team, like the Clippers or the 60s version of the Pistons. Some poster are criticizing Wilt's FG%, who shot a pitiful 54% from the field, while in the twilight of his career against some very outstanding centers in the late 60s and early 70s, he only managed to average over 62 FG% in his last 7 seasons. He was crazy inefficient. Career wise, he was averaging 23 ppg on 2 point field goals alone (excluding free throws). Even in today's game, Wilt would be insanely efficient compared to most players, as alot of posters will argue the time difference. Though, if you think Russell, Kareem, Thurmond, Haywood, and Reed struggled with or sometimes could not match Wilt (even in his decline). Could you imagine putting Andris Biendrins, Pau Gasol, Al Horford, Joel Anthony, Chris Kaman, or Joahkim Noah against him? Wilt may not score a hundred, but he could easily average 25-40 against some of those guys. I rather see him taking 20 - 35 shots per game over someone like Rudy Gay, Stephon Marbury, Russell Westbrook, and even players, such as Allen Iverson, Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan (himself). Bill Russell, on the other hand, only averaged 44 FG% (on 15 shots) for his entire career, while he also had terrible free throw percentage, like Shaq and Wilt. Back to field goal percentage, do you want to know some of the players who ranked ahead him in career field goal percentage, during the 60s? Gus Johnson, Elvin Hayes, Gail Goodrich, Earl Monroe, Bob Pettit, Hal Greer, Sam Jones, and host of other wing players. Even in assist (if you take away Wilt's two freakish seasons), he still has Russell beat. You have to give Wilt some credit, how unusual is that for critics to nitpick a scoring center for being selfish, yet he goes out the next two years and places in the top 10 for assist and leading the league in one of those seasons (8.6 and 7.8). There are quality point guards who struggled to get that in their best seasons. http://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/ast_per_g_career.html http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...t-chamberlain-is-the-greatest-nba-player-ever http://bleacherreport.com/articles/180402-why-wilt-chamberlain-is-better-than-bill-russell
With all of that being, I doubt Rockets would be near the bottom of league in attendance. Zombified Wilt Chamberlain destroys opposing players by dropping 35 points and 28 rebounds per game, while eating their brains near the end of game (when he is little hungry). Oh forgot, even when he was less walking dead, he averaged 45.8 minutes per game. I'll say this much, Wilt Chamberlain is arguably the best ball hog ever. Which is why have hard time simply saying Michael Jordan is the greatest NBA player without question. There some players you could put on those Chicago teams who could win just as many, if not more than MJ. Trade MJ for Wilt, Olajuwon, Shaq, Robertson, Bird, Magic and even Kobe in their primes. You cannot tell me most of those teams wouldn't win less than 3 or 4 titles.
