One of the Greats or most Overrated?

One thing we have a tendency to do as humans is to rank things. In sports this is very prevalent, and we do it with everything. Ranking people or teams by statistics or an overall body of work is how we compare one with the next, and it makes it a “tidy” way of doing so.  Statistics are important because it is a way of quantifying how good a player was, and gives us a gauge as to what they may be in today’s version of the league. The one major problem with this is that the game has evolved. The rules have changed, the competitiveness has changed, but most importantly the competition has changed. With this in mind, I want to examine one of the “greatest of all time.”

In the NBA, there are those names recognized by even the casual fan, and ranked amongst the best players of all time; Jordan, “Magic”, Bird, “Dr. J”. These and others are revered because they can be imagined being just as good if not better at any point in the history of the game, they have a sort of feel to their game that can withstand the test of time. But there is one player I have in mind that I don’t feel matches that same level of these players, and yet is still revered to the same magnitude as these players.

Wilt Chamberlain is considered to be one of the top 10 players of all time by many critics and rankings. However, in my opinion he might not even be in the top 50. This article isn’t meant to bash Wilt Chamberlain, but only meant to give another perspective on his legacy. Surely he is a great player and absolutely in the top 100, but the following summary will show why he shouldn’t hold the lofty position most give to him.

Wilt Chamberlain was considered a giant in his day. Standing in a 7 foot and 1 inch, he stood head and shoulders above most others. This height advantage was one of the greatest advantages in all of sports history. He was definitely a physical marvel at that time, and you can’t take that away from him, just like you can’t take any physical tolls away from players in today’s game when discussing them. However, the tallest players he was playing against in that era were around 6’9” to 6’10”, and his wingspan was incredible as well which just added to his height advantage. IF you were to put him into today’s NBA, he would be of average size in comparison with most other big men.  Not only that, but big men today are much more technically skilled than in that era.  Not to say he wouldn’t still be an athletic freak, but I don’t know if he would stand out from the rest of the trees.

The next major problem I have in the debate of Wilt Chamberlain is with the rules of the day compared to now.  He was able to put up incredible statistics year after year, but with the new defensive 3 rule I think it would put a tremendous damper on those figures. Also, with the way fouls are called today, combined with his height advantage being diminished, his defensive numbers would also see a negative trend.

All of the above mentioned reasons help make the argument for his fall in the ranks, but the one point that brings those points to light, is Wilt Chamberlains matchups with Bill Russell.  Russell is one of the most truly skilled players of all time. He was a 6’9” with all the skill in the world, and continually got the better of Chamberlain. This should shed a little light on what it would be like for Chamberlain in today’s NBA.  The players are obviously not all as skilled as Russell, but the size and skill improvements of the players in today’s game would bridge some of that gap.

So, in all reality, it is really difficult to rank players from different eras and group them all under one giant umbrella, but having to do so I would say Chamberlain ranks somewhere right around the 50 mark, which is still an incredible accomplishment if you think about it, but not as lofty as some or most make him out to be.