In my last post I pointed out the difficulty in picking a basketball G.O.A.T. (greatest of all time) because of all the variables, like the era and the position. There are many other variables that make it impossible to choose just ONE player, as the greatest, besides era and position. This post is about two players that DID play the same position and DID play in the same era. They are arguably the most compared and debated players to ever play. In my last post I picked my greatest player from each era and gave a brief reason for my picks. (Several comments I received were about leaving Bill Russell out of my best player of the 1954-1969 era.) I would like to address these comments from a coach’s perspective, as well as a fan of the NBA for over 70 years. As a former college coach and a high school coach one of the most critical facets of basketball is “matchups”. I saw Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell play head-to-head, many times, and I don’t even think it is close as who was the greatest PLAYER. Chamberlain’s domination during the era he played, his impact on the game, and his skill on BOTH ends of the court makes it a marginally debatable issue as far as I am concerned. They played against each other 94 times in their regular season careers, and 49 times in the play-offs, which provides a huge “sample size”. One of the biggest issues in comparing one player with another is they never play each other during the “prime” of their respective careers. This is certainly not the case with Wilt and “Russ”. (Perhaps the only other Top 75 players that went head-to-head in the prime of their careers were Oscar Robertson and Jerry West.) Before I go any further, I want to state for the record that I grew up near St. Louis and my favorite player was Bob Pettit. I have always been a fan of the NBA and looked forward to the “game of the week” and watching the best basketball players in the world play. I would try to emulate them as a high school player and later as a college player. I intend to offer an unbiased argument that may be controversial but hopefully not confrontational. I understand that “fans” is a shortened word for “fanatics” and often fans get VERY fanatical about “their” team or “their” player. Both players have an equally devoted fan base, which is understandable and as it should be. My intention is not to alienate anyone. Obviously, this is not a scientific theory or an objective exercise that can be proven in a lab. The reason for this post is simply to try and give an objective argument about why I believe Wilt was better than Russell. Finally, keep in mind that this post is about two great players, not about TEAMS! So, without further foofaraw, here is why I believe Wilt Chamberlain was a better basketball player than Bill Russell.

In my book “The G.O.A.T.: The Quest to Find The Best” I give a page of statistics about each of my Top 75 players as does everyone else that tries to justify their picks. To save space in this post and to “cut to the chase” the only statistics that I think are relevant to this post are the statistics between these two in head-to-head matches. In 94 regular season games Wilt averaged 29.9 points to 14.2 points by Russell. Wilt averaged 28.1 rebounds to Russell’s 22.9, and Wilt averaged 3.8 assists to 4.4 by Russell. Statistics can be overwhelming, but I am looking at these stats from a coach’s perspective, and what “jumps out” at me is Wilt held Russ to a .370 FG% (.440% against the rest of the league) and Wilt had a .488 FG% (.540% against the rest of the league). In the 49 playoff games their averages were about the same except Wilt’s FG% went up to .522%, Russell’s went up as well to .415%. But in the playoffs, a coach would have his team focus on the ONE player who he felt could beat him. Wilt would get double and triple teamed. Russell was rarely an option in the Celtic offense, and never the offensive threat that a coach feared. If you are reading this you are a learned NBA fan, so I am not going to bore you with a lot of statistics but suffice it to say NO ONE in the history of the NBA has the numbers, stats, and records that Wilt has.

The second point that I want to make about why I think Wilt was better has to do with the impact he had on the game. NO player in the 77-year history of the NBA was responsible for more rule changes than Chamberlain. (I know of no rules that were changed because of Russell.) Wilt was the reason the NBA had to make continuous rule changes to neutralize his ability to dominate the players and the GAME. For example, one of the rules that were made because of Wilt was that a free throw shooter could not cross the free throw line until the ball hit the goal because Wilt would throw the ball off the board to himself and dunk it. (He could not shoot free throws, so there you have it, he was not perfect!) There were over 30 other rule changes attributed to Wilt. Wilt has been retired for over 50 years but still holds 72 NBA records.

My final point and the need to address the “elephant in the room” regarding comparing Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell is the eleven championships Russell won to the only two won by Wilt. First, as I was doing the research for my book, I discovered that the best offensive player on most teams only accounts for 20-25% of the TEAM’S offense. (The greatest like Jordan and Wilt account for 30+%.) As great as a player may be they can only guard ONE player. No matter how big or how high they can jump one player only accounts for 20% of the teams’ rebounds. (Rodman has the highest percentage at 37% but that still means that the rest of the team got 63% of the rebounds.) My point is it is a TEAM game and in my 22 years of coaching no ONE player has ever won a championship. Everyone who has seen the Celtics during those dynasty years knows that Russell had five Hall of Fame players playing with him and arguably the greatest coach in the history of the NBA. They also had two of the best to ever play in the NBA coming off the bench. The final point I would make as it pertains to NBA Championships is this; there were 8 teams in the league during this era, so a team only had to win one series to be playing for a championship. I am not diminishing what the Celtics did from 1954-69 but it was much easier to win a championship then that it is now.

Throughout history and at every level, basketball has always been a game of matchups. The successful teams and coaches win the matchups. In the case of the matchup between Chamberlain vs. Russell it was dominated by Wilt. Team success may have been a different story, but this post was about two of the greatest basketball players in the history of the game. Not about who “played” on championship teams. There is an argument that could be made for Wilt to be The G.O.A.T. I don’t believe there is a winnable argument for Bill Russell to be the greatest of all time.