Centers now and then

[Rens]

From the Boston Globe 14 februari 2003 by Bob Ryan
Since it was brought up again that Wilt Chamberlain had no competition whatsoever, this article is very interesting.


"Here are some of the centers who started in the NBA during the expansion season of 1970-71, when there were 17 teams: Walt Bellamy, Wes Unseld, Dave Cowens, Tom Boerwinkle, Sam Lacey, Walt Wesley, Bob Lanier, Wilt Chamberlain, Lew Alcindor, Willis Reed, Neal Walk, Elvin Hayes, Nate Thurmond, Elmore Smith, and Bob Rule.

Bellamy, Unseld, Cowens, Lanier, Chamberlain, Alcindor (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar), Reed, Hayes, and Thurmond are all in the Hall of Fame. Boerwinkle is one of the great passing centers of all time, and he once had a 37-rebound game. Wesley had a 50-point game. Look it up. Walk averaged 20 points and 12 rebounds for a season. Smith, not a bad jump shooter, once blocked 17 shots in a single game. Rule twice averaged 24 points a game, but his career was cut short by an Achilles' tendon injury and an inability to stay away from alcohol.

That same year, Dan Issel broke in with the ABA Kentucky Colonels. Dan Issel! How good would that consummate scoring machine look in a Celtics uniform today? The ABA of 1970-71 had such centers as Zelmo Beaty and Mel Daniels. That was also the rookie year for Billy Paultz. The Whopper would make some serious coin today.

Here are some of the centers who played regularly in the NBA during the expansion season of 1980-81, when there were 23 teams: Tree Rollins, Artis Gilmore, Bill Laimbeer, Joe Barry Carroll, Moses Malone, James Edwards, Abdul-Jabbar, Lanier, Mike Gminski, Bill Cartwright, Darryl Dawkins, Caldwell Jones, Alvan Adams, Dave Corzine, Swen Nater, Jack Sikma, Mitch Kupchak, and Unseld.

Malone is one of the handful of greatest players of all time. Sikma, a seven-time All-Star and possessor of a 1979 championship ring, is better than many people in the Hall of Fame. Gilmore was a 12-time NBA All-Star after being a megastar in the ABA. Laimbeer was, well, Laimbeer, heart and soul of the two-time champion Pistons. Cartwright was a big scorer in New York who became the plowhorse guy doing all the inside dirty work for the Bulls as they won titles 1, 2, and 3. Carroll was an indifferent artiste who could really play when the spirit moved him to do so. Edwards was an accomplished inside scorer. Dawkins was a man-child sort who never realized his potential, but who would look very good in anyone's uniform today.

On and on we go. Jones was a magnificent rebounder and defender at both the center and forward slots. Adams was a clever passer who scored as high as 19 a game and who averaged 14 for a 988-game NBA career. I once saw Gminski, a smooth 7-footer who had a four-year run of averaging 16 a game, pile up 40 and 20 against the Celtics, when they were the Celtics. Corzine was a sneaky good scorer and rebounder. Nater could really rebound and he had the game's second-best hook shot. (Gee, wonder who had the first?) Kupchak was a moose whose career was wracked with injury, but this man could really play.

Now, gang, what do we have today in the 29-team NBA?

Top-Flight Centers, 2003: Shaq. Tim Duncan (playing forward).

Second Tier: Vlade Divac? Brad Miller? Zydrunas Ilgauskas? Dikembe Mutombo? Michael Olowokandi? The ancient-and-held-together-by-duct-tape Arvydas Sabonis? Shawn Bradley? C'mon, help me out here. Ben Wallace me no Ben Wallace. He's a power forward.

It is shocking. It is pathetic. It is literally unbelievable. Legitimate old-fashioned butt-kicking centers are a truly endangered species, all the more so if you eliminate all foreign-born players from the equation.

Ask yourself this: Shaq aside, who is the second best under 30 years of age American born (i.e. stateside) and bred center -- who is pure center, not 7-foot combo-man, such as Kevin Garnett -- in the NBA? And Shaq will turn 30 March 6.

Let's go, smart guy. Name somebody. Duncan? Doesn't qualify. He was born and raised in the Virgin Islands, which means he was not engulfed in the insidious American youth basketball culture. He didn't get ensnared in the AAU trap. He was delivered to Dave Odom as a pure vessel, into which this very underrated mentor poured nothing but the proper messages.

So who? Nobody, nobody, nobody! They're all tied for last place! Alonzo Mourning, sadly, is hors de combat (he's 32, anyway). Miller? Please. Tony Battie? Oh, sure. The NBA today is overrun with forwards playing no position, or out of position, masquerading as ''centers'' only because someone has to go for the opening tap. Brian Grant is a nice player, but if he were in the NBA of 20 or 30 years ago, he would only play ''center'' if three guys fouled out.

And it's not as if the foreigners are sensational, either. Sabonis was -- a long time ago. The pre-injury (Achilles') Sabonis was The Greatest Player Americans Never Saw. They all say he was Bill Walton with a 3-pointer, and all I can say to that is Omigod. Mutombo is getting up there (36), and he was never exactly a scoring machine, anyway. Divac is the best of them now. Ilgauskas might be good if he could ever get through a season without breaking a foot. Todd MacCulloch (Canadian) can make a layup. As for all the assorted Serbs, Croats, Slovenians, etc., I don't think so.

Players whom history might not treat that kindly would be huge money stars in this center-less NBA. I'm thinking about guys like Gilmore, Carroll, Gminski, and Dawkins, to name four. Other great players would look even more dominating today. Sikma was an absolutely wonderful hard-nosed player who never got the attention he deserved because he played in Seattle and Milwaukee and because in his time the headlines went to Kareem, Moses, Robert Parish, Lanier, Cowens and Co.

Time was when a couple of great centers in each conference were being left off the All-Star team. Now we have sunk so low that Wallace has to start for the East in the All-Star Game. Wallace rebounds nicely and blocks shots expertly, but he has zero comprehension of what a center does. Then again, why should he be different than any other American? Kids in this country have decided that being a pure center is decidedly uncool (a mystery to me, since there is no greater buzz available in the game of basketball than burying someone in the low hole), and coaches have allowed them to get away with it. We've come a long way from the time when 6-8 1/2 Cowens fought for the right to play center because he thought, correctly, that it was the most important position in the game and there was nowhere else he'd rather play.

Yes, I've left out a name. It is precisely because Yao Ming enters such an astonishing pivot vacuum that he will be the most important NBA player the minute Shaq retires. Yao Ming is the answer to every prayer offered up in the last decade by hoop freaks yearning for a real center.

Here's what it has come to: Sam Lacey would be a big star today. You young'uns might not grasp the significance of that statement, but let me assure you that your father and uncle do, and they will tell you it's a truly frightening thought."

[EGarrett]

First of all...it's really great to see that now the perceived "death of the big man" is also somehow the fault of America.

Second...we already discussed this issue here.

The gist of that post was that there is just as much big talent now as there was at any other single time in the league. Guys like Walton, Nate Thurmond and others were all the same size or smaller then people like Garnett, Nowitzki and Rasheed Wallace now. It's ironic that this author lists the 6'7" 245 pound Unseld as a great bruising center then later claims the 6'9" 240 pound Ben Wallace is just a power forward. He's just in a rush to blabber on about how great the old days were and how these new fangled youngins are ruining everything. Don't mind him.

The big men listed in the article joined in 70-71...when Chamberlain was at the end of his career. His scoring also took a sharp drop-off during that period so that list doesn't have much to do with how much competition Chamberlain had when he was putting up his most ridiculous numbers.

[Wall St. Peon]

First of all...it's really great to see that now the perceived "death of the big man" is also somehow the fault of America.

Well, it is. AAU is destroying the teaching of the game of basketball to the talented players of today. They choose style over substance in the hopes that they'll be able to jump to the NBA, and instead of discouraging something that few players have actually accomplished, it's encouraged and players aren't being coached, aren't being taught how to play...or something like that, I think my point got across. I'm exhausted...

The gist of that post was that there is just as much big talent now as there was at any other single time in the league. Guys like Walton, Nate Thurmond and others were all the same size or smaller then people like Garnett, Nowitzki and Rasheed Wallace now. It's ironic that this author lists the 6'7" 245 pound Unseld as a great bruising center then later claims the 6'9" 240 pound Ben Wallace is just a power forward. He's just in a rush to blabber on about how great the old days were and how these new fangled youngins are ruining everything. Don't mind him.

No players that have the size to play center want to play center. Garnett could play center if he gained weight...hell, he could dominate at center now, since most centers are either just as skinny as Garnett or not quick enough...

Centers of the past knew how to pass, usually had a jumpshot out to the free throw line, and rebounded and clogged the middle. The centers of today have a range of four or five feet, save Duncan, Sabonis, Divac, and B. Miller (I want to say I'm missing someone...) and only clog the middle with their lack of real footwork as opposed to true talent...the reason Duncan's such a wonderful player is that he knows how to pass, has range, uses the backboard, rebounds, blocks, and is a great defender...he's the epitimy of what center SHOULD be...at least in my opinion.

The big men listed in the article joined in 70-71...when Chamberlain was at the end of his career. His scoring also took a sharp drop-off during that period so that list doesn't have much to do with how much competition Chamberlain had when he was putting up his most ridiculous numbers.

I could be wrong, but wasn't Chamberlain on an extremely talented Lakers team towards the end of his career? That wold cause a drop off in scoring, as well, as Chamberlain was generally an unselfish player.

[scubilete]

Well, yes, basically Chamberlain went to the Lakers where the main thing they needed from him was rebounding & blocking, so they didn't share that much the ball with him.