Audacity of a ‘new’ 50 greatest

Twenty years ago, during its All-Star Weekend celebration, the National Basketball Association released its list of 50 greatest players of all time. It was a grand celebration, as all the living recipients of the honor were gathered together and presented to the public. Of course, there was little debate about those who deserved it and were actually selected, mostly since the players were not ranked, but merely honored in alphabetical order. The players were selected by an unparalleled group of 50 retired and active players, coaches, team executives, and members of the media. Each selection had to be unanimous.

In 2003, five-time Emmy awardee Elliott Kalb, long-time television statistician for the NBA TV coverages of NBC, ABC and ESPN, released “Who’s Better, Who’s Best in Basketball?”, a book which listed his own choices for the NBA’s 50 greatest players. Kalb went a controversial step further, listing the players in order of greatness. He similarly polled 32 experts, and had the backing of roughly three decades of deep stats, and not just the regular numbers you see on a scoresheet. He cited who scored the most when it counted the most, who lost the most Game Sevens, and who lost merely because they were surrounded by inferior talent or coached by duds. Kalb knew his stuff, and by then had personally witnessed over a dozen NBA Finals series.

Last week, in anticipation of the 20th anniversary of that legendary list, CBS Sports released its own over-reaching lineup, a pale, pale comparison to the previous two, decided by only seven panelists. In another audacious move, they added nine active players: LeBron James, Steph Curry, Paul Pierce, Kawhi Leonard, Dwight Howard, Dirk Nowitzki, Chris Paul, Dwyane Wade and Kevin Durant. They removed a shocking 19 of the original immortals listed by the league, to make room for the likes of Ray Allen and Steve Nash.

This is the first cause of argument. How could you justify taking so many legends out of that illustrious roster, and placing players who have never won championships or were not really integral parts of champion teams, or did not come close? If even a Most Valuable Player like Bob McAdoo (1975) was excluded from the original list, how can you justify players who have not even come close to the achievements of those players from the past? I’m talking about Dwight Howard and Chris Paul, for example. I was a Dwight Howard fan, even got to play an exhibition game with him in the country after his rookie season. But he has not really been close to a championship since he left Orlando. Chris Paul is an extraordinary player, for sure. But how would he stack up against those who have gone further?

CBS eliminated giants of the game like Robert Parish, who played in the league the longest and starting center of three Boston Celtics champion teams in the 1980’s? Or what about Bill Walton, who gave the Portland Trailblazers their only NBA title, then came back after a series of foot injuries to become a valuable back-up to Parish on those same Celtics teams? And speaking of the Celtics, many of those on the original NBA list from the 1960’s glory days are no longer on the updated, sacrilegious version of CBS. Granted, Kalb also removed James Worthy and Lenny Wilkens from his own list, but he had numbers to back his opinion. This new list only has moments, highlights which don’t do justice to long, consistent careers.

The next issue is ranking. In Kalb’s book, the top 10 read as follows: Shaquille O’Neal, Wilt Chamberlain, Michael Jordan, Bill Russell, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Oscar Robertson, Tim Duncan and Bob Cousy. The new list’s all-time best are Jordan, LeBron James, Chamberlain, Johnson, Abdul-Jabbar, Russell, Duncan, Bird, O’Neal and Kobe Bryant. Yes, James is at number two. On a side note, Curry is the youngest in their top 20 at number 19. Take a moment to go over those names again.

Kalb justified Shaq being number one by saying that, by age 31, he had scored more than just about two dozen or so players in the entire history of the league, and was doing so in a league of close to 30 teams, unlike the eight to 16 teams of past eras. Incidentally, O’Neal was also the youngest player on the NBA’s original list, after just four years in the league. Chamberlain was number two because he could do anything he set his mind to, including holding the scoring record in every arena, scoring 100 points in one game, averaging more than 48 minutes in one season and more than 50 points a game in another, and even leading the NBA in assists. And Wilt lost so many Game 7s in the Finals because of somebody else on his teams. When Bill Russell came along, the league eventually had to start keeping track of blocked shots, and he and the Celtics won eleven championships in all, including eight straight. 

Michael Jordan was six of six in the NBA Finals, two three-peats with different sets of teammates, and led the league on scoring as a matter of habit. Kareem brought one title to Milwaukee and five to Los Angeles, and retired with all-time numbers. How many of the new additions to this arbitrary list even approximate those achievements? Kalb even had Dennis Rodman at number 30, because he averaged 14 to 17 rebounds a game on top of what his teammates pulled down, and won championships despite only playing one end of the floor, albeit the opposite end that Dominique Wilkins and George Gervin played on.

We all appreciate a good story, and are often plagued by an irresistible (and unnecessary) itch to rewrite history. There are so many flaws to the new list that CBS foisted onto the public, but at least it stimulates discussion. At its heart, greatness is not a popularity contest, it is governed by hard facts, passion and the understanding of the fans. All of the fans, not just admirers of certain players of a certain era.