Most Athletic Center of All Time? David Robinson or Dwight Howard

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Originally Posted by Drachen

Honestly, what you are doing is the same as the following:

I personally have never met, seen, or talked to 4down, but I mean come on, the guy has Herpes and 1 leg.

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Fair enough. that was a bad post. Abchang can be vindicated in his criticism.

In reality I have seen film - not a lot, but enough to know that it ain't for sure that he was hands down a better ahlete than Drob or Howard.

Who told you I had herpes? :lol

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Originally Posted by Cry Havoc

A fair point, and I agree. However, I'm not sure just simply stating that Wilt > everyone else is an unassailable comment, either.

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There were many arguments throughout the thread before I chimed in, whatever I could say would probably just repeat what was said.

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Originally Posted by Cry Havoc

Okay, I understand the advances, but when I watch NBA FINALS games from the 80s, which are usually the two best teams playing, I see defenders sagging back and giving wide open jumpshots to other players, 15-18 feet from the hoop with staggering regularity! I see lazy, half-effort defense everywhere! The offense is spectacular, but this is the Finals! To say nothing of the regular season. Do that in today's NBA, and you're going to get killed.

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That has much more to do with change in defensive philosphies rather than individual abilities. Before the Pistons, defense was an afterthought, and the speed in which the game evolved in the 90s since the success of the Pistons demonstrated that the players have the ability to change along with the game.

I watched those games as well, and while defense certainly sucked back in the day, another part of it was also there were great passers as well. People fawn over the passing abilities of Nash and Kidd, but it just doesn't compare to those of Magic and Bird, who not only passes to a player for open shots, but create scoring opportunities by passing to an area where their teammates should go. They just see the game 3 steps ahead of everyone else.

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Originally Posted by Cry Havoc

I'm not sure you can draw such parallels between a science and a sport. For starters, science relies on empiric knowledge of experiments and knowledge performed beforehand. Basketball does not. Unless you'd care to explain Tim Duncan, who was never really interested in basketball and certainly wasn't a student of the game, walking onto Wake Forest as a freshman and dominating the varsity players from day 1?

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The point was that players and teams do learn from those of the past. The Knicks and Rockets had that bruising defensive philosophy from the Pistons, the Spurs in turn evolved the Rockets defensive philosophies and offensive game by having the dominate big + 4 shooters model, which evolved by adding new offensive wrinkles with the penetration of Parker and Ginobili.

On an individual stand point, Jabbar (I think) created the reverse dunk to shield the ball from a blocker using the rim, Cousy invented the behind the back dribble, Tim Hardaway popularized the killer cross over done by Nate Archibald, and was since improved upon by Allen Iverson, Hakeem learned his ball fake from some teammate during his college day (don't remember the name), and kept improving it to be part of his dream shake. People learn from others who played before them, take the good parts, improve upon them and make it great.

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Originally Posted by Cry Havoc

The counter to your argument is thus: If Wilt was the first truly dominant bigman of the game, then other players are limited by him, because he was the first. Just like Hawking is unable to make a discovery like relativity, because of the fact that science is more nuanced today than in the past, today's players are unable to make the drastic leap forward in ability/production that Wilt did, and therefore, no matter how great they are, will not be looked upon the same as he was, rendering any comparisons moot and biased by their very nature.

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Players, and Scientists, can certainly break new grounds though the years. Sure it was much easier back in the day for Socrates to come up with new theories when there was absolutely no study on the subject of science, the Newtons and the Einsteins break new ground by discovering aspects of life that has never been thought before. Life, and the universe, is so complicated that we as humans probably haven't explored a minute part of it.

Sure, basketball is not as complicated as the universe, but we have seen advances being made in the game in every decade, Jabbar with his skyhook, Magic and Bird with their passing, Jordan with his dominance at the guard position, Duncan with his bank shots, Shaq with his combination of agility and power. I am sure I am going to see the games of LeBron James evolve to a new level, and it's also a reason I would not consider Kobe Bryant as one of the best of all time, because he tried to hard to emulate what Jordan did, and lost his own signature.

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Originally Posted by Cry Havoc

The idea remains that if you insert David Robinson or Hakeem into the 60s, they probably would have been absolutely unstoppable, much like Hakeem was.

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I am sure they would, and I am sure Wilt and Russell would have dominated in the 80's, 90's and 00's.

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Originally Posted by Cry Havoc

Howard could still get there. He needs to add polish to his offensive game, but if he develops a mid-range jumper and improves his footwork, he could be a nightmare for other teams.

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I am still not sold on Howard. His offense is still far away, and his defense is based more on athleticism than understanding of the game. I would love to see him dominate one day, because he is really a showman and a joy to watch, but I doubt he could ever attain the level of a Shaq or an Hakeem.

Wilt footage vs. David footage

Wilt gets blocked twice in his own highlight reel. Wilt was legendary in his own right, but let's not put a blue ox by his side.

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Originally Posted by ambchang

his defense is based more on athleticism than understanding of the game.

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Is he as athletic as those guys, though? My biased opinion is that David was more athletic, but Dwight is a beast.

Another bit about Robinson, I am sure I have read somewhere that he was golfing in the low 70's the first time he picked up a golf club. That's the level of coordination and control you are dealing with.

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Originally Posted by newacc

Wilt footage vs. David footage

Wilt gets blocked twice in his own highlight reel. Wilt was legendary in his own right, but let's not put a blue ox by his side.

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Bingo - although the hook shot in wilts video around 1:18 was money.

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Originally Posted by Phila_Chamberlain

Other than things listed that were later proven to be different,

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Are you talking about the one year of highschool vs no highschool? That pretty much changes nothing...it's the difference between 1 and 0.

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I do not believe there was a defensive player of the year award while Wilt was playing, and blocked shots were not an official stat until after Wilt retired.

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And Wilt still has no rep as any sort of a defensive stalwart...

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I couldn't answer the question of Wilt being able to walk on his hands, but Wilt was the fastest player on all of his teams in the 60s and it wasn't even close.

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It's more impressive if David Robinson was the fastest player on all of his teams. And there's an interview with Pop right now that confirms he was the fastest player on his team when he entered the league(and I've seen interviews that he actually could outrun Tony Parker, even in his final year).

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However, blocked shots were kept by team stat takers and Wilt averaged a triple double in points, rebounds and blocked shots. Had record been kept his blocked shots numbers would blow Hakeem's way out of the water.





I'll look up a quick video of Wilt when he played with the Globbies later. In case you didn't know though, Medowlark Lemon played center on that team and Wilt played guard, so in this video Wilt pulls off at least one move I believe that you would think was a guard (partly because it was, he was just 7'1")

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David was pretty much the PG of the 94 team...he didn't lead the league in assists, but up better assists number than any other C of his era(and I think Chris Webber is the only PF or C since to beat David's 4.8 outside of Garnett
s typically high numbers), but then again bigman assists are the measure of double teams as much as anything else, and there's no doubt Wilt faced a great many of them.

But I still don't believe he was faster than Drob, and I don't believe he was any stronger either.


We should get some video and see just how fast they were....


It's a no-brainer that Wilt doesn't have David's arms.

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Originally Posted by ShoogarBear

For what, the National Arithmetic Association?

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sure, I'll take that. Arguing height is usually something you only do in basketball arguments and height isn't necessarily true arithmetic...


You get points for being funny of course, but I'm still pulling the out of condition card(and waiving it).

The answer is so obvious and is Wilt as stated above:
Wilt was a world class athlete as a sprinter, high jumper and without weight training was strong as a bull.

Robinson > Howard and even a young Shaq might be greater than Howard who is a great leaper but what else?

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Originally Posted by newacc

Wilt footage vs. David footage

Wilt gets blocked twice in his own highlight reel. Wilt was legendary in his own right, but let's not put a blue ox by his side.

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Only that it was the greatest blocker in the history of the league, Bill Russell.

And let's face it, everybody gets blocked in the NBA at one point or another.

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Originally Posted by newacc

Wilt footage vs. David footage

Wilt gets blocked twice in his own highlight reel. Wilt was legendary in his own right, but let's not put a blue ox by his side.

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I challenge anyone to watch those videos and tell me Wilt was in the same stratosphere of speed or quickness as Drob.

Drob just looks like he runs in a totally different gear than anyone else, and that's against modern NBA players.

That footage of Wilt is obviously slowed down, but he's still not anywhere close to Drob.

And Drob being faster than any body else on his team is a hell of a lot more impressive than Wilt being able to make that claim.

Wilt was a collegiate level high jumper, and that's without putting much practice or training into it. If Wilt were around today and trained the way athletes trained today with all the advances in conditioning, weight-training, and nutrition, he'd easily be a world class high jumper.

There's a distinction to be made, as often there needs to be with comparisons that pit individual athletes from different eras. I probably agree with the notion that David Robinson is the fastest among those mentioned in the thread. But, if we break it down to natural athletic ability, I think everything we know about Wilt Chamberlain would give him the edge overall athletically.

We're talking about him being in an era where there was little to no weight lifting for basketball players, probably little to no isometric training, certainly not the advancement in nutrition and cardio conditioning there is now. With what we know about Wilt, and granted a lot of it could be exaggerated to some varying degrees, I think there's a strong case for him being the most naturally gifted athlete in the history of the NBA.

The claims that he played against a bunch of 5'11" white guys are outrageously ignorant. I don't really believe that Wilt had a 50 inch vertical. But, I believe that if there are enough people who were in the know that contended it, he was probably in the neighborhood. And, a 45-48 inch vertical for a 7'1", 275-290 lbs guy is still pretty incredible. He has his high school times of a 10.9 second 100 yard dash and 49 second 440 yard run in the books. Neither are close to world record times, but are pretty impressive for a guy his size and probably not the best he could have done since that was high school. I believe (and this is from memory of reading and watching stuff about Wilt) that his best in high jump is 6'8" or 6'9" and that's with little time and training put into it. Again, with actual time, effort, and training, I could see him getting close to clearing a 7 foot bar.

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this yet either, but after he retired from the NBA, he played several years of professional volleyball as well.

Wilt was the first real "athletic freak" in the NBA. Based on purely "natural" athletic ability, I don't know if there was, is, or will be a greater athlete than him in the NBA, center position or otherwise.

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Originally Posted by JamStone

Wilt was a collegiate level high jumper, and that's without putting much practice or training into it. If Wilt were around today and trained the way athletes trained today with all the advances in conditioning, weight-training, and nutrition, he'd easily be a world class high jumper.

There's a distinction to be made, as often there needs to be with comparisons that pit individual athletes from different eras. I probably agree with the notion that David Robinson is the fastest among those mentioned in the thread. But, if we break it down to natural athletic ability, I think everything we know about Wilt Chamberlain would give him the edge overall athletically.

We're talking about him being in an era where there was little to no weight lifting for basketball players, probably little to no isometric training, certainly not the advancement in nutrition and cardio conditioning there is now. With what we know about Wilt, and granted a lot of it could be exaggerated to some varying degrees, I think there's a strong case for him being the most naturally gifted athlete in the history of the NBA.

The claims that he played against a bunch of 5'11" white guys are outrageously ignorant. I don't really believe that Wilt had a 50 inch vertical. But, I believe that if there are enough people who were in the know that contended it, he was probably in the neighborhood. And, a 45-48 inch vertical for a 7'1", 275-290 lbs guy is still pretty incredible. He has his high school times of a 10.9 second 100 yard dash and 49 second 440 yard run in the books. Neither are close to world record times, but are pretty impressive for a guy his size and probably not the best he could have done since that was high school. I believe (and this is from memory of reading and watching stuff about Wilt) that his best in high jump is 6'8" or 6'9" and that's with little time and training put into it. Again, with actual time, effort, and training, I could see him getting close to clearing a 7 foot bar.

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this yet either, but after he retired from the NBA, he played several years of professional volleyball as well.

Wilt was the first real "athletic freak" in the NBA. Based on purely "natural" athletic ability, I don't know if there was, is, or will be a greater athlete than him in the NBA, center position or otherwise.

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That's one of the better arguments I've seen from you, but I can still look at the video and see Wilt didn't have David's physique and David's got gymnasts arms, produced by muscle extension, which is the strongest muscle development there is, not body builders produced by muscle contraction and those guys that Wilt was playing against definitely weren't as advanced as the atheletes David played against.



I'll just put it another way, I can also look at the video and see Wilt was an extremely skilled offensive player with a great deal of natural touch and feel for the game...part of what made him Wilt Chamberlain was his skill, as well as his athletecism.


David did what he did just because he could do things, a lot of them, phbysically that no one else of his size(and even smaller) could do.


David Robinson accomplished things that only players like Wilt or Karreem accomplished...and it was almost entirely predicated upon athletecism, moreso than it was when they themselves accomplished those feats.



I still say Wilt was unquestionably the greatest player to ever step foot on a basketball court, I do not think putting him in a comparison with the Admiral on sheer athletecism is an argument that was decided before it even began though. There is definitely room to speculate David was his match or even his superior as an athlete.


There just are no other 7 footers that moved like David Robinson did...


As mentioned earlier, David Robinson had a freaking 6-7 inch growth spurt after joining the Navy...


It's almost like his body didn't have time to get slower as it got bigger like is the typical case with bigmen....he has the movements of a much smaller man.

who's David Robinson?

I haven't read the whole thing, but I will say that D-Rob at age 28 or 29 (his prime) was a better pure athlete than Howard is now. The way he moved, his body control, and his level of coordination was amazing. Not only that, but most people forget how explosive he was because he was so effortless doing it.

It's close race, though, and Dwight could well pass up The Admiral within the next few years. He's undoubtedly the most athletic pure center to come along since Robinson and Hakeem, and I'd already put him as one of the 5 most athletic centers of all-time.

All I know is that Wilt wouldn't have been put to sleep by Karl Malone.

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Originally Posted by 2Cleva

All I know is that Wilt wouldn't have been put to sleep by Karl Malone.

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Wilt had the soft / no heart label too you know.

And Karl Malone finished his career like 0-20 in games against Drob after that incident...including being held scoreless by David in a game in his final season.

Dont Dis DAVID ROBINSONS legacy by comparing him to a guy who hasnt accomplished jack on the court or off.........

When he donates 12-million of his own money to do something for others outside of basketball then compare them... But dont mention them in the same sentence let alone try to compare the 2 basketball wise.

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Originally Posted by Phila_Chamberlain

Out of everything you brought up this is the one that is easily the most wrong. People today don't know it, but Wilt was a better defender than he was an offensive player. When he was coming out of college after averaging just under 30 ppg he was known for his defense. There were stories that if Jerry West was lighting up a Wilt team, Wilt would leave the post and lock down West. The only downside to that was there was no dominating defender to grab the rebounds and block shots, but West was not a worry anymore.

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Eh...I gotta go to work, I'll be back for the rebuttal later. For now I may have posted some fatual details in error, but I didn't invalidat any arguments I've been making. I got two facts wrong, one one of those errors served to enhance my argument(sligthly) the other one served to hurt it...

So focusing on small details and attempting to argue that has somehow invalidated my arguments is pretty weak and reeks of grasping for straws.

I feel I've been pretty unbiased, even bolstering some of the Wilt arguments where I felt it was deserved...whereas you are pretty much focusing on unsubstantiated talk, and conceding nothing to David...discounting a great deal of factual informartion in his favor in the process...


IOW, Wilt does not have reputation for being a great defensive player. And block stats kept by team stat keepers before there was even an agreed upon definition of a block doesn't really serve as ironclad proof.

I imagine he probably was hell of a shotblocker...but you are saying man who registerd like, no block totals, blocked more shots than anyone in the history of the game? That is pure runaway speculation and conjecture...and unacceptable as either logic or fact.

Not only that but David was a better FT shooter, and not because he practiced his free throws, or took more of them. It's simply because he exceptionally coordinated beyond the typical bigman.

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Originally Posted by newacc

Wilt footage vs. David footage

Wilt gets blocked twice in his own highlight reel. Wilt was legendary in his own right, but let's not put a blue ox by his side.

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The only really impressive thing (athletically) that I saw in that video of wilt was the block on the skyhook toward the end.



* oh and the game was most certainly played at a far slower pace back then :D

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Originally Posted by JamStone

Wilt was a collegiate level high jumper, and that's without putting much practice or training into it. If Wilt were around today and trained the way athletes trained today with all the advances in conditioning, weight-training, and nutrition, he'd easily be a world class high jumper.

There's a distinction to be made, as often there needs to be with comparisons that pit individual athletes from different eras. I probably agree with the notion that David Robinson is the fastest among those mentioned in the thread. But, if we break it down to natural athletic ability, I think everything we know about Wilt Chamberlain would give him the edge overall athletically.

We're talking about him being in an era where there was little to no weight lifting for basketball players, probably little to no isometric training, certainly not the advancement in nutrition and cardio conditioning there is now. With what we know about Wilt, and granted a lot of it could be exaggerated to some varying degrees, I think there's a strong case for him being the most naturally gifted athlete in the history of the NBA.

The claims that he played against a bunch of 5'11" white guys are outrageously ignorant. I don't really believe that Wilt had a 50 inch vertical. But, I believe that if there are enough people who were in the know that contended it, he was probably in the neighborhood. And, a 45-48 inch vertical for a 7'1", 275-290 lbs guy is still pretty incredible. He has his high school times of a 10.9 second 100 yard dash and 49 second 440 yard run in the books. Neither are close to world record times, but are pretty impressive for a guy his size and probably not the best he could have done since that was high school. I believe (and this is from memory of reading and watching stuff about Wilt) that his best in high jump is 6'8" or 6'9" and that's with little time and training put into it. Again, with actual time, effort, and training, I could see him getting close to clearing a 7 foot bar.

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this yet either, but after he retired from the NBA, he played several years of professional volleyball as well.

Wilt was the first real "athletic freak" in the NBA. Based on purely "natural" athletic ability, I don't know if there was, is, or will be a greater athlete than him in the NBA, center position or otherwise.

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The woulda coulda stuff is weak. It's basically a concession that David was more athletic than Wilt - which he was.

Wilt had nowhere near a 50 inch vertical. That was as big a lie as his 20,000 women claim. If a 7 footer had a 50 inch verticle, I guarantee he wouldn't need to float up those weak no look, quick flip finger rolls around the post. Nor would all his dunks be of such low elevation...The video truth is that most of his dunks weren't too far above the rim. Moreover, it doesn't even look like he had the coordination to catch an alley oop with a defender around him.

Wilt's athletic prowess has been embellished. David Robinson was by far the more athletic of the two. It's not even really close and you can look at video after video to prove it. Wilt's athleticism was more akin to Robinson in his last years.

It's not weak to qualify eras. It's what it is.

You put Usain Bolt in the 1940s, he's not running a 9.58 100 meters. You put Barry Bonds in the 1960s, he doesn't hit 73 HRs in a season.

You have to take into consideration the time/era and what advantages athletes in each era have. Technology in nutrition, conditioning, and weight lifting absolutely should play a factor in this analysis. Would David Robinson have those arms if he didn't lift weights?

That's why I qualified my comments by saying "natural" athletic ability.