If you do not want us and our partners to use cookies and personal data for these additional purposes, click 'Reject all'. On March 18, 1968, Wilt Chamberlain allegedly put up a stat line of 53 points, 32 rebounds, 14 assists, 24 blocks, and 11 steals. But Chamberlain's enduring legacy is his series of losses to the Boston Celtics. In 1960-61, leaguewide field goal percentages had only just crossed 40 percent. Heres why. Keep in mind, a bulk of these games are from the later rounds of the playoffs. Question, Comment, Feedback, or Correction? However, there is one Wilt Chamberlain record that stands the test of time. And what about sickness? Wilt Chamberlain claimed that he slept with 20,000 women. A media firestorm erupted, and Chamberlain was attacked from all sides. His basketball battles against his own personal David, Bill Russell, became a morality play which did neither man justice, but defined the essence of sporting success for generations of American fans. Heck, Chamberlain might have posted a 100-point triple-double. Wilt Chamberlain PPG 30.1 RPG 22.9 APG 4.4 HEIGHT 7'1" (2.16m) WEIGHT 250lb (113kg) COUNTRY USA LAST ATTENDED Kansas BIRTHDATE August 21, 1936 DRAFT 1959 EXPERIENCE 14 Years Stats Career Per Mode. The 7'1" center also took home the Rookie of the Year award in 1960, and led the league in rebounding 11 times. He never fouled out of a game, ever. It's not easy being Goliath. For instance, according to Basketball-References records, Chamberlain and Russell combined for 22 of the 24 40-rebound games in NBA history, as well as the top 18 single-season rebounding averages. We will take a closer look at his remarkable quintuple-double performance and the myths surrounding the record. Which NBA players could break Wilt Chamberlain's 100-point record? But it is believed that Chamberlain achieved a quintuple-double in that game. Two of the 10 records Bill Simmons detailed in his Book of Basketball as the most unbreakable have fallen in the past four years. Coach Bill Sharman, a former Celtic, challenged Wilt to play "like Russell" for a season. As for his nemesis Bill Russell, in 1961, the man with 11 rings pulled off one of the most shocking quadruple doubles ever and it was against Wilt: 15 points, 25 rebounds, 13 blocks and 15 stealsnot assists but steals. His dominance was such that nearly every scoring or rebounding recordof hiswould remainuntouched. The guy I've noticed getting a lot of poke aways and steals was actually Russell. Even more than his 50.4 points per game, Chamberlains most unbreakable single-season record might be his minutes-per-game mark: 48.5 in 1961-62. Chamberlain is reportedly the only player in NBA history to record a quintuple-double. If this is all just based on newspaper reports the stats are not trustworthy at all. Wilt Chamberlain played 14 seasons for the Lakers, Warriors and 76ers. The Warriors were playing a "home" game, but the team had to travel toHersheypark Arena. Allegedly this was the trigger that set Wilt off in the 2nd half. Chamberlain was emphatic that he never went to bed with a married woman. Tools and Resources Used by Real General Managers. A lot of NBA scoring and rebounding records look unattainable because of Chamberlain's dominance in the 1960s. FGA, TRB, AST, PF, GS over 99% complete back to 1975-76. We are not making it all up in our heads, thinking well of Kris Dunn because we want to: he has real talents to bring, and a body that for the time being will allow him to use them. That puts Wilt at 7'4". We have tools and resources that can help you use sports data. Wilt Chamberlain wasn't just a scoring champion. Despite the backlash, Chamberlain never backed down from his claim. Kyrie Irving and Luka Doncic both had 40-point games after the Sixers loss against the Mavs. Given the taxing weighton every player for a single game with travel, media commitments and so on, it doesn't seem likely that this record of 33 straight wins will ever be bettered. When Wilt or one of his rivals grabbed a bunch of boards in quick succession, they just kept going. In the 2 games in the link he averaged at least 14.5 per game. Even todays reb, blocks, steals and assists recording has an error rate of 20-30%. He managed his money shrewdly, and found his reputation growing as his ground-breaking statistical domination came to overshadow his failure in championships. He probably would take a woman to bed any time he couldn't fall asleep. Find out more. Maybe Embiid should call himself the greatest. Wilt Chamberlain: Sample Average - 8.63 BPG Sample S.D - 4.05 Sample Size - 112 Estimate Career BPG (99% Conf Interval) - ~7.7-9.6 BPG If one believes that there is a "high" bias going on, taking out the 11 highest block numbers leads to a range of: Bill Russell - 6.7-8.0 BPG Wilt Chamberlain - 7.0-8.5 BPG Subscribe to Stathead Basketball: Get your first month FREEYour All-Access Ticket to the Basketball Reference Database. Nor was there ever a woman who came forward with an unplanned pregnancy or a paternity suit. The publicity turned the book into a bestseller. He put up video game numbers on a regular basis. It would be like saying Michael Jordan averaged 40 PPG because of newspaper headlines that only pointed out his great games. The NBA's weirdest triple doubles include some of the NBA's signature names, including Wilt Chamberlain and Jason Kidd. MORE:Which NBA players could break Wilt Chamberlain's 100-point record? It's not easy being Goliath. On March 2, 1962, Wilt Chamberlain set the NBA single-game scoring record by tallying 100 points for the Philadelphia Warriors in a 169-147 victory over the New York Knicks. Yet the two were friends: Wilt would bring Russell to dinner at his mother's house, then Russell would take advantage on the court. I've (also) found out that having one woman a thousand different times is more satisfying.". Chamberlain entered the league in 1959 at the age of 21 years old. The Lakers won 33 games in a row on their way to the title, arguably the greatest season in NBA history. Or write about sports? Duality underpins practically everything about the brief existence of the KD, Harden and Kyrie Nets. You can change your choices at any time by clicking on the 'Privacy dashboard' links on our sites and apps. Raptors. The reasons for their failure may have been inherent to the whole project. For his feats, Chamberlain was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1978, elected into the NBA 35th Anniversary Team in 1980, chosen as one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History in 1996, and named to the NBA 75th Anniversary Teamin 2021. Not that he minded. In an era when a black sportsman's success was inevitably attributed to "natural" talent, Chamberlain was an intelligent, articulate black man cursed with an unmistakable natural attribute. This exercise is meant to gaze in awe at Wilts statistical hegemony, not conclude that he was Drummond or Whiteside with a heavier workload in a different era. Who has the most points in a half in NBA history? Or, view "Trailers" for Season Field Goal Pct, or Career . Since it's inception in 1947, the NBA has witnessed plenty of such records. His NBA years: from 1960 to 1973 Wilt Chamberlain NBA Stats Summary: Career Averages Wilt Chamberlain Full Stats by Year : Per Game: Regular Season Stats Playoffs Stats Wilton Norman Chamberlain, basketball player, born August 21 1936; died October 12 1999, Giant figure of basketball whose skills revolutionised the game, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. According to close friends, Wilt loved threesomes. Wilt Chamberlain: 118: 2: Michael Jordan: 31: 3: Kobe Bryant: 25: 4: James Harden: 23: 5: Elgin Baylor . Miss only one extrafree throw, and he's stuck on99. Plenty of records are falling this NBA season, but this feat wont. I always knew Wilt blocked more shots than Russell. Yes, the league hadfewer teams in the 60s than it does nowbut that doesn't take awayfrom the fact that Bill Russell and the Boston Celtics clinched 11 NBA titles in a span of 13 years. The NBA did not record blocks until the 1973-74 season, so it's likely he also had a few of those. Still impressed by Oscars triple-double or Wilt slapping up a 50-25 for the season? Thats more than there have been total 30-rebound games from every NBA player combined since he retired. Chamberlain spent the last five seasons of his career with the LA Lakers from 1968-1973. "We went straight to the arena where we had to wait around for five or six hours for the game. He was acquired by the Philadelphia 76ers midway through the 1964-65 season. So, for the sake of missing games and financially,every player is incentivitized to ensure that they are called for less than 16 technicals in theregular season. Answer: I read up on Wilt. Hassan Whiteside did it four. All known blocked shot data of Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain: https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-fRFgkADAK80/VkG0j3zRocI/AAAAAAAAHTA/swVybP9vvpE/s0-Ic42/Russell%252520blocked%252520shots%252520135g.jpg, https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-tTIVEWsAP14/VkFK-IE7GHI/AAAAAAAAHSo/n_u04_ScpoQ/s0-Ic42/Wilt%252520blocked%252520shots.jpg. Due to the schedules forboth teams, he went on to play the Pistons' remaining 53 games and ended up with 88. If this is a representative sample, using the blocked shot numbers: "If I walk outside somebody might just hit me with their car, or say anything negative to me. NBA Playoff Seeding, Conference Championship Previews, and Best Bets, Adidas 2023 Sneaker Preview and Dillon Brookss Wild Outfit, Bucks Continue to Dominate, Believing in the Knicks, and Yet Another Live Show Announcement, The Mandalorian Season 3 Episode 1 Deep Dive, The Ploys and Tactics Behind Oscar Campaigning, A Secret Laundromat Meetup, New Jersey Episode 4, and Potomac Reunion Part 2. Let alone the best depth too. He was selected to play in 13 All-Star games. So perhaps he made time for repeats after all. He averaged over 50 points per game for an entire season. They would obviously not average anything close to that today, but they are still some of the most "transportable" vintage all time greats. Additionally, he did have a six-month schedule, for 14 seasons, of playing professional basketball. But it happened to be in this arena they had a shooting gallery, old penny arcade, so some of the guys went there, and I started shooting rifles and so forth. Kc Jones the assistant coach of the 72 Lakers publicly said to the media that he was utterly wrong in his thought about Wilt as a defensive player and also as a human being and in fact he even said it was the fault of Wilt's teammates as to why Wilt couldn't beat Russell and the Celtics. --------------------------------------------------------------------, Or more likely, newspapers only reported on the number of blocks when Wilt and Russell had an unusually high number of them. As in, final; complete; etched, essentially, with chisel in stone. However, it's highly unlikely that this record will be broken simply because of a rule change that was enforced in 2006. So many more shots meant so many more rebounds, especially when combined with factor no. In the 132 Warriors games in that span for which Basketball-Reference has rebounding data, Wilts rebounding percentage was 20 percent on the nose. He scored 23 points in the first quarter and had 41 by halftime, then tallied 28 in the third quarter, when the fans began to chant, "Give It To Wilt! In his legendary career, Chamberlain scored 31,419 points, including the unbelievable. In leading the Warriors to a169-147 victory, Chamberlain broke his own single-game scoring record of 78 points set on Dec. 8, 1961, against the Los Angeles Lakers, a game that included multiple overtime periods. Since then, Charles Oakley has the most single-game rebounds with 35 in 1988. And considering he never had any children, I would suggest that he could have been infertile from an STD he caught early in his career. and our The fact that he said 20,000 different women also leaves little time for repeats, or love. Is Golden State a sleeping giant? James Harden cant stop climbing historical leaderboards. One of my very old friends saw Wilt play many, many times and he always said, "If they kept track of blocks, Wilt and Russell would have averaged triple-doubles just like Oscar did." 2 in Wilts favor versus Drummond: Teams in 2019 dont miss enough shots. Go back in time and learn about Wilt Chamberlain's early years growing up, and early years in the NBA. All 4 are legit hall of fame players and are well deserving. He averaged 22.9 RPG also an NBA record for his career and with current day centers not grabbing near as many rebounds as centers from the past, it is pretty safe to say this record will not be broken. Powered by phpBB Forum Software phpBB Limited. Todays stats are just an estimation just as they were in the 60s. Three decades later, even Oakleys mark looks unattainable: Dwight Howards 30-board game last season was the leagues first since 2012 and just the third since 1996. It is no surprise that analysts and pundits covering basketball call the NBA record book 'The Autobiography of Wilt Chamberlain.' In both categories, Jason Kidd ranks second to Stockton with 12,091assistsand 2,684 steals. More broadly, last season, the leagues top 10 rebounders averaged 32 minutes per game, the lowest on record. So, it's highly improbable that any player would come close to Stockton's record, let alone break it. Chamberlain routinely went off for 50or 60 points throughout his career, but this one felt different, especially when the crowd got behind the chase for 100. According to statisticians, Chamberlain dropped 53 points, 32 rebounds, 14 assists, 24 blocks, and 11 steals in a game against the LA Lakers. There is some selection bias. 1. In those seasons, he grabbed 19.4 percent of available boards when he was on the floor. Chamberlain was the most dominant force the NBA has ever seen, Michael Jordan notwithstanding. Or write about sports? the official stats partner of the NBA, NHL and MLB. Prior to the 2006-07 season, the NBA announced that after 16 technical fouls in a season, an NBA player would be suspended for the next game without pay. At 7'1", Wilt Chamberlain may have been the most dominating and amazing basketball player of all time. For his career. Who could be a value signing? Let it Disturbing perimeter, on ball defence; Wilt was a rim standing guy like Eaton,Mutombo or Shaq. The five seasons with the most qualifying players with a rebounding percentage of 20 or better are the five most recent seasons, as many traditionally sized rebounders leave the court (or spread out on it) and yield more space for the few remaining close-to-the-basket bigs. Do you have a sports website? This record is most certainly going to remain untouched. Off the court, he embodied Hugh Hefner's 60s "Playboy philosophy"; a hipster who owned a popular jazz club, Smalls, he made no bones about romancing women of all races. Maybe that tally isnt fair to Chamberlain, given that it comprises the end of his career rather than his peak. Chamberlain tallied 25 separate 30-rebound games in his rookie season. Wed 13 Oct 1999 21.45 EDT. His quintuple-double performance in 1968 validates that statement. However, CP3is 35 years old and is heading into his 16th season. He won one more championship, with the Los Angeles Lakers in 1972. It may never be emulated again.