Record Records - Part 3 NBA-I: Bill Russell
Sporting achievements that will probably never be repeated or bettered, an opinion
Scrutinising sport is a funny thing. It’s a competition of physical prowess, mental toughness, team work, preparation, all that jazz that coaches go on about. But it’s hard to put a number on mental toughness, hard to precisely define how prepared an athlete is, hard to objectively state the team work at play. But we want to know these things! The inherent nature of competition drives the desire to quantify who is competing the best, and those really invested in the culture and fabric of a sport know that winning titles and medals doesn’t always reflect this. And so we get statistics, analytics, numbers based solely on output and production by the athletes, an imperfect but inescapable surrogate for what we really want.
This series is a celebration of those in their sports that have statistical achievements so impressive I don’t think they’re likely to ever be bettered or even repeated. This is by no means supposed to fulfil some perfect list of the most impressive records and statistics across the sporting world, these are just records that are interesting and incredible in my opinion, and are therefore of course very much centred on the sports that I love or pay attention to. This series of articles is focused on sports that I am attached to, so, apologies for inevitably missing some incredible record in a field I’m ignorant of.
This week we’re staying in North America but turn to a different code, basketball.
To hear the breakdown of Jerry Rice and his records, as well as more of an introduction to statistics in American football, see the first part of this series.
The explore the incredible career of Tom Brady see the second part of this series.
My apologies for the cumbersome length of the Brady piece, I hope this week feels a little easier of a read.
Basketball
How does a country obsessed with sporting statistics handle a sport with comparatively few statistics to record? Well, in basketball, the answer is in finding ways to combine them, or looking at extra details of a player that other sports don’t even log. Sure, you can go and look up how many minutes an NFL player played in a game, but it’s buried in the stats, rarely discussed or even known by fans. But in the NBA, the minutes per game is a key talking point. As is player usage, efficiency, estimated wins added, double-doubles (or triple-doubles, quadruple-doubles) and so on. All because at its heart, the game has the following outcomes [and statistic recorded] available each possession:
The team in possession successfully shoots a field goal [player who scored, player who made the final pass (the assist)]
The team in possession shoots a field goal that misses [player who attempted the shot, player who collected the rebounded ball]
The team in possession shoots a field goal but it is blocked by a player from the opposing team [player who attempted the shot, player who made the block]
The team in possession loses control of the ball either by a bad pass or stepping out of bounds [player who lost the ball]
The team in possession either gains free throws or loses possession due to a foul by the opposition or themselves respectively
This is not to simplify the game, basketball has as much nuance and intricacy as any other modern sport. But there’s only 5 players on either side, as opposed to 9 in baseball, 11 in cricket/soccer/gridiron, 13 or 15 in rugby league or union, or 18 in Aussie rules. This leads to less scale, less interactions between specialised positions, and so the core statistics need additional analysis when discussing who is balling the best. Ignoring the fancy stats for a moment, the raw statistics a player accumulates in a game (from any or all of those outcomes listed above) are (core 5 bolded):
Minutes played
Points scored
Field goals made and missed, and therefore completion %
The same but for 3-point shots
The same but for free throws
Assists
Offensive, defensive, and total rebounds
Steals
Blocks
Turn-overs
Fouls
From these we get combinations of statistics, like efficiency, which combines the total of the 5 core with shooting percentage and turnovers. The higher the core numbers, the lower the turnovers, and the better the completion rate the better your efficiency score. The other classic combo stat is the double-double, or triple-double, etc. The concept here is that reaching double figures in any of the core 5 stats is a good game in that statistic, so to get double figures in 2 of them, i.e. a double-double, is impressive. Even more so is to reach double figures in 3 of them, a triple-double, and then the extremely rare quadruple-double, ten or more in 4 of the 5 statistics in one game (only 4 have ever been recorded in the NBA, and no player has ever recorded a quintuple-double outside of high school basketball). But the advanced statistics (as it’s referred to) goes way deeper, with some metrics that sound unbelievably and unnecessarily complicated to any but the hardcore basketball fans.
So with these comparatively few core statistics to analyse, surely the argument over the best player is easy? Hahaha, oh reader, if only. If only. No, the basketball greats debate is a furious and surprisingly vitriolic world. Maybe because they need to pick apart the raw statistics more than most sports the debate focuses on the smallest of details. Or maybe, (and this my preferred theory) the 5-player team means individuals have disproportionate impact compared to other sports, and so arguments over the most impactful feel extra important. Whatever it is, the more I dug into basketball fandom, the more shocked I was by how polarised, fractious, and down-right mean the zealots of given legends are. If you feel strongly about whether Michael Jordan or LeBron James is the GOAT, or that neither of them are, or even that “everyone is right in some way, why can’t we get along?”, get ready for a very unpleasant experience on the internet (though there are many ways to have one it must be said). But let’s not discuss the basketball GOAT here, the only option is not to engage really, and instead just look at some players from the history of the NBA that own some impressive records, whether or not they were the best…
Bill Russell and the Celtics - Championships
Bill Russell played over 60 years ago, and yet no one has come close to his team’s achievements. Picture taken from Amino.com
Something about the NBA favours dynasties. Generally in team sports, for a side to keep winning championships they need to keep most of the core personnel around for a long time, maybe the comparatively smaller rosters of basketball makes this easier to achieve. It might also be that because individuals have a bigger impact on a smaller team you just need one or two superstars to hang around for the team to win a lot of titles. Whatever the reason, the list of NBA players with the most championships features a lot of double and triple-ups of team-mates:
Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar won 5 together for the LA Lakers between 1980 and 1988, so out of 9 seasons they won the whole thing 5 times, though interestingly only once going back-to-back (Cooper, Wilkes, Rambis, Worthy were all there for 3 or more of those but I’m highlighting the super-stars here)
George Mikan and Jim Pollard won 5 titles in a 6 year run in the 1950s when the Lakers were still in Minneapolis (the name makes a lot more sense now, it’s not like Los Angeles is known for its lakes…), again with a host of supporters present for most of them (Mikkelsen, Harrison, Skoog)
Larry Bird and Kevin McHale won 3 in 6 years in the 80s for the Boston Celtics
Tim Duncan won 5 championships with the San Antonio Spurs between 1999 and 2014, never going back-to-back but impressive for the longevity of the dynasty, with Manu Ginóbili and Tony Parker there for all but the first (and Bowen for the middle 3)
Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant won 3 straight from 2000-2002, with Bryant winning 2 more in 2009-2010
Dwayne Wade won 3 with the Heat; first in 2006 and then back-to-back in 2012/2013, Udonis Haslem with him for all 3 and LeBron James there for the repeat
In recent years the Golden State Warriors out of San Francisco have had remarkable success, winning 4 between 2015 and 2022, including back-to-back in 2017-2018, with Steph Curry and Klay Thompson the stars present for all 4, and Kevin Durant the superstar of the repeat (not to mention Green and Iguilda, who were also there for all 4)
And of course there’s the legendary 90’s dynasty from Chicago, the Bulls pulling off the rare feat of winning three titles in a row, and doing it twice in an eight year span, though only Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen were present for both runs
This is to highlight several dominant patches by various teams over the years. It also shows that most of these patches are quite dense, with Tim Duncan the exception. Interestingly, looking at the list of most championships by a player, there are very few that weren’t part of a dynasty like this, that won multiple titles with common team mates. Though this isn’t surprising, there are similar trends in other sports, where the players with a lot of championships tend to win most if not all of them with one team. The NBA exceptions are LeBron James (4 in total: 2 with Miami, 1 with Cleveland, and 1 with the Lakers) and Robert Horry (7 in total: 2 with Houston, 2 with San Antonio, and 3 with the Lakers). LeBron is one of the top candidates for greatest of all time, but I’m guessing most of you reading haven’t heard of Horry, despite the fact that he has won 7 championships, that’s as many as Tom Brady!
Legendary duos of dynasty franchises: Magic and Kareem, Jordan and Pippen, Shaq and Kobe. Pictures taken from (left to right): Marca.com, Getty Images, NBC News
Now, Robert Horry has some impressive records himself, mostly surrounding play-offs seeing as he played in so many, but surely the most impressive is his 7 championships, after all I confidently stated that to be an unbreakable feat by Tom Brady in the NFL. The thing is, Horry doesn’t have that record. He’s not even in the top 6 for most championships. You see, in the above tour of great NBA dynasties I left one out, the topic of this piece, the truly remarkable dynasty that was the 1960’s Boston Celtics. Horry does have a record to do with championships: “He played 16 seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA), winning seven championships, the most of any player not to have played for the Boston Celtics of the 1950s and 1960s”.
Before we go further, my statement about Tom Brady’s 7 Super Bowls being unbreakable is a reflection of a particular quirk that’s the difference between the NBA and the NFL. The first Super Bowl was played at the culmination of the 1966 season. Since then, of the 32 teams in the NFL currently, only 4 have never been to the championship game, while of the 30 teams currently in the NBA, that number is 7. That’s 12.5% for the former and 23.3% for the latter, or, almost a quarter of the teams in the NBA have never even been to a final. The proportion of teams with multiple wins in each code is pretty similar though, and if we look at the teams with the 3rd most finals in each over those 57 years, it’s 5 in the NFL and 6 in the NBA, so how do we explain those percentages above? Well this is that quirk I alluded to before, and it comes down to the top two teams winning so much more in one sport than the other. The top two of the list in the NFL, the Patriots and the Steelers, combine for 12 of 57 Super Bowls with 6 each. While the top two of the NBA, the Celtics and the Lakers, combine for 21 in the same span, and a whopping 34 since the first NBA finals series (17 each over 77 years).
Logos taken from team websites
So, we’ve seen 21% of all NFL championships won by the top two teams, but 44% of all NBA championships won by their top two. Pick a year from the last 77 years to go back in time, and it’s almost 50-50 that the Celtics or Lakers were champions that year. That’s insane! It’s also neat that the record for most wins by a franchise is a tie in both sports, but I digress (as usual).
Looking at just the last 50 winners, as opposed to 77, the Lakers drop, from 17 to 11, still head and shoulders above the best of the NFL, but the Celtics plummet from 17 to 6! That difference of 11 finals corresponds exactly to the record for most championships by a player: Bill Russell.
My apologies for what was a very long introduction on the topic before even mentioning the record holder we’re discussing, but hey, gotta build that suspense.
Bill Russell joined the NBA in 1956, which is obviously a very long time ago. This was an era when racial tensions in the US were very topical, not that they’re not now, it’s just there was legal segregation still in place in some states in the late 50’s. Russel was joining a professional basketball league that had seen the first black players ever in 1950, only 6 years before Russell was drafted. It’s a great story, with Earl Lloyd, Chuck Cooper, and Sweetwater Clifton (the first black players) all playing their first NBA games within 4 days of each other, a thrice breaking of the racial barrier. Though a non-white player had played three years earlier, Wat Misaka, an American of Asian descent. But it wasn’t a flood after these developments, the first Latin-American ethnic player wouldn’t see a game until 1978, and the first Chinese player was in 2001. By the end of the 60s black players were dominating across the court as opposed to the scattering of brilliant individuals in the 50s, but they still faced unspoken quotas by teams and racism continues to be an issue. All I’m trying to illustrate is that Bill Russell’s incredible success is all the more impressive considering the environment he entered.
Russell by the standards of day-to-day life was tall, very tall, 6'10" in America, or 208 cm in most of the world. But by NBA standards that's not outlandish at all, what separates him from most other bigs (as centres are often referred to) was his immense reach, with a wingspan of 7'4" (224 cm) and incredible athleticism for his size and given the era. These meant he could guard the basket better than most, and get to rebounds before almost anyone. His ability to block shots, collect rebounds, and shut down players made him a dominant force even if he wasn't scoring the majority of his team's points like other superstars. He was also reportedly very quick for his size, his team-mates would later refer to their defensive pattern as the “Hey, Bill” defence, as whenever a player was struggling to mark an opponent they would shout for Russell who was so fast he could get to their aid in doubling-up the ball carrier and then get back to his original mark before the opposition could utilise the open player. His speed and shot contesting ability meant the other members of his team told reporters they could afford to play much more aggressively on defence, because if they over-committed and the guy got past them it didn’t matter, Russell would shut them down at the rim.
His temperament and personality were complicated, the New York Times reported in 1966 that:
"Russell's main characteristics are pride, intelligence, an active and appreciative sense of humor, a preoccupation with dignity, a capacity for consideration once his friendship or sympathy has been aroused, and an unwillingness to compromise whatever truths he has accepted."
A major influence was his paternal grandfather, the first in that line born a free citizen of the United States and someone who had built a school for black children (despite confrontations with the KKK), and who’s motto, passed from father to son to Bill, was:
"A man has to draw a line inside himself that he won't allow any man to cross."
Bill Russell grew up surrounded by severe and violent reminders of the racial inequality at the time and would throughout his life remain vocal on the issue, not allowing anyone to cross that line he had drawn. This is all the more laudable considering the circumstances we described earlier with regards to race in the NBA at the time.
Bill Russell was drafted by the then Saint Louis based Hawks in 1956, but only because the team that desperately wanted him had a lower pick that year. That team, the Boston Celtics, who had yet to win a title, moved heaven and earth to trade for Russell the day of the draft, sending the Hawks their premier player (and current centre, the position Russell played) as well as one of their best prospects who hadn’t yet played a game due to military service. The move was un-orthodox, Russell’s strengths were in his rebounding and defence, something viewed as of secondary importance at the time as the tallest players were primarily relied on for scoring. Dealing away their premier centre, Ed Macauley, who had been selected as an Allstar each of the prior 6 seasons and was statistically their best (well, maybe second best) player in 1955-1956 for a rookie prospect not known for his scoring was a bold call to say the least. It helped that Macauley was from Saint Louis and wanted to be home to help care for his sick son and was putting pressure on the Celtics to trade him away, but it was still a huge risk. Paid off though! The Celtics had already been a great scoring team, true even without Macauley, but they had lacked the defensive edge to beat the best. They made their first ever finals appearance in Russell’s rookie season, winning against those very same Hawks. That’s a first title for the franchise in Russell’s first year. They went back to the finals the next year against the same opponents, but the Hawks were victorious in the rematch largely because an injury early in the series meant Russell missed most of the finals. It would be the last time a team other than the Celtics won the NBA championship for almost a decade.
For the next 8 seasons straight the Celtics would absolutely dominate, almost always posting the best regular season standings and every single year taking out the championship. It was in this period that another record setting legend would enter the frame, Wilt Chamberlain, who we will discuss in depth in a later piece. Chamberlain was the offensive juggernaut to Russell’s defensive one. Both were tall and remarkably athletic for their height, but while Chamberlain’s production and statistics were otherworldly (they really were, looking forward to talking those numbers soon), it was Russell who got the wins, effectively the only player who could slow down Chamberlain and probably the main reason Chamberlain didn’t pile up championships himself. They first met in the 1960 season and would go on to have one of the most well-known rivalries in NBA history, many argue in all of American sporting history. All in all they would play each other 143 times (94 in the regular season and 49 in the play-offs), with Russell winning 86 and Chamberlain 57. But the wins on the biggest stage mattered most, with Chamberlain winning just two titles, one of which only after Russell had retired.
The first game between iconic rivals (Russell left, Chamberlain right). Picture taken from X
That said, it was Chamberlain who denied the Celtics an even more impressive run of titles. By the time Russell retired he had won 11 championships, 1 in his first season, 8 in a row, and then back-to-back to finish his career. There was only 1 season in between the first win and that run of 8, and only 1 season in between the run of 8 and the repeat, so that’s 11 championships in 13 seasons! The first gap was courtesy of the Hawks, while the second gap was the 1966-67 season, the first that the Celtics were without legendary coach Red Auerbach who had won the previous 9 titles (the most by any coach until 2009). In his stead Russell had agreed to the role of player-coach. He was the first black head coach in the history of the NBA, an area still dominated by white personnel to this day (despite the overwhelming black representation amongst players). Though his first season as coach marked the end of the streak of wins, they still made the semi-finals, but were defeated by Chamberlain and the 76ers who would go on to win the first of Chamberlain’s 2 titles. But it was not the end of the dynasty, merely a blip, as Russell won the next 2 championships as player-coach before retiring as a player.
Though he had won those additional two titles Russell was in a bad place in that final year, telling friends he was disenfranchised with the nation following Robert Kennedy’s assassination and America’s entering of the Vietnam War and felt unsatisfied committing himself to something as superficial as playing a game. His already surly attitude worsened, he skipped mandatory NBA coaches meetings and was described as lacking energy. He and his wife divorced, and after winning the championship he announced his immediate retirement and cut all ties with the Celtics. He would much later go on to coach other NBA teams in the 70s and 80s though with middling success and never making the finals.
That last paragraph wasn’t meant to be a downer, just an interestingly sudden and sad ending to a record breaking career. To win 11 championships out of 13 seasons (and being the runner-up in one of them) is just insane. There are other sports with similar dominant dynasties, but none of them had a single integral player at the heart of every win (that I could find without too deep a dive, very happy to be proven wrong, let me know!). He won a staggering 5 regular season MVP awards, equal 2nd with Michael Jordan and one win behind Kareem, despite not being a star scorer, the most common way to get the award. The finals MVP award, and the NBA is one of the few sports I know where this award is held in the same regard, sometimes higher, than the regular MVP award, was introduced the year of his last season. Because of his dominance in NBA finals, and he played in and won more than any, the award has been named in his honour since 2005.
But let’s talk stats.
Russell’s game-changing impact was his defence and rebounds, and sure enough these are his impressive stats. Rebounds are an underappreciated part of the game, but in my opinion should be held with as much reverence as points, because a missed shot regathered gives a second chance to a wasted possession, or if the missed shot was by the opponent, the re-gather is key to ensure they don’t get that second chance. A lot has changed in the NBA since Russell’s time in how offences are run, as well as the shooting ability of the average player, and so rebounds are lower today than they were then. But his numbers are still insane. Going back in 10 year leaps let’s look at the rebounding per game leaders:
2022-2023: D. Sabonis (12.3), G. Antetokounmpo (11.8), N. Jokic (11.8)
2012-2013: D. Howard (12.4), N. Vucevic (11.7), Omer Asik (11.7)
2002-2003: B. Wallace (15.4), K. Garnett (13.8), T. Duncan (12.9)
1992-1993: D. Rodman (18.3), S. O’Neal (13.9), D. Mutombo (13.0)
1982-1983: M. Malone (15.3), B. Williams (12.5), Laimbeer (12.1)
1972-1973: W. Chamberlain (18.6), N. Thurmond (17.1), D. Cowens (16.2)
1962-1963: W. Chamberlain (24.3), B. Russell (23.6), W. Bellamy (16.4)
1952-1953: G. Mikan (14.4), N. Johnston (13.9), H. Gallatin (13.1)
Which looks like:
You know what, I take it back. It’s not that the NBA has changed that much (though it has), Chamberlain and Russell were just freaks! The top rebounders each year have changed but not as much as I thought, there just happened to be two guys in the 60s who were absolutely incredible. Russell would average 20+ rebounds per game every season of his career except his first (19.6…) and his last two when was also the head coach (18.6 and 19.3). His career average is 22.5 rebounds per game! That’s insane, almost double the best person of the most recent season, double, and averaged not over the most productive stretch, but his whole career. But this is not his record, Chamberlain won out in that aspect of the rivalry, just edging him and finishing with a career average of 22.9. Chamberlain also had more seasons leading the league in rebounds. Though Russell does have the record for most rebounds in playoff games (24.9 per game), the most in a rookie season (22.9 per game), the most in a single half (32!), and most consecutive games with 20+ rebounds (15). These records will almost certainly never be broken (unless Chamberlain is resurrected) as the league rebounding numbers have decreased and as we’ve seen above, Russell and Chamberlain are just streets ahead. There have been 24 times in the history of the sport that someone has averaged 20+ rebounds per game in a season:
The other elite aspect of Russell’s game, defence, is harder to quantify. One of the key stats in today’s game used to assess a defender is blocks, but they weren’t officially recorded by the NBA until 1973, 10 years after Russell had retired. So that’s another record he doesn’t own. The record by the way is held by Mark Eaton, who’s career blocks per game was 3.5. However, Boston writers did attempt to tally Russell’s blocks, so we have unofficial numbers. From those home games his blocks per were a little higher than that record of 3.5, sitting at 8.1. 8.1!!! What if the home stats were higher than the away stats, and what if the Boston writers were being overly generous? Well even if we half that number (and the reports would need to be wildly off for that to be appropriate) he would still have the record for blocks per game. So, while that record is not officially his, I think we can give it to him.
But the real record he holds that stands head and shoulders above the rest is championships.
Players in bold are in the basketball hall of fame.
For reference, almost every Celtics championship on that figure is from that 13 year period that was Russell’s career, with Havlicek and Nelson present for the Celtics brief title resurgence in 1974 and 1976. The Lakers also have a huge showing on that figure, but those come from different dynasties decades apart. In terms of total championships won by players with 5 or more, the Bulls dynasty of the 90s account for 21 (13%), the Lakers of the late 80s and early 2000’s for 44 (27%), while the Celtics of the 60s (and those few in the 70s) accounts for 83 (51%)! I mean, the top 6 most championships by a player are all from that dynasty, and 8 out of the top 9, with that one exception not in the hall of fame as he was never the star in his 7 titles. It’s otherworldly. I know I keep saying this every week, and maybe we’ll get to some breakable records soon, but Bill Russell’s 11 championships in 13 years is as unbreakable as any. The game has changed considerably since Russell retired, salary cap and players moving between teams to get better deals (far more common now) means keeping a dynasty together is tough. The Warriors have done the best job of it in the last decade, and they have 4 titles to show, a very long way from the record. Considering the closest anyone has come in the 60 years since that Celtics dynasty is 7, and in the last 25 years the best is 5, the idea of a single franchise winning 11 or more in short order is bordering impossible.
Russell died in 2022, aged 88. He had already had his jersey number retired by the Celtics, but in the wake of his death the NBA announced a league-wide retirement of this number, the only instance of this in the history of the game (so far). Never again will an NBA player wear the number 6, reserved forever in respect of the legend. Reading his life story I was struck by his force of personality and his accomplishments despite the trials of his youth due to racial persecution. One particular story really stood out and I want to end this piece with its anecdotal retelling. Recall before you read it that his grandfather had been a particular influence on his life, especially in representing the struggle for racial equality.
“After the loss, he led his grandfather through the Celtics locker rooms and the two saw the white Celtic Havlicek taking a shower next to his black teammate Sam Jones and discussing the game. Suddenly, his grandfather broke down crying. Asked by Russell what was wrong, his grandfather replied how proud he was of him, being coach of an organization in which blacks and whites coexisted in harmony.”
Bill Russell, absolutely amazing. Picture taken from Wikipedia
