Kareem’s HOF teammates – Oscar, Magic, Big Game James

McHale’s HOF (or should be) teammates – Bird, Parrish, DJ (only a few years, and he belongs in the Hall for his Seattle work too, the boost he gave the Celtics the few years he was here was invaluable too) Walton (1 yr. and he was washed up at that point)

Kareem’s list is MUCH more impressive. He played with 2 of the top 6 of all time (and he’s in that group too) at some point in his career. It’s amazing how much deeper and stacked teams were back then (I guess 8-10 less teams will do that!)

Why am I getting clled out here. “The insanity of CELTS Fans?” I didn’t say anything like that. I agree you CAN make the case that Pierce is a better ALL-AROUND scorer than Larry (I’d disagree, but you can make a case) but I never went all homer on it…

Also, we disregard Shaq (and some people do Wilt) because I think we’re talking more a finesse game down low here (having multiple moves or one AMAZING move a la Kareem and Hakeem.) Obviously if we’re including smashing through people, Shaq’s way up there too…

I believe Kareem played on some pretty loaded teams as well. Didn’t seem to hurt his numbers. I just don’t see how McHale would rank higher on any scale than Kareem. Some say Kareem only had one move — I say he used one move way more than any other because that one move was unstoppable. Either way, he’s clearly a better low-post scorer than McHale.

Until this year, PP has been the best player on a horrible team.

rico must be crazy sayin karl malone was the second best player after jordan
give me olajuwon, robinson and shaq for my team. keep the mailman that if it werent for stockton the jazz woulda never been to the finals.

gman
duncan shoots around 70 percent thats real decent besides why mention free throws here.

Statistics don’t help here at all, obviously. Wilt scored a whole lot more points than McHale because he played in a different era and, ultimately, WAS a much better player overall. You can get more points than someone without necessarily being a better player in every aspect of the game. For example, Lebron was the scoring champion this year but Zach Randolph, who averaged about half as many points, is a better in the post. McHale also averaged fewer points than he could have because his team was just that loaded.

Ultimately, all you can go by is McHale’s moves and the opinions of those he played against. McHale was far from the game’s best big man ever – in my opinion, that award goes to Chamberlain – but many, MANY people agree that he’s the most skilled low post player in the history of the game.

Oh, and when people talk about Pierce being a better scorer than Bird, they’re not saying Pierce is BETTER than Bird. Nobody would be that stupid. They’re just saying Pierce has more ways to score than Bird. Bird, while one of the best shooters ever, was not as good at driving to the hoop as Pierce is. I’ll still say Bird was the better scorer, but that statement isn’t that crazy either.

And in defense of malone; he may be the greatest choke artist in the history of basketball, but he was a low post scorer. He didn’t have his back to the basket, but if you got yourself somehow in the low post and you somehow got the ball in the hoop and you do that consistently, you’re a low post scorer.