Quick. Name three centers from the 1950s. You can’t do it can you? Our fam at TheHoopDoctors.com did. They named 10 dudes, and made up a list. Some of the names, forget that, pretty much all the names outside of Bill Russell and George Mikan will be foreign to mostly everybody. Even the biggest hoophead has probably only heard the names Ed Macauley and Clyde Lovellette a few fleeting times. They weren’t Dwight Howard. But they weren’t Pavel Podkolzin either.
Is there a universe where Mikan is rated higher on a list than Russell (only the biggest winner in NBA history, and some say the best player)? Turns out there is. Mikan sits atop this list, averaging 23.1 points and 13.4 rebounds over the course of his six seasons in this decade. He won four championships and made four All-Star teams during the ’50s. Plus, he warrants extra points for “The Mikan Drill” and “The Mikan Rule.” Some players get one thing named after them. Your name gets stuck on two things? Legendary.
[Related: The Current Top 10 NBA Centers]
Russell averaged 16.1 points and a WTF-like 22 rebounds a night during the decade, with a couple of titles and All-Star games. Yet, he only played his first four seasons in the 1950s. Do you think that should that matter?
And when can we get back to great nicknames like “Easy” Ed Macauley, or even Red Rocha aka “The Thin Man”? Six of the players on this list have nicknames and they’re pretty much all better than K-Mart , D-Will or T-Mac.
Head on over to TheHoopDoctors.com to check out the full list. Get educated.
Could any of these guys play now?
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