Forget LeBron James.
Forget Michael Jordan.
Forget Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson.
The best basketball player ever to play in the National Basketball Association never averaged 20 points a game, although he did average an amazing 22.5 rebounds a game.
The best basketball player ever won 11 championships, eight of them in a row and two of them in seasons when he served as coach of his team as well.
The 11 championships weren’t some bizarre hang-around-forever Nolan Ryan or Pete Rose thing either. The best basketball player ever had only two seasons in which he didn’t win the championsihip.
Oh, and he also won back-to-back NCAA championships and an Olympic gold medal.
Nobody came close to being what Bill Russell was, and when he died Sunday at age 88, the world lost an amazing man.
There’s a story that Russell and Michael Jordan were playing golf in the 1990s and Jordan told Russell that he and the Bulls were going to break the record for championships set by Russell and his Boston Celtics.
“You know, we won 11, but we won eight straight,” Russell said. “I don’t think you’ll live long enough to get either one of those.”
Jordan won three in a row twice for a total of six.
Russell’s accomplishments as a player were spectacular enough, but he took them to another level when the legendary Red Auerbach retired from coaching. After several other Celtic greats turned down the opportunity to take his place, Russell agreed as long as he could continue playing as well.
He coached the Celtics to championships in each of the next two seasons.
Impressive, especially when we consider that Russell was the first African-American head coach in any of the four major sports played in the U.S.
He wasn’t just a player or coach. He also spent a good part of his life fighting for civil rights and human rights.
In 2017, when Donald Trump started attacking black athletes for taking a knee during pregame national anthems, the 83-year-old Russell posted a picture of himself taking a knee.
He stood with Muhammad Ali when the heavyweight champion resisted the draft during the Vietnam War, and earlier than that, he marched with Martin Luther King.
Was he the greatest?
Put it this way. If he isn’t the greatest ever, I certainly wouldn’t want to live off the difference between him and anyone greater.
