Wilt Chamberlain was a statistical marvel. Perhaps no player has dominated the NBA as thoroughly as Wilt did during his prime. His records are as close to being insurmountable as records can be, considering that he scored 100 points in one game and somehow averaged a whopping 50 points throughout a season as well.
Thanks to his many achievements, Chamberlain is considered a Top 10 player of all time, even though Stephen A. Smith spoke about removing him from that list to make space for Stephen Curry. But barring the case of his entire career, Wilt is in consideration to be spoken about as the greatest scorer of all time.
And with the crown belonging to Michael Jordan as per most people, who was ridiculously prolific in his ways, an interview of Wilt has resurfaced where he spoke about why MJ wasn’t the GOAT scorer and gave his example to illustrate his point.
(starts at 00:54 minutes):
“When they compare me with Michael, all those years I was scoring all those points I was leading the league in percentile shooting. If you’re taking all the shots, you should also be making the highest percentage.”
Funnily enough, MJ and Wilt both averaged 30.1 points per game when considering their entire career averages. However, Wilt had a field goal percentage of 54% for his career, while MJ was at 49%, which explains the argument that the legendary big man is making.
Jordan was a guard though, so a lot of his shots came away from the basket, meaning his percentages are even better than they appear at first glance. Wilt made his living under the basket so it’s not surprising that he would be more efficient, and even then, the gap’s not too big.
This is another example, though, of players from eras gone by thinking that they were better than the legends that came after them. There can be a lot of debate around who the GOAT scorer in NBA history is, and no matter who is debating, MJ and Chamberlain would both be part of all of those conversations.
