How would Nate Thurmond do in the modern league?

[dantheman9758]

[ame=http://youtu.be/Xh90_lXqh5o]Nate "The Great" Thurmond - Career Tribute (Version 1.0) - YouTube[/ame]

A jumpshot (with range), a skyhook shot, and terrorizing defense that kept the ball in play... big Nate could give you 20/20 any given night. By modern standards he put up his shots on some guard-level fg%... I think reason being that his high school coach's philosophy of outscore your man stuck with him, and by today's standards he "forced" a lot of shots against that era's gifted offensive/defensive centers to keep his offensive volume on par with theirs. But he indeed did lockdown the bigs of his era, including Wilt and Kareem, to their lowest fg% and scoring volumes of any center they ever faced - Thurmond was a defensive monster in the lowpost, one of the best all around basket protectors and perhaps the best one on one big at containing opposing superstar centers

 

[dantheman9758]

Here's some examples of how Nate kept super-centers like Kareem in his pocket:

Tue, Nov 18, 1969 Milwaukee Bucks@San Francisco Warriors:L 110-127
Alcindor: 21pts(7-24), 15rbs, 2ast; Thurmond: 26pts(10-17), 19rbs, 4ast
"Probably the biggest reason the Bucks bombed out was that Lew Alcindor was thoroughly outplayed by Nate Thurmond, just as he had been in the Warriors' 118-104 victory here Oct.25.
Alcindor missed his first nine shots, and only a flock of meaningless baskets after the outcome was determined enabled him to finish with 21 points. Thanks to Alcindor's late flurry, Thurmond outscored him by only five points. Final rebounding figures were fairly close, 19 for Thurmond, 15 for Alcindor. But a far more accurate gauge of Thurmond's superiority is contained in statistics of the first half, in those first 24 minutes, Thurmond outscored Alcindor, 21-7; outrebounded him, 13-5, and outshot him, .727 to .100. Thurmond made 8 of 11 shots, Alcindor 1 of 10."

('70 season recap)
Nate the Great is the major reason Warriors opponents have their worst team field goal percentage against San Francisco. "There are a lot of great players in the NBA, and plenty of great big men -- but the one toughest guy I've had to play against so far has been Nate Thurmond," was the way Alcindor put it. KAJ only scored 21.6 points and 12 rebounds against Thurmond in regular season of 69’-70’ including the 16 points and 5 rebounds in their first matchup and not a single game scored 30+ against Warriors but two games below 20 points. (Kareem's reg season avgs were 28.8pts 14.5rb - and Thurmond obliterated his fg% as well from .518 avg down to .349)

Sat, Nov 21, 1970 Milwaukee Bucks @ San Francisco Warriors: W 127-102
Alcindor: 29pts Thurmond: 30pts
This is two games away from Nate Thurmond passed Wilt Chamberlain's SG Warriors' team scoring record, Milwaukee Bucks limited San Francisco to only points in the second period, the Bucks rolled to their 13th consecutive victory. Alcindor and Thurmond waged a stirring duel in the first quarter. Alcindor scored 14 points, including 8 in a row late in the period in a spree which he climaxed with a spectacular driving stuff shot. Thurmond, called by Alcindor "the best center I've ever played against," countered with 12, of which most were from medium or long range. Alcindor settled for a single field goal in the second quarter and finished the half with 16 points while Thurmond ran his first half total to 18pts and finished a game high 30 points.

Game 4, Tue, Apr 4, 1972 @ Golden State Warriors: W 106-99
KAJ: 15pts(6-17), 20rbs, 6ast; Thurmond: 26pts(10-28), 15rbs, 5ast
Thurmond plays KAJ tougher than any center in the NBA again had a big game with 26 points(10-28) 15 rebounds. Jim(Crazy Horse) Barnett, who threw a 50ft bomb at the third quarter horn, led the Warriors by 29 points. Kareem was held by Thurmond to a season low of 15 points and went scoreless the entire second quarter and didn't tally in the third frame until only four minutes remained in the third quarter, the Bucks' two superstars KAJ and Big O combined only 26pts, the only reason they won only because the forwar star Dandrige and Perry, of course Warriors' terrible 38.8% shooting too. Dandridge was the key to Buck's win, he drilled in 31 points and got a good helping hand from the rest of the Bucks, Curtis Perry 17pts 12rbs, Lucius Allen 15pts and Oscar and Wally Jones 11 apiece. Big O only scored 11pts(3-12) 6rbs 11ast...

 

[AlbertPullhoez]

Nate Thurmond wouldnt be fukking around with these wanna be perimeter ass big men in today's NBA. He'd average 20 pts, 10 boards and 8 flagrant fouls

 

[dantheman9758]

Nate Thurmond wouldnt be fukking around with these wanna be perimeter ass big men in today's NBA. He'd average 20 pts, 10 boards and 8 flagrant fouls

In an era of Wilt/Russell/Kareem his peak was good for 20 points and 22 rebounds, 4 assists, and probably (estimated) about 3.5 blocks a game. His fg% was very low for a big, always under .450

I'm thinkin today that translates to anything from 10-20 points today depending on how turned off a coach is by that fg% (with lower more careful shot volume he might bump that up closer to .500's which some coaches might expect/want) - but 22 boards even back then in the late 60's is huge (minus Chamberlain and Russell) and should be good for at or very near Howard / Love level rebounding today. I haven't calculated his TRB% yet but Thurmond would prob be peaking at 14 today with a slew of 12+ seasons. He was troubled with knee problems like a lot of bigs are today, so as he aged his numbers/minutes/games played got shaky so his stats dropped sharp his last 5-6 seasons. In his peak though, for a good 7+ seasons today I think he could be reaching for 15pts (on close to ~.500) and 13, or 10 (on above .500) and 13, or a 20 (on his sub .450) and 13 and his basket protection would be like healthy Dwight Howard levels except his blocked shots would be kept in play and turned into fast break points twice as often, and his 1 on 1 big man defense would be unsurpassed though obviously there aren't many offensive threats in the paint these days

 

[sm0ke]

In an era of Wilt/Russell/Kareem his peak was good for 20 points and 22 rebounds, 4 assists, and probably (estimated) about 3.5 blocks a game. His fg% was very low for a big, always under .450

I'm thinkin today that translates to anything from 10-20 points today depending on how turned off a coach is by that fg% (with lower more careful shot volume he might bump that up closer to .500's which some coaches might expect/want) - but 22 boards even back then in the late 60's is huge (minus Chamberlain and Russell) and should be good for at or very near Howard / Love level rebounding today. I haven't calculated his TRB% yet but Thurmond would prob be peaking at 14 today with a slew of 12+ seasons. He was troubled with knee problems like a lot of bigs are today, so as he aged his numbers/minutes/games played got shaky so his stats dropped sharp his last 5-6 seasons. In his peak though, for a good 7+ seasons today I think he could be reaching for 15pts (on close to ~.500) and 13, or 10 (on above .500) and 13, or a 20 (on his sub .450) and 13 and his basket protection would be like healthy Dwight Howard levels except his blocked shots would be kept in play and turned into fast break points twice as often, and his 1 on 1 big man defense would be unsurpassed though obviously there aren't many offensive threats in the paint these days

are you just a sports fan, or are you a statistician?

 

[Walt]

Not trying to sound homoerotic, but :Oh shyt: @ that dude's build.

 

[Majestic Pape]

He'd get shytted on every day on this site for his hairline.

 

[dantheman9758]

are you just a sports fan, or are you a statistician?

sports fan - I rarely talk about stats, but I will occasionally jump in on a stat convo with input if someone is comparing eras and trying to make adjustments for pace/game style/etc - or if I know some context that others might not I'll fill in on why certain seasons of certain players statistically changed (like injury/coaching-system change/plays different role/etc)

 

[dantheman9758]

He'd get shytted on every day on this site for his hairline.

true, at least he didn't try to cover it with paint tho

 

[Malta]

true, at least he didn't try to cover it with paint tho

With modern technology you know he'd try though :smugCarroll:


And, I think he'd have similar rebound numbers to Dwight and similar impact on D, don't see him scoring 20ppg since there isn't a single 5 in the league doing that and he wasn't exactly gifted offensively.

 

[Slaimon Khan Shah]

WE DON'T KNOW.