If Bill Russell replaced Tim Duncan could the spurs win 8 rings in a row too?

Question

After all competition wasn't has good as it was back in the 50's-6-'s.

Answer 1

Yes

Answer 2

honestly, winning 11 championships is really impressive but not nearly as much so when there were only what, about 9 teams? To account for how tough the odds he had to overcome were, for comparison with any closer to modern players, you should think of Russell as having won about 4 rings.

Answer 3

no, because they relied on duncan to score during 3 of those championships.  as good as russell was, he wouldnt fill duncans shoes on the offensive end.

Answer 4

Maybe on a fantasy league .

Bill is happily retired these days .

Answer 5

i dont think the would win 8 rings but i think they would probably win a couple.. that is saying bill russel would be younger than he is now..

Answer 6

Not a chance. There are more teams now days and also more teams at the top. Also back then the stars were concentrated on just a few teams. Russell was a great player on a bunch of great teams. But what the Celtics did in the 60's is not possible in today's game. What if you put Duncan on those Celtics teams? He may have won 15. That's why you can't compare eras that far apart.

Answer 7

Yep, he would and more.

Whatever scoring dip the Spurs would take when Russell (15PPG) replaces Duncan (21PPG) in the lineup, would be more than compensated by Russell's defensive intensity and rebounding (22RPG). To cite a real life example, remember when Cousy who averaged 18PPG, retired and  was replaced by a defensive oriented KC Jones who only averaged 7PPG, - KC was scoring less than half Cousy was doing -  the Celtics regular season record actually IMPROVED by 3 more wins. The Celtics as a whole scored less with KC than before but they shutdown their opponents by a much greater margin.

And before i forgot,

The level of talent during Jordan's time was DIFFUSED across 30 teams and international players are still few and hardly made an impact (like Dirk, Manu, Parker etc. in post-2000) to counterbalance this. Players who were NOT talented enough to be drafted and play in the NBA in the 80's got their chance in the 90's when 6 expansion teams joined the League. Also, the top players in Jordan's time rarely match up each other to test thier abilities. To give an example, Shaq only faceoff with Ewing in the East 4x and facesoff with Hakeem and Robinson in the West 2x. The top centers spend most of their time fending off middling talent like Ilgauskas. Where is the challenge in that? You consider this a competitive era?

In contrast, in Russell's time, the NCAA and NIT (when it still mattered) was concentrated in only 8-9 teams. The 24th pick of the 1st round today would be the final pick of the 3rd round in the 60's. Only the cream of the crop get to play in the NBA in the 60's. In addition, Russell would face off Wilt Chamberlain 8-9 times a season. When he is not fighting Wilt, he is fending off other Hall of Famers 8-9x again like Nate Thurmond, Jerry Lucas, Willis Reed etc. you get the drift. They have to work their butts off almost everytime.

In short, the quality of teams and/or difficulty of winning a championship  is not dependent on the quantity of teams in the League. Having a  30-team League in the 60's wouldnt change the outcome. It would just pad the number of victories for Russell's Celtics and West and Baylor's Lakers enroute to their inevitable finals matchup.