Understanding Bill Russell through his scouting archetype.
When looking back on Bill Russell, we rarely speak of his skillset or how he would function in different eras. He’s a man containing too many off-court multitudes to limit in such a way, behind Muhammad Ali and of a teir with Jackie Robinson when it comes to social importance. But what is his “game,” and why does it matter? How would a scout perceive Russell?
Of course, his greatness is tied to the Celtics — a success that is rightly or wrongly diminished because of dominance. An oft-cited reason is that there were fewer teams and it was easier to dominate, though this sidesteps the fact other teams had equal opportunity. Still, the odds were higher that one could have an overwhelming collection of talent (or a genius evaluator like Red Auerbach). Russell’s 11 titles in 13 years don't automatically make him the “GOAT,” but we can adjust for relativity (as we always hope to when considering greatness) and understand just how special he was.
It isn't just influence or rings. For one thing, the dominance was in large part due to tactical innovation; employment of the fastbreak, increased ball movement and the idea that the two sides of the game (defense and offense) are fluid rather than bifurcated. These things are true today and mastery of them impacts the game, but it takes players to make conception into reality. Russell’s skill set is the tool by which the Celtics employed revolutionary strategy, and the way in which that skill set is still important is what a scouting perspective reveals.
Each of the past two drafts has had complex arguments at the top, which I will simplify in order to look at them in the light of Russell. On one side: Cade Cunningham, Paolo Banchero and Jalen Green — players who would eventually have the ball in their hands for the majority of their team’s possessions. The fact that the ball itself is how points are accrued should mean the player who controls it is most valuable. This is what people mean when they talk about it being a guard’s league, though what they really mean is any handler of the ball (often wings/forwards).
On the other side of the debates were Evan Mobley, Jabari Smith Jr. and Chet Holmgren. One of them stands out as different, but two are of a piece. Mobley and Holmgren are often compared as all-world defenders who can protect the rim and close space quickly with an offensive versatility that elevated them above the contributions of, say, Rudy Gobert (whether shooting, passing, or handling). Smith is a different player, though his attraction lies in that same two-way impact.
I saw a Twitter poll asking to choose between Mobley and Banchero and was surprised that it leaned towards Banchero. This indicated an answer to my argument about whether a player can be so impactful defensively and as an offensive co-creator and play finisher that he becomes more important than a top-line creator. If football were five-on-five with players playing both ways and the best wide receiver was also the best defensive back, could he be more important than the quarterback? It's very unlikely; the man who makes the decisions with the ball controls the game but in that constricted setting, the odds increase that a player could be a safety valve, ball-hawk, center fielder, and red zone threat all in one. Mobley’s appeal is in that possibility. In Summer League, Banchero believers felt vindicated because his centrifugal offensive capability felt so crucial, and the Magic’s choice felt correct.
To tie this back to Russell, these debates had me thinking theoretically about how the second group can be more important than a creator. What do we call players who shape the court and lineups? In Mobley’s case: a player who swallows on switches just like he does layups and can run offense out of the post, creates enough for himself and generally controls the rim on both sides. Are they court-flippers, scheme-shifters or superstructures? If not creators, are they augmenters? Are they architecture itself? Whatever the term, Russell is the OG, and perhaps still the apex of such a player.
Russell’s skill that separated him from any player in his era was his one-man fastbreak ability for his size, and it’s a skill that the average basketball fan doesn’t know him for. In the casual collective memory, I assume he’s thought of as a proto-Duncan, a 'Mr. Fundamental' who hit enough hook shots and swatted enough finishes to rule over a game that took place almost solely in the restricted area. The idea is that it’s very easy to control a game as a statuesque behemoth when there is little scoring opportunity happening away from the basket. (In actuality, despite the lack of perimeter shooting, Boston pushed the game into the open court and had a run-and-gun pace that didn’t rival the 80s.) In reality, it was much faster than the 90s and 2000s that I was raised on. In fact, it most mirrored the selective, game-independent pace of today.
An easy thing to point to in defiance of the idea of an “old school” Russell is that he was a track-and-field star — a champion sprinter and high-jumper — who adapted to basketball in college. Sure, he isn’t going to match up with the skill and athleticism of players today, but he was the most modern player on the court when it came to the application of his physique. He cut a figure of draconian shoulders and limbs with a loping gait and precise control of such wild appendages. Wilt Chamberlain was closer to a “freak” or a glimmer of Giannis Antetokounmpo, but Russell somehow had the strength to force him into fadeaway jumpers and keep him off the boards despite giving up three inches, while also staying in front of guards. People might have hardly noted such switching at the time, but it’s now perhaps the most important defensive skill.
That athleticism was weaponized in service of the Celtics' fastbreak and ball movement, spurred by their superior conditioning (an underrated part of the dynasty was their relentless, unheard-of commitment to staying in shape). These were calling cards of Auerbach teams. It’s a true chicken-and-egg argument about whether his conception of basketball or Russell’s ability created the style, but it doesn’t matter; their symbiosis made each other possible. Russell was the all-time greatest defensive playmaker who caused fast breaks to start, his superior conditioning and speed for his size flipped turnovers directly into offensive advantages and his guard-like passing for a big meant he’d make the outlet to the equally inventive fast break genius, Bob Cousy, or turn to lead the break himself. Russell even had a surreal, unreplicable volleyball-like touch for getting the block to a teammate.
A fast break can’t be a system unto itself, but this overcoming of staid half-court execution isn’t just a relic of another era. There were misgivings about the 2020 Lakers and 2021 Bucks concerning their half-court offense, but transition turning into easy buckets gave them just enough scoring to rely on their incredible defenses. (Antetokounmpo and Anthony Davis are perhaps the best two recent examples of controlling games without heavy ball control, though the former knocked down that door as part of his title breakthrough). This isn’t seven-seconds-or-less; it’s something more forceful that resounds with a quality Danny Leroux calls “undeniability” — a delightfully elusive term for that which works efficiently despite any opposition. Think of Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen's long-armed point-of-attack wall which could turn a game off steals alone. Think of the Heatles' ultra-aggressive blitzing into their open-court athleticism. That was what Russell brought to his era.
Russell invites one to imagine a rim-and-paint defender like Gobert who could then initiate a fastbreak like a Bam Adebayo or Draymond Green and also be the most dominant rebounder in an era where an offensive rebound was as much a math-buster as a three is today. Where it gets more difficult is applying Russell’s offense. The game no longer slows down for post moves and hooks, and his finishing wasn’t dominant. He was never a particularly efficient half-court scorer. His true shooting was not only dwarfed by Chamberlain and later Kareem Adul-Jabbar, but also their forebear, Bob Pettit, as well as wings like Oscar Robertson and Jerry West.
Russell’s invisible power was the first concept that “impacted winning” without a number to measure it. His gift was somehow specific to his time and yet well ahead of it; what if rather than getting stops or putting the ball in the basket, the game was about creating advantages in between the half-court plays themselves? The advanced offensive stats may have pointed to a great but not all-time player, but the defensive analytics were overwhelming. The fact that his tiny school of San Francisco, which always finished under .500, won two championships in a row seems telling. Or how about Chamberlain, so confident in himself that he once decided on a lark to lead the league in assists (and nearly doubled his average in doing so), said plainly that the Celtics wouldn’t have won as much with him in Russell’s place?
Russell was an avatar for ideas about basketball synergy which we’ve now internalized. He self-scouted teammates in order to maximize them. Like Pat Riley and Steve Kerr after him, Auerbach believed that basketball perfection was reached when one never had to call a play — a lovely deflation of old-fashioned concepts about coaching “genius.” Players were in tune organically and silently, and Russell fostered such an environment of basketball nirvana. He prioritized teammates inhabiting specific roles, and he himself changed his own; the Adebayo-like playmaking so ahead of its time flowered as Cousy waned, and Russell became a player-coach as he aged. The mix of lineup versatility and lineup fit demanded of a contender today was on Russell’s mind in a way that we’d only see the smartest teams master for the next five decades. The man knew more about the future of basketball than half of the executives in the early Aughts did. If we can look at the 2014 Spurs and say “more than the sum of their parts,” the idea of such transcendence was birthed with Russell and Auerbach.
I’ve thought about these concepts in a granular fashion since Russell's passing, trying to peel away the epicness of the man and better understand the player, but I can’t miss his inherent poetry. He advanced the game while simultaneously being a voice for social change. He staked the claim that would make it the defining African-American sport. As noted in Bill Simmons' video-obit, Russell seemed almost as excited about Obama as his own basketball success. This was a man who never forgot history and society, making him the perfect presenter each June. Does Joe Namath pass the trophy to Tom Brady? Does Sandy Koufax congratulate the pitcher who clinched the winning out of the World Series?
One must ask, is Russell the most evolutionary player ever? Some lists don’t have him in the top 10. The three-pointer grew organically; Steph Curry altered a landscape that was already shifting. Jordan, Magic Jonson and Larry Bird were the aesthetic firebrands, helping a curious but novice audience understand the sport as graceful, cunning, beautiful, ugly and inventive — but they didn’t completely change the fundamentals. LeBron James wasn’t new, but instead the ultimate compiler of the past. He could narrow and whittle the game down to a robotic process and a perfect symphony, where someone like Johnson was a soul ballad; an empire of one, the queen on the chessboard.
Famously, Bill Russell was said to try and jump higher and more confidently than anyone had before; to make his rebound impossible to disrupt, to ensure that he could block any shot and come down with it or send it to a teammate. The coaches preferred players stay earthbound so they could adjust, react and not get caught out of position. Russell said, “No. In fact, I will make the right decision about when to jump, so inherently well-timed and perceptive about the game that there will be no risk." Isn’t that what basketball is? The ability to make a decision with your body that will prove right in relation to the ball, the basket, and the other players, using only a split second’s information, your body and brain communicating to form a reaction?
Russell mastered that, and it just so happens to be the same process that creates open-court basketball, which is the synergistic “beautiful game," which marries barnstorming and ball-zipping with brute force and spring-loaded legs. He married athleticism to the game’s inner logic in a way that is now inseparable and figured out how one could enforce the other with or without the ball, anywhere at any time, as a coach or a center or a guard, as a conduit or a hub. Russell jumped and, while he was in the air, the game changed. By the time he came down he had won, and his death’s lesson is this: so did we.
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