I disagree. Why was Barry Bonds considered great? It's because of his numbers vs the numbers of his contemporaries. If there were 106 guys with 70+ HR's in 2001, would he have been considered the guy with the greatest statistical season or just another dude in 2001? He was better than everyone else. If he played 100 years ago, he still would have been a great player, but even if he were the same guy he was born as in 1964, he would have never hit 73 bombs in a season, because he would have weighed his natural weight of 185.
Yes, but if Baylor were born is 1990, with the same desire and body, he would be 20 pounds heavier and an even better athlete, simply through today's nutrition and workout programs, he would have played AAU ball, gone to camps, etc, and would have been a far better version of the Hall of Famer that he was
One thing that's overlooked about men from back then was how physically strong they were because everything wasn't automated. Mickey Mantle wasn't the biggest guy I have ever seen, but the dude had forearms like Popeye. I remember my Grandpa and even my Pops being that way. My biceps are quite a bit bigger than theirs were, but their forearms were bigger than mine. I was talking to a buddy of mine that owns a big tire and auto shop, he's still got some big pipes from being in the industry for 30 years, but he said whereas when he first started, everything was manual, now, he has machines that would allow an 8 year old to change a tire by pushing a few buttons. He actually showed me the promotional video to prove it. Big hands and forearms don't mean as much in the NFL and NBA, but they matter in baseball
Baylor was a 6'5 SF who dominated the boards, which was a respectable sized piece of his greatness. In your modern fairytale version is he also picking up an additional 4 or 5 inches of height so that can continue to be the case? Or in addition to all of the other assumptions you are making, are you also switching him over to SG and altering his entire skillset to fit the modern game?
Kinda hoping we do a partners draft
No, you don't, and I'm sure he'd still be a decent rebounder, just not an elite one like he was against his era. More like a DWade type of guy. He was the average size (I'm assuming) for his position then and was ahead of his time athletically. That wouldn't be the case of he was teleported to today. I believe he had something like 5 or 6 seasons above 13 rpg in his career and had a season where he avgd 17+. That is not happening today as a 6'5 SF (or or most likely a conversion to SG). Today he'd be small for SF, avg for SG and imo there are lots of players in the NBA today who are better athletes than he was, even if you give him the benefit of 40/50 years of modern nutrition and training. I think he would have to be a different type of player that he was then to be the best version of himself in the modern NBA. I respect your opinions if you are comfortable making the assumption that he was great enough to be able to modify whatever he needed to in order to still be great today. I'm just not as confident that he would.
I personally do. I'd wager that we ALL do to an extent. We all have our own ranking systems of which guys we like from long ago. That is part of the fun of doing these for me....critically analyzing who I think would translate better to today's game or acrosfls different eras (works backwards too) for their respective sports.
