One of the NBA’s quirkiest and most beloved longtime fan turned writer turned podcaster is Bill Simmons, founder and CEO of the Ringer. One of Simmon’s most endearing and sometimes eye-rolling running bits is making up metrics, clubs, tiers, rankings, drafts, and all kinds of different ways to classify, discuss, and evaluate basketball players.
He’s arguably most famous for his pyramid from his Book of Basketball; he tiered the greatest players of all time on different levels of a pyramid. He’s also heralded for his “Ewing Theory” an idea that a team can start playing better without their best player (named for Patrick Ewing and the late 90s Knicks).
But recently, he has gotten away from writing and focuses solely on podcasting. He has become more creative with some of his ideas, inventing different “clubs” or “lists” for players based on different combinations of stats and accolades. That’s exactly what he did on the latest episode of his Bill Simmons Podcast.
Simmons’ “Wilt-50 Club” has Jokic with best season since NBA/ABA merger
Simmons was opening up an NBA 6-pack on his December 12th pod, and he busted out a brand new club, the Wilt-50 Club. This elite list is reserved for players who finished a season playing in at least 50 games and averaging at least 50 combined points, rebounds, and assists per game.
Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell would have been mainstays in this club and dominate a historical list because their stats were preposterous in that era. But since the merger, there have only been five players to accomplish this feat; Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (3x), Luka Doncic, Russell Westbrook, Bob McAdoo, and James Harden.
Since the merger, Kareem had the highest total with 56 combined points, rebounds, and assists per game in 1971. But this year, two other players are currently on pace to join this club; Giannis Antetokounmpo and Nikola Jokic.
Not only that, but Jokic is currently averaging a total of 56.2, a number which would top Kareem’s record season, and give Jokic the highest total since Chamberlain’s days.
There’s obviously a lot of season left and many games to be played. The Joker has a long way to go before toppling this list. His gaudy number would only need to dip the slightest bit for him to fall back below Abdual-Jabbar. All things considered, it’s extremely unlikely that Jokic can keep up his ridiculous pace.
But it’s still amazing to see what Jokic has done over the first quarter of the NBA season. He’s dragging the Nuggets to being a solid NBA team almost single-handedly. He can’t possibly continue carrying this burden, yet he may have to. It doesn’t seem feasible, but if anyone can do it, it’s Jokic.