[Hoot Gibson]

I don't think many young people have a clue about how good Wilt Chamberlain was. I remember the rumors years after he retired that play-off bound teams were trying to sign Wilt. Wilt was a 7 ft. 1 inch mountain of muscle who could run and jump with anybody. Anybody who thinks that he could not defend modern players just does not know what they are talking about.

I recall the basic rules of basketball being changed because of two players (there were others, but George Mikan was before my time). The first one was Chamberlain and the second one was Kareem. Before the changes, Kansas's in bounds play on the baseline was to lob the ball over the backboard to Wilt for a dunk. When he was in high school, Wilt would stand behind the free throw line, lob the ball toward the basket, grab it from the air and dunk it.

Some of you youngsters may be familiar with Larry Brown, who has played against and coached some pretty good players. Here is his testimony:

From Wikiquotes:

Of all his memories of Wilt Chamberlain, the one that stood out for Larry Brown happened long after Chamberlain's professional career had ended. On a summer day in the early 1980s, when Brown was coaching at UCLA, Chamberlain showed up at Pauley Pavilion to take part in one of the high-octane pickup games that the arena constantly attracted. "Magic Johnson used to run the games," Brown recalled Tuesday after hearing that Chamberlain, his friend, had died at 63, "and he called a couple of chintzy fouls and a goaltending on Wilt. "So Wilt said: 'There will be no more layups in this gym,' and he blocked every shot after that. That's the truth, I saw it. He didn't let one [of Johnson's] shots get to the rim." Chamberlain would have been in his mid-40s at the time...