Wilt Chamberlain
He was basketball's unstoppable force, the most awesome offensive force the game has ever seen.—Introductory line of Chamberlain's NBA Encyclopedia biography.
Wilton Norman "Wilt" Chamberlain (August 21, 1936–October 12, 1999) was an American professional basketball player for the Philadelphia/San Francisco Warriors, the Philadelphia 76ers and the Los Angeles Lakers.
He is known for three things: his numerical dominance, his 100-point game and the amount of women he claimed to have slept with. He also made a guest appearance in animated form on Goober and The Ghost Chasers.
Chamberlain was a two-time champion, four-time MVP and one-time Finals MVP. He is widely considered the most dominant player in the history of basketball.
Wilt Chamberlain provides examples of the following tropes:
- The Ace
- Awesome McCoolname
- Badass
- Badass Crew: The 1967 Sixers and 1972 Lakers.
- Beyond the Impossible: Only player to score more than 4000 points in a season (The only other to score more than 3000 is Michael Jordan), is the all-time rebounding leader (and holds the record for rebounds in a season), was the only non-point guard to lead the league in assists, once averaged 50 points together with 25 rebounds per game and has the all-time high in minutes per game, at 45.8. These are just some of his records.
- The Big Guy: He wasn't called Wilt "The Stilt" Chamberlain for nothing.
- The Casanova: Chamberlain claimed he slept with 20,000 women. The people who knew him agreed that this is probably an exaggeration, but not by as much as one might think.
- Crowning Moment of Awesome: In-Universe. Scoring 100 points in a single game by himself is almost universally regarded as this by basketball fans. Rightly so, as this is a feat that was never achieved before and has never been replicated since. ((For comparison, that's as much as most teams score nowadays.))
- Enthusiasm Versus Stoicism: Chamberlain was the enthusiast; Bill Russell was The Stoic.
- Friendly Enemy: Chamberlain was great friends with his rival Bill Russell.
- Gentle Giant: By most accounts, this was because Chamberlain was genuinely afraid that he would kill an opposing player if he lost his temper (easy to believe, since Wilt bench-pressed 450 to 500 pounds with ease).
- Humble Hero: He didn't really think too much about his 100 point game, and was very modest about the achievement.
- The Juggernaut: He held 72 records at one time.
- Large and In Charge
- Lightning Bruiser: Very strong but also very fast, coordinated and graceful.
- Nice Guy
- One-Man Army: He scored 100 points in a single game by himself. Keep in mind that most teams don't even break that score very often.
- Red Baron: The Stilt, Goliath, The Big Dipper.
- Showy Invincible Hero: Chamberlain during the 1966-1967 season, ironically the first time he was not the top-scorer, but he led his team in four categories, won the rebounding title (again), was the MVP (again), led his team to a then-record 68-13 regular season record and won Philadelphia its first NBA championship.
- Super Strength: By normal human standards anyway, considering he could bench press over 500 pounds easily.
- Thirteen Is Unlucky: Regarding team play, he suffered a long streak of losses against the ultra-stacked Boston Celtic dynasty, but his championship teams set several standards.
- Tough Act to Follow: He scored 100 points in a single game alone, which is something no one else has been able to do.
- Ubermensch: Anti-social personality (pretty much did whatever he wanted)? Check. A vision of how things could be different (basketball, women's athletics, how black men are seen)? Check. Also, Chamberlain had his own values, which made him such a complex person.
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