YouTube Gold: Dr. J’s Top Plays
A rare and elegant talent
We mentioned recency bias in our last YouTube Gold, which was a look at the Top Ten NBA centers of all time, pointing out that Bill Walton and Nate Thurmond deserved some props there too.
That kind of bias happens in various ways. When you look around the league today, you see guys like Anthony Edwards, Zion Williamson, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Ja Morant - guys who are cutting edge to be sure.
Looking back a bit you see Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman and others who were supremely athletic.
You go back a bit further and you see Bobby Jones, David Thompson and a guy who changed everything in Julius Erving.
This video shows some of his greatest plays. Not surprisingly, most of them are dunks and if you look carefully, like Jordan you’ll see that Erving had large and powerful hands.
Most of you will have seen the top two plays on this list - they’re legendary. Both are against the Lakers, with the first a huge dunk over Michael Cooper and the second the astonishing under the backboard layup that Magic Johnson said he just couldn’t believe.
The other plays are pretty spectacular too though. Erving was a brilliant talent, a shining star who did as much as anyone to make the game a vertical war.