The NBA Equivalent Of Shohei Ohtani's 50/50 Club And Which Player Has A Chance To Do It
Unless you've been living under a rock, I'm sure you saw Shohei Ohtani's historic performance last night. Given I'm not exactly a baseball guy, Hubbs broke everything down in real time last night that's worth a read. What I am is someone who loves witnessing history regardless of the sport, so it's pretty cool that we were all alive to witness the first ever 51/51 season in MLB history.
After watching all the clips last night, my brain started to wander down the path that usually happens when something historic goes down in another sport.
What would be the NBA equivalent of this type of dominance?
It's a bit of a tricky question once you start to dive in. The beauty of Ohtani is the fact that he's a baseball freak who does shit that makes zero sense. The perfect ball player if you will. To me, for this to happen in the NBA it would have to come from an MVP or an MVP-caliber player and has to be so rare that it'd be something we've never seen before in the history of the league, while also being something so tough that the likelihood of it happening again is extremely small.
Once upon a time that used to be triple-doubles. Oscar Robertson became the first player to ever average a triple-double in 1961-62, and he remained the only player to accomplish that feat until Russell Westbrook did it in 2016-17. Now, pretty much anyone can get a triple-double in an NBA game, and Westbrook has since had three more seasons averaging a triple-double, so I think it's fair to say it's as "common" as ever. So that's out.
Then I started thinking about leading the league in certain categories. Tiny Archibald is the only player in NBA history to win both the scoring title and the assist title in the same season, and that came in 1973. Since then, we've yet to see someone achieve that feat, but given that it's been done before, that's out.
Wilt has had seasons where he led the league in rebounding and assists, but not scoring. He also had seasons leading in rebounding and scoring, but not assists. So that's out.
That's why after giving it some thought, I think the only reasonable comp to what Ohtani did last night is for a player to lead the NBA in scoring, rebounding, AND assists. The triple crown if you will. It's never been done before in NBA history, and I feel like it needs to be something so inconceivable that you're not just going to fall backward into doing it. You need to be a freak of nature just like Ohtani is where your dominance is inevitable.
When you think of potential players who could do something like this, the list is extremely small. You need someone who can be unstoppable offensively, is a generational passer, and someone who is active enough on the glass. How many current players check those boxes? There are really only two guys that come to mind for me that fit that description, and that's Jokic and Luka.
The only issue I could see is Jokic not giving enough of a shit about the scoring aspect, but this is more about who has the skillset to pull something like this off, and if Jokic ever decides it's time for him to be selfish and get up close to 20 shots a night, he could absolutely lead the league in scoring. His efficiency is otherworldly. He already has the rebounding/passing boxes checked, so I don't think it's totally crazy to have him included in this.
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With Luka, shit he's already come fairly close. Just last season he was 2nd in ppg (33.9 vs 34.7) and kind of got screwed because Embiid only played 39 games (which is why the NBA should go with totals and not averages for this stuff, but oh well). The rebounding part is where Luka would need to take a leap, as his 9.2 per game was just 19th in the NBA, with the leader being at 13.7. That's a crazy number for a PG, but that's the point. Assist-wise, Luka was 3rd last year at 9.8, with the leader being 10.9. Given Luka's usage, he'd probably be the leader in my clubhouse to become the first player to lead the NBA in scoring, rebounds, and assists, and given the fact that he is also a prodigy just like Ohtani, the connection makes sense.
I considered something like averaging a 50 in a season, but we've seen someone do that before (Wilt). What makes Ohtani's 51/51 so insane is the fact that we've never seen it before, which is why I ultimately landed at leading the NBA in those three categories. There's a chance we'll never see anything like that in our lifetimes, similar to how I'm sure people felt about a 50/50 Club.