Top Ten: Greatest basketball players of all time

With the 2013 All Star match recently taking place in Houston, with the West coming out eventual winners once more against the East, mainly thanks to Kevin Durant’s high score of 30 and Chris Paul’s MVP performance with 15 assists.

One man showed that at the age of 34 he still has what it takes and should be considered at least inside the top five of all time. With nine points and eight assists, the Black Mamba played a more defensive game and in the last quarter, marked LeBron James out of the game, twice blocking him late on. This then fuelled Michael Jordan’s comments pre game that Kobe has had a better career than LeBron.

This got us thinking who is the greatest? So here at TIBS News we have decided to give our opinion on who the Top 10 that have ever played in the NBA are and why.

10 – Tim Duncan
Simple and straight forward, but gets the job done. That is Tim Duncan’s style of play. He isn’t flashy and has never tried to hog the spotlight. He is the American media’s version of Paul Scholes. He keeps himself to himself off the court, but on it is one of the most effective players there is. With two MVP titles, four Championship rings, and 14 time NBA All Star, we think the San Antonio Spurs man merits the number 10 spot.

9 – Shaquille O’Neal
Eccentric, loud and in your face are just some ways to describe Shaq’s personality. With these characteristics you would assume that he was just another player. You would assume wrong. With four NBA Championships, two finals MVP’s and fifth on the all-time top scoring list, O’Neal would take his presence to every game and was most dangerous at the rim. He played for potentially the three biggest franchises in Basketball, featuring for the LA Lakers, Miami Heat and Boston Celtics. Creating formidable partnerships with Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett. Shaq definitely deserves to be in the top 10.

8 – Larry Bird
Green and White through and through, Larry Bird was around in the golden age of Basketball. He featured for the USA in the Olympics for a team nicknamed, ‘The Dream Team’. He was on a side with the likes of Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Scottie Pippen, and Karl Malone who were all starters for the side that won the Gold medal. Bird domestically won three NBA Championships; three MVP’s and is a 12 time All Star. Since his retirement in 1992, Bird became Indiana Pacers coach from 1997 -2000; in 2003 he then became executive of the same team until 2012. Larry Bird is the only person in the history of the NBA to win MVP, Coach of the Year and Executive of the Year. This is more than enough to make our list of greats.

7 – Wilt Chamberlain
Averaging more than 40 points a season and the only man ever to score 100 points in a single NBA game, Wilt Chamberlain was a machine when it came to converting chances at the rim. He holds records for scoring rebounds and assists in NBA History. He was also two-time NBA Champion, four-time MVP, and considered the most dangerous point’s scorer ever. He however is said to have lacked the leadership that was needed to win more titles and for this only makes our number seven.

6 – LeBron James
Never was there so much hype around a player coming out of the drafts and into the NBA before LeBron James. Tipped to be a superstar he has done just that by taking Cleveland Cavaliers to their first ever Finals in 2007, they were however beaten by the San Antonio Spurs. James joined the Miami Heat in the summer of 2010 and reached another finals in his first season. He lost out again though which made him determined to win his first ever Championship ring. He finally got it in 2012 and won finals MVP. On a personal note he has won three seasonal MVP’s, became the youngest player to hit 20’000 points and at the age of 28 could win a lot more in his career. He is without doubt the best in the NBA and has taken the gauntlet from Kobe Bryant. However he has not won what the Lakers man has won and for that reason only makes our number six. He does though have age on his side and could go on to even eclipse our number one.

5 – Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Into the top five now and half way through we have one of the game’s greatest. He leads the all-time NBA scoring chart with an impressive 38’387 points. He was most notable for his trademark move which was labelled the ‘Sky Hook’. This was where he bent his whole body and not just his arm to hook the ball over his head and was hard to block because of his 7ft height and long arm-span. Abdul-Jabbar is also one of the most celebrated athletes to have played the game with honours such as: six-time NBA Championship rings, six-time MVP, two finals MVP awards and he is the most picked NBA All Star with an incredible 19 appearances. He easily makes it into the top five let alone the top 10.

4 – Bill Russell
11 time NBA Champion; Bill Russell is the most coveted basketball player ever. Winning all 11 titles with the Boston Celtics, eight as a player and three as a player/coach, he is described as one of the best ever by many. 11 Championships in 13 seasons has never been matched in any American sport let alone NBA. He was notable for being a great leader amongst his other traits, blocking and rebounding and having a great all round defensive game. He was named MVP five times and was a 12 time All Star. The NBA also recently renamed the MVP Finals trophy ‘The Bill Russell Trophy’ in honour of the great man. He easily sweeps into the top five.

3 – Magic Johnson
Now, number three and number two were so close and it was hard to separate them. But we believe that Magic Johnson can only make the third spot on the list. He is the league’s best ever player assist’s wise as he holds the record for an average 11.2 per game. He won a Championship in his first season as a rookie, and he also won the finals MVP award in that series. He then won four more NBA titles with the Lakers during the 1980’s. His career was traumatised and put on hold however with the announcement that he had HIV. He quit in 1991, but came back in 1992 to play in the All Star game; he won the MVP award for the match. Fellow players protested and he retired once more, returning in 1996 at the age of 36 to play 32 games for the Lakers. He won three NBA MVP awards, five Championships but appeared in nine finals, three-time finals MVP and was part of the dream team that won gold in the Olympics in 1992. His adversity through his illness and his phenomenal style of play earned him the award for greatest ever point guard in the NBA in 2007 by ESPN. He definitely makes the top three.

2 – Kobe Bryant
‘The Black Mamba’ as Kobe Bryant is also known, is described by many to be the heir to throne of our number one. He is the youngest player ever at the age of 34 to reach the milestone of 30’000 points and has five NBA championship rings, two finals MVP awards and a seasonal MVP award in 2008. He has also won MVP four times in the All Star games in which he has appeared 15 times. He has also won two gold medals with the USA Olympic team in 2008 and 2012. Many pundits have touted the Lakers man as the best of his generation and one of the best at his position, but clearly not ‘the best’. Sporting network TNT have named Bryant the greatest player of the 2000’s. He has two seasons left on his current contract in LA and it remains to be seen if he will quit or carry on. The number 24 is the Lakers all-time top point’s scorer and is an iconic figure in not just their history, but NBA’s too. From number 10 all the way up to Kobe, are all players that are close together in terms of ability and medals won, but when it comes to number one on our list, no one comes close.

1 – Michael Jordan
The first time I heard of Michael Jordan was when I was a youngster at the age of six, watching Space Jam. I didn’t think much of him as I wasn’t really interested in the sport. But as I grew older I started to take in the stature of how big Michael Jordan’s brand is and how good a player he actually was. On the NBA website underneath his Biography, it says ‘By acclamation, Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player of all time’ and it is hard to find any expert, pundit or fan to say different. He was in a different class to any other player. With a career spanning from 1984 – 2003 he won everything you could win as a player: six-time NBA Champion, six-time finals MVP, five time seasoned MVP, 14 time NBA All Star, 10 time NBA scoring Champion and three-time All Star MVP. He wasn’t just a great player he was also a celebrity raising awareness around the world for NBA and was very successful in doing so.

His leaping ability gave him the nickname ‘Air Jordan’ and with this, sports brand Nike developed shoes for the superstar naming them after his nickname. This brand generates over $1bn for the sporting company. He is without doubt the best there has ever been and no one has come close yet. Although many have tipped that Kobe Bryant and LeBron James to emulate the great man, the latter has more chance being younger and having more ability, yet James doesn’t have the Championship rings that Kobe does.

So there we have it, our top ten Basketball players of all time. There will always be different opinions on who should be where, for example we didn’t include Karl Malone or Oscar Robertson. But without doubt Michael Jordan will be for a long time at number one. As our number three, Magic Johnson once said: “There’s Michael Jordan, then there’s the rest of us”.

By Jack Griffiths
Follow @JGriffiths89