i was watchin ESPN SportsCenter earlier, and they made Hakeem Olajuwon the #10 top #1 pick in all of sports. just a share..
i didn't even get how they were doing the list. it wasn't just greatest number 1 picks it didn't seem but hakeem didn't really get a lot of hype as a number 1 did he? so i'm not sure what they were going on, hype + performance, performance, or just whatever they felt like. cool to see hakeem make the list though.
I think the list was the "top ten rookie regular season debuts" in anticipation of LeBron's debut tonight.
no.. it was top 10 #1 draft picks not debuts.. coz they included john elway and john elway played horrible on his debut game..
I'm sorry, I meant top ten debuts by number one picks. After each pick, they would say the stats for that players debut game.
they basically were talking about how lebron is the biggest hype player in all of history of all the sports and they had a top 10 list of players in sports that we had high expectations of, and the players on the list also went above our expectations
Here are some that I remember: #1 picks that had the most impact over a career I assume... 1) Jabaar (6 championships) 3) Magic (5 championships) Mario Lamieux (may have been second) Elway, 6) Shaq OJ,A-Rod 9) Ken Griffey 10)Hakeem
Here are some links for reference... http://www.nba.com/history/stats_top_picks.html http://www.redozone.addr.com/nbadraft.html http://www.nba.com/history/awards_rookieofyear.html http://www.nba.com/history/awards_allrookieteams.html Kinda cool, just looking back...
it wasn't basketball players, it was everyone in all sports. he was 4th in terms of bball players on that list. which is about right. it was still a weird list. no earl. wasn't wilt a #1 pick? was gretzky a #1 pick? if they weren't, then who was doing the scouting? that's what seemed weird. it didn't seem to be based solely on production or on hype or really even a combo. just 10 #1 picks that did pretty damn good.
Oh. Seems like they were being very obscure. By the way, most of the 50 Greatest NBA List I've seen had Hakeem around 9th to 12th. I remember back when the 50 Greatest List came out, every single sports mag did their own ranking. That's all-time, regardless of pick. Not sure about 4th all-time. That seems more like a Greatest Center List.
Damn!!!! Digging up old Phily records suck! Wilt Chamberlain, Drafted: 1959, 1st round (3rd overall), Philadelphia Warriors. Here's some more interesting picks... Julius Erving, Drafted, 1972 (12th overall), Milwaukee Bucks. Michael Jordan (sorry Portland) and Kevin McHale were also 3rd over-all picks. Jerry West was 2nd over-all pick (Minneapolis Lakers). Just like Steve Francis and Rudy Tomjanovich. Clyde Drelxer was 14th pick! I'll let someone else dig up Gretzky!
How did this happen? Who was in front of him, was it geographically based? Did 2 teams get bought off the way Celts stole Russell with the Ice Capades bribe to the team ahead of them that could have drafted Russell?
Just to show how unbelievable it was for Wilt not to go #1, here's an excerpt from ESPN's Greatest NBA Rookies: "1. Wilt Chamberlain, Philadelphia Warriors, 1959-60 MVP. Rookie of the Year. First-team All-NBA. Everyone expected Chamberlain to be an impact player, but he exceeded expectations by far -- setting an NBA record with 2,707 points (37.6 ppg) and another NBA record with 1,941 rebounds. The Warriors, who went 32-40 the season before Chamberlain arrived, went 49-26 and reached the Eastern Division finals before bowing to the Celtics, 4 games to 2."
