Who would you want as your franchise big man: Hakeem or Kareem?

Chump?

We certainly would not want to be rude or impolite now would we.

I thought the discussion was about moving Hakeem to the 4 if you had the luxury of also having Kareem. Somehow this turned into a history of the college days of Ralph Sampson. Oh well.

I agree with you 100% that Hakeem was a superior player to Ralph and I don't think you will find many folks arguing that Ralph should have not lost his position.

Ralph was a great player, but a Kareem? Maybe we should have a poll. I guess just us chumps would experiment with Hakeem at the 4 and leave Kareem at the 5.

Personally, Hakeem generates the fondest basketball memories, but logically I would have to hand it to Kareem. As for Ralph........

 

Haha if this was a Lakers forum it would be 75-25 in Kareem's favor. I'm curious to see how it would turn out on a non-Lakers or Rockets forum, anywhere not biased. Would probably be 60-40 Kareem since he's more well known.
I'd go with Hakeem of course. He played in the 90s and dominated.

 

Dream did play in the toughest era of centers, but you have to also look at who Kareem played against, during the span of his career.


Bob Lanier, Bill Walton, Wilt Chamberlain, Nate Thurmond, Moses Malone, Dave Cowens, Artis Gilmore, (younger) Hakeem Olajuwon, Robert Parish (Kevin McHale - PF), Wes Unseld, and Willis Reed.

 

It's hard not to be biased after watching Hakeem do what he did for the franchise and the city, but it helps if you watched all those big men play. The epic battles between Chamberlain and Russell may be some of the best sports of all time.

I must admit I have a bit of bias towards Kareem also, sort of. I was a young boy when the Milwaukee Bucks acquired someone by the name of Lew Alcindor. The next year they acquired another pretty good player in Oscar Robertson. They went on to win it all in the second year of their existence.

Quite an accomplishment, going 12-2 in the playoffs, including a sweep in the finals. Lew was a good player, but only in his second year. Oscar was towards the end of his career.

 

Why not both?

 

The one we had.