NBA's All Time 50 Greatest Players: Excerpts from Standing Above the Crowd: Success Strategies in Athletics, Business, Community and Life by James Donaldson

Normal 0 false false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE

THE 50 GREATEST PLAYERS IN NBA HISTORY

One of the most frequently asked questions that I encounter besides “how tall are you?” is either who is the greatest player that I've ever played against, or who is the toughest player that I've ever played against?  Depending on the person’s knowledge of basketball who's asking the question, I typically give a couple different responses.  There's a big difference between “the greatest” and “the toughest”.

The game of basketball has been around for a long time now and it has evolved over the years from when Dr. James Naismith first tied a peach basket an old barn post and the players were shooting two hand set shots, to now where the game is played on a global scale with some of the finest athletes in the world.  There were great players back in the beginning of the game, just as they're great players now.  I don't know if it's ever totally fair to compare players from one era against players of another era.  Periodically you see sports aficionados coming up with hypothetical computerize scenarios of say the great Green Bay Packers of the 60s versus the New England Patriots of the new millennium.  It's impossible to really say who the best players are or which team would come out on top.  But it's a fun exercise and it creates a lot of heated conversation amongst the fanatics and all of us.

I was lucky to play during perhaps the greatest era of NBA basketball.  My NBA career spanned two decades essentially, from 1980 – 1996.  Some of the greatest NBA players to ever play the game played during that era.  I remember as a rookie in 1980 marveling at the great Dr. J. and also been privileged to witness the new era of NBA basketball that was brought to us by Ervin “Magic” Johnson and Larry Bird.

All in all I was privileged to play against over 30 of the all-time 50 greatest NBA players ever.  I'm going to go through the whole list of the 50 greatest players and share my thoughts with you in regards to either actually playing against them or watching them as I was a youngster.  They are listed in alphabetical order and if you want to find the actual numerical order in which they are listed by the NBA you can check out their website at NBA.com 

Dave Cowens

 

Dave Cowens was always one of my favorite Boston Celtics throughout the years.  That was probably because of a number of things that I saw in him and his game that I really connected to.  He wasn't the most talented player on the court, and he wasn't the biggest and strongest guy in the court either.  But he had as much determination and intensity to make up for whatever shortcomings he had through pure hustle and an all-out passion for the game.  There are some great NBA highlight reel videos that show Dave Cowens chasing down loose balls and sliding 20 or 30 feet across the court in order to do so.  You just don't see that many guys playing that way!

Also one of the things I remember about Dave Cowens was that he seemed to be a consummate team player.  He didn't care how many points he scored how many rebounds he had but he seemed to get all he had every time he is on the court.  And another thing, he wasn't afraid to get up into his teammates faces and I never ever saw him back down from anybody else.  Those are the kind of guys you want to go to war with any day of the week!