Barry Wilner - Basketballs Top 10 Scorers

BASKETBALL'S GREATEST SCORERS!

Is it Jordan or LeBron? Bird or Kobe? Who are the greatest scorers in the history of basketball? From the slam dunk to the three-point shot, author Barry Wilner gives us the ten greatest players who ever lit up a basketball scoreboard.

About the Author

Barry Wilner is a professional sportswriter. Other titles he has written for Enslow Publishers, Inc., include Sports Great Peyton Manning and Michelle Kwan: Star Figure Skater.

Dunks and long three-pointers. Spinning layups and graceful hook shots. Even free throws.

The points just piled up for the top scorers in the National Basketball Association (NBA), whether they were leading fast breaks or jamming home passes. Some stood near the basket, waiting to be fed the ball for a monstrous, rim-rocking throwdown. Others used lightning-quick first steps to drive down the lane, float through the air, and softly lay in the ball.

All were great. All were winners because, after all, the idea of the game is to score points.

Nobody did that better than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, a six-time NBA MVP whose 38,387 points are the most in pro basketball history. He invented the Sky Hookan unblockable shot that became like a lay-in for the 7-foot-2 center who also dominated college basketball when his name was Lew Alcindor.

Another brilliant center was the powerful Wilt Chamberlain, the only man to score 100 points in an NBA game. Chamberlain could palm the ball as if it were an egg, yet his gentle finger rolls made it seem as if the ball could break as he gently laid it in the basket.

For sheer grace, it has been the shooting guards who seemed to fly who truly made the NBA so popular. Michael Jordan, the MVP of all six NBA Finals in which he playedand wonis considered by many the best player ever. Kobe Bryant, the nearest thing to Jordan, has become an unstoppable force with the ball. Reggie Miller was the most dangerous shooter from downtown the league has seen. And Jerry West, so pure a shooter and memorable a player that his silhouette serves as the NBA logo, also was a pinpoint passer and excellent defender.

Not that guards are the only ones who can pile up the points. Three forwards always mentioned among the top scorers are Larry Bird, Karl Malone, and Elvin Hayes.

Bird was a deadly outside shooter from anywhere on the court, and he was so confident in his skills he challenged defenders to come try to stop him. They couldnt.

Malone was the perfect power forward, a man whose strength let him dominate under the boards. Hayes, the Big E, never took a shot he thought would miss. He rarely did.

And then there was the Big O, Oscar Robertson, who once averaged a triple-double for a season. Everything that the other great scorers specialized in, Robertson also could do.

Put these ten men on the court against each other and each side might score a thousand points. Or more.

In the entire history of the NBA, no one has scored more points or won more Most Valuable Player awards than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

The 7-foot-2 center who won three straight NCAA championships with UCLA before becoming the top overall draft pick in 1969, went on to capture his first pro title in his second season with the Milwaukee Bucks. After being traded to Los Angeles in 1975, he led the Lakers to five more NBA crowns.

Those six titles matched his six MVP honors, and when Abdul-Jabbar put in his last sky hookthat unblockable sweeping soft shot that became his trademarkhe had concluded his Hall of Fame career with 38,387 points, more than 1,000 beyond anyone else.

Theres a ball. Theres a hoop. You put the ball through the hoop, Abdul-Jabbar once joked.

Abdul-Jabbar developed from a rail-thin high school star named Lew Alcindor to a strong, graceful, and dominant performer. He changed his name for religious reasons while he was with the Bucks, but he never changed his game.

Abdul-Jabbar would set up just outside the lane, many times with two players guarding him once he got the ball. Because he was an excellent passer, he often would find teammates for open shots. More often, though, he would shoot. And hit.

Beginning with his Rookie of the Year campaign for Milwaukee, when Abdul-Jabbar scored 28.8 points a game, he averaged at least 21 a game in each of the first seventeen seasons of his twenty-year career, leading the league in scoring twice. He made the All-Star Game in all but one of his seasons and twice was MVP of the finals. The numbers were just as special in the playoffsa 24.3 average.

Why judge anymore? asked Pat Riley, who coached Abdul-Jabbar during the Lakers Showtime days. When a man has broken records, won championships, endured tremendous criticism and responsibility, why judge? Lets toast him as the greatest player ever.

He was certainly the greatest scorer ever. And it was not only with backboard-shaking dunks or that famed sky hook; Abdul-Jabbar was a good foul shooter, rare among big men. Less rare among tall, athletic centers was Abdul-Jabbars shot-blocking skills. He retired in 1989 at age forty-two with the most in league history: 3,189.

BORN:

April 16, 1947, New York, New York.

HIGH SCHOOL:

Power Memorial High School, New York, New York.

COLLEGE:

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).

PRO CAREER:

Milwaukee Bucks (196975); Los Angeles Lakers (197589).

RECORDS:

NBA Most Career Points (38,387); Minutes Played (57,446); Field Goals (15,837); Most NBA All-Star Games (18).

HONORS:

Basketball Hall of Fame (1995); NBA Most Valuable Player (1971, 1972, 1974, 1976, 1977, 1980); NBA Finals Most Valuable Player (1971, 1985).

He was supposed to be too slow and not strong enough to become a star. So Larry Bird soared powerfully through college basketball, nearly winning an NCAA title with Indiana State.

And then Larry Legend dominated the NBA with the Boston Celtics on his way to the Basketball Hall of Fame.

Bird brought a lot more to the game than basketball smarts and a near-perfect shooting eye from anywhere on the court. He was so confident that hed tell opponents he was going to score 40 points, then do it. He once asked the other players in the All-Star Games three-point shooting contest which one was going to finish secondto him. Then he won it.

Larry is something special. Ill never forget those battles, said Magic Johnson, the Lakers great guard and one of Birds best friends in the NBA. That man is one of those guys who actually scared me to death. He could beat you at any time and in so many ways. It was scary.

When Bird joined the Celtics in 1979, they were struggling. The most successful team in NBA history, the Celtics had become losers. Bird quickly changed that, winning the leagues Rookie of the Year honors, as Boston won 61 games, 32 better than the season before.