RealGM

For me:

Shaq - I often hear a lot from people how Shaq got lazy and could've been even better with a disciplined work ethic, which there is some truth but I've found a bit to be nit picking to be honest. He retired in the top 1% (so called top 10 greatest ever lists) of people to ever play, thats a extremely hard bar for a player to reach.

I dont think people realize how hard and rare it is in NBA history for player of that size to have played THAT long. The few 7ft 290 to 300 odd plus lb guys that existed in history like Sabonis and Yao, one can see that their bodies just could not take the constant running and jumping and broke down with devastating injuries. Or they were relative stiffs like Muresan and Eaton who were barely mobile playing limited minutes.

Shaq never did play a full 82 game season but he logged a lot of minutes when he did play.

Vernon Maxwell - Imho p4p THE biggest headcase and craziest player in NBA history on and off the court. His transgressions on and off the court were seemingly endless.

8 different stops in 12 seasons. I am really surprised that no matter how many times he wore out his welcome, some team would come calling.

I absolutely guarantee he would NOT last more than 3 seasons in today's NBA. Probably the most impressive thing about him to me is despite the endless drugs and alcohol he's consumed today is his 60th birthday and he looks in relatively fantastic shape as if he could suit up for a team today. Many ex NBA players have let themselves go, I've seen videos of him on IG on the Peloton bike and he is cut and lean with ripped six pack abs.

Forget his basketball career I am legit impressed he's even alive today, lol

Grant Hill, after all the injuries I thought he was toast, but he reinvented himself and stuck around for quite a bit (until his age 40 year!)...

Vince Carter as well, people claimed he didn't care, but you don't not care about basketball and stick around as long as he did - all while being cited as a veteran leader on all of your post prime stops...

Udonis Haslem

FuShengTHEGreat wrote:For me:

Shaq - I often hear a lot from people how Shaq got lazy and could've been even better with a disciplined work ethic, which there is some truth but I've found a bit to be nit picking to be honest. He retired in the top 1% (so called top 10 greatest ever lists) of people to ever play, thats a extremely hard bar for a player to reach.

Yeah, this 'stereotype' is very strong - while in reality Shaq has 14x All-NBA appearances, and furthermore once he missed All-NBA teams despite being 7th in MVP voting as a rookie because Ewing, Hakeem and D-Rob were ahead.

15x All-NBA is the second highest number for a player not named LeBron (Kobe, Duncan, Kareem) - and yet people believe that Shaq shortened his career or whatever. In reality, he had epic longevity.

For me - that's Pau Gasol: he averaged 18-9-3 as a rookie and 17-11-4 in his 15th season, and that all while winning 3 Olympic medals, 7 Eurobasket medals and one World Cup gold. For a ~top50 player ever or so - this is epic, epic career.

Karate Diop wrote:Grant Hill, after all the injuries I thought he was toast, but he reinvented himself and stuck around for quite a bit (until his age 40 year!)...

Vince Carter as well, people claimed he didn't care, but you don't not care about basketball and stick around as long as he did - all while being cited as a veteran leader on all of your post prime stops...

I'm disappointed in him given his talent level and skillset in a sense he should've been the face of a franchise for much longer than he did.

After Toronto for the remainder of his career he was content in being in the periphery in terms of being the face of a team, despite not suffering any major career altering injuries like other players in history that were curtailed.

Kobe and Paul Pierce of similar talent skill level and physical builds led teams for a much longer period in the same time span Vince played in.

Shaun Livingston and Paul George. I thought their careers were done after their injuries

Garrett Temple

Joel Embiid

Dwyane Wade....his knee was bone on bone right from day 1 in the NBA and he relentlessly attacked the basket like that for 16 years.

Mutombo it was admirable that he was forced into starting jobs due to Yao having a brittle body. Those middle 2000s Rocket teams are my biggest What If

Brian Scalabrine (11 years)

BCbudraptorfan wrote:Garrett Temple

Similarly, Ish Smith

I’m surprised that Taj Gibson played from 2010-2025. He’s still not officially retired.

Kevin Willis played from cassette tape era all the way into digital music era. Straight through CDs as if they had never happened.

Sean Marks

Played from 1998-2011 (13 seasons)

Never averaged more than 4.6ppg

Only played more than 29 games once

I always found it funny that the player with the shortest NBA career of all time shares names with not only two of the best players in NBA history, but also with the player who will soon achieve the feat of having the longest career in NBA history.

JamesOn Curry

https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/c/curryja01.html

Uncle Cliffy played 17 years

Tyson Chandler. He was considered a borderline bust at first and had injury issues that even got a trade for him voided, ended up playing for 19 seasons

Seth Curry is still in the league at age 35. Not bad for an undrafted player who had to get his start in the D league (it wasn't called the G league when he was in it) and was initially written off as a nepo brother

VC

With how high he jumps i would have thought he would mess those knees up earlier..

Austin Rivers and Jeff Green