We Finally Give These Guys a Title

Given that each of the Celtics' Big Three (Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen) is looking for his first championship ring, we certainly hope no one thought it was going to be easy for them in these playoffs. With the career-long struggles of Garnett, in particular, in mind, we were wondering: Who is the greatest NBA player never to have won a title?

Karl Malone and John Stockton

Stockton to Malone. Malone from Stockton. Stallone to Mockton . . . you get the idea. The careers of these two go together the way the words "Utah" and "Jazz" most certainly don't. So why separate them here? The duo pick-and-rolled opponents to death for 18 years in Utah, and their combined numbers over 19 NBA seasons each are staggering, beginning with a combined 21 first- or second-team all-NBA selections. Malone, a two-time MVP, ranks second all time in career points (36,928) and first in defensive rebounds (11,406). Meantime, Stockton's assist numbers are just absurd: 15,806 for his career, a full 5,472 ahead of the next guy (Mark Jackson), and all but one of the top six seasons ever in terms of per-game average. Little wonder that neither fellow, in 38 total seasons, ever missed the playoffs. The wonder, of course, is that none of those 38 total seasons ever resulted in an NBA title. For that apparent historical oddity, we can mostly blame Michael Jordan. And, yeah, probably Malone, too. Utah's only trips to the Finals, in 1997 and '98, resulted in a pair of six-game losses to Jordan's Bulls, and the first and last games of that span spell out the difference between Jordan and Malone. 1997, Game 1: With seconds left and the score tied, Malone had a chance to live up to both his "Mailman" nickname and the MVP award he won that year, but the Jazz star missed two free throws and, predictably, MJ drained the game-winner. 1998, Game 6: With seconds left and the Jazz up one, Malone had the ball knocked out of his hands by, yes, Jordan, who predictably went on to drain the game-winner. Stockton eventually retired in 2003, and Malone latched on to the Kobe-Shaq Lakers for one last shot at a ring. Alas, he got as far as the Finals but was stymied by the Pistons, who, surprisingly, did not feature His Airness. Stockton and Malone never got an NBA title, but here they get this title: Best of the Guys Who Couldn't Beat Jordan.

Charles Barkley

The Chuckster finishes third among GWCBJ, but his consolation prize is that he was much more fun to watch than Stockton and Malone back then and he is much more fun to watch than Jordan right now. As a much-lauded NBA analyst on TNT, Barkley gets to sit back and yuck it up while MJ struggles in the front office, first with the Wizards (Kwame Brown, anyone?) and now the Bobcats (Adam Morrison, no one).

Elgin Baylor

A list of NBA greats shorter than Stockton's shorts would still have Baylor's name on it, but the D.C. native went 0 for 7 in Finals appearances, thanks largely to Bill Russell's Celtics. Then, after injuries forced Baylor to retire nine games into the 1970-71 season, his Lakers immediately went on a 33-game winning streak and ultimately won their first championship in Los Angeles. That must have been fun to watch.

Patrick Ewing

It's tempting to invoke ol' No. 23 here, or that teammate who picked a really bad time to shoot 2-for-18, but our crack staff ignored the obvious and wondered about "what might have been had Bernard King not blown out his knee." Of course, that unfortunate incident happened the season before the Knicks drafted Ewing and, in fact, helped put New York in a position to land him, but it is a reminder that the Big Fella never really had that big-time running mate that seems to be a championship prerequisite.

Allen Iverson

The feeling in this tattooed neck of the woods is that Iverson, not, say, Garnett, is the active player who deserves to be on this list. Hey, at least the Answer has taken a team as far as the NBA Finals. And despite being much smaller than KG, not to mention almost everyone else, Iverson ranks third all-time in points per game (27.7) and, belying his ball-hog image, a very respectable 40th in assists (6.3).

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