A few words on the Brazilian basketball legend Oscar Schmidt (the only player in the poll not to have played in the NBA).
He is widely considered the greatest player never to have played in the NBA. In fact, he had multiple offers to join the NBA, but he turned them all down cause he wouldn't have been eligible to play for the Brazilian national team (at the time NBA players couldn't play for their national team).
Schmidt was called “Mão Santa” (Holy Hand) because of his ability to shoot the ball. He scored 49,703 points throughout his 23-year career, which is about 11,000 more than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
Hats off to Drazen as well. The MJ of european basketball (although Luka will certainly enjoy more success in the NBA).
Anyway, I voted for Arvydas Sabonis. Prior to the injuries, Sabonis was a 7'3'' Larry legend!
- strong like a bull
- massive hands
- out of this world basketball IQ
- imo, the best passing big man of all time (certainly better than Walton/Jokic)
- terrific rim protector
- great rebounder
- endless repertoire of post moves, he could score pretty much at will in the paint
- he could shoot the 3 (he is 7'3'' and he was shooting 3s in the 80s-90s!)
In a nutshell, he could do it all! It's just unfortunate that he wasn't allowed to play for a team outside the Soviet Union till he was 25 years old. Here's a short video about him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18tnToDLHV4And here's a short video of 22-year-old Arvydas Sabonis demolishing 21-year-old David Robinson (among others) in the 1986 FIBA World Championship.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06usV6451ikCall me crazy, but I truly believe that Sabonis in his prime (prior to the injuries) was a GOAT candidate.
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I didn't include guys like Ewing/Duncan/Kyrie etc. cause they have played for team USA. I included KAT cause he has represented the Dominican Republic.
Honorable mentions: Steven Adams, Nicolas Batum, Sergei Belov, Rolando Blackman, Dejan Bodiroga, Bogdan Bogdanovic, Bojan Bogdanovic, Andrew Bogut, Manute Bol, Clint Capela, Kresimir Cosic, Luol Deng, Boris Diaw, Goran Dragic, Evan Fournier, Nikos Galis, Danilo Gallinari, Marc Gasol, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Al Horford, Serge Ibaka, Sarunas Jasikevicius, Andrei Kirilenko, Radivoj Korac, Toni Kukoc, Dino Meneghin, Nikola Mirotic, Jamal Murray, Juan Carlos Navarro, Nene, Dino Radja, Ricky Rubio, Domantas Sabonis, Detlef Schrempf, Dennis Schroder, Luis Scola, Rik Smits, Milos Teodosic, Tristan Thompson, Hedo Turkoglu, Nikola Vucevic, Andrew Wiggins