Olajuwon imagines Shaq today and lights up. “He’d be a monster! Who’s going to stop him?” (I received a similar reaction from Van Gundy, who calls Shaq “the greatest distorter of defenses who ever played,” as well as his brother Stan, who coached Shaq in Miami.) Next is Giann...
But as the game moved outward, the Shaq’s and Yao Ming’s of the league became the exception to the point that in today’s NBA, there is a playoff team in Texas starting a 6’6 player at center. The emphasis is on skill over size with the best players in the league having the ...