Nominees for the Basketball Hall of Fame

In my mind pro basketball, known as the NBA in North America, has an important decision to make. Should they keep their Hall of Fame an elite club, or open the doors to players who were simply very good. Major League Baseball’s Hall of Fame is fastly becoming the Hall of very good, so far basketball is not there but this year’s list of nominees certainly could take it that way. I hate to agree with Rob Parker, former Detroit News writer and current ESPN, on anything. However, he submits that when a sports fan reads a guy’s name they know if he is a hall of famer or not.

If that was the case, than the only pro basketball enshrined in 2011 should be Reggie Miller. When I read that guys name I think about his great career and deem him Hall worthy. The others on this list, not so much. There is Mark Jackson who is #3 in career assists, Bernard King who was a scoring force even after knee surgery ruined two of his years, Coach Don Nelson the winingest coach in NBA history eight months out from being fired by the Golden State Warriors, and Dennis Rodman who had a great NBA career.

Miller is a lock no question, and even though I may be prejudiced by being from Detroit I would also enshrine Rodman. He was first or second all team defense eight years in a row, and was one of the reasons the Detroit Pistons and Chicago Bulls won consecutive championships. With that being said I think it is too early to enshrine Nelson, but he probably belongs there as well.

The rest of the candidates to not measure up in my estimation, even though the Basketball Hall of Fame does recognize players from all levels of the game.