NBA Fa(c)T and Fiction

[bakahump]

So while buying some furniture for the house I visited a lazy boy store. While there the sales person was selling up the reliability of the product. One thing she mentioned was that they are great but that some people 300Lbs + are shouldnt expect a long life span (...of the product...).
I know personally adding 10 lbs a year goes pretty much unnoticed (of course I am not in any way a pro athlete. But they are more likely adding more muscle mass and a smaller amount of "Fill out")

And its slow and the off season....so...

That got me thinking about sports figures. Obviously football players are massive. Baseball, Golf, Tennis and hockey are pretty normal sized humans.
(all weights are BBRef)
Then I thought about "NBA" players (College etc etc). And I thought about the listed weight of players.
For guys So tall their weights seem off. I mean 8-12 inches of height over a normal person has to be a significant amount of weight. And if a person can look "normal' at 185-225 then where are these guys at?
KG For instance was maybe 240 (at 6'11 ish) but despite being pretty thin was also pretty Jacked. So some players I can see or it at least passes the "possible" test.
But others .... Like Shaq. Not sure even his listed 325 is even fair. For a 7'1 Guy as physically huge as he is. And I am talking his Laker/Celt years. Orlando and LSU....300-325 was probably right.
Luke Kornet is only 250? Or about the same as Olujuwon?
Or Tatum for instance. Thinner guy...but 210 on a 6'8 frame? Comeon.
Aron Baynes is a large human (in more ways then one...). You cant tell me that a 6'10 man is 260 lbs.
No way "Playing Barkley" was only 250.
I mean just google Arnold Schwarzenegger, Andre and Wilt. A 230+ lb man looks like a child compared to Wilt. No way he was only 50 lbs more.

None of this matters of course. But I am curious.

So I figured I would ask as I know some of you have played coached and know real NBA players. Those cant be there real weights can they? I figure there is a stigma much like Bill Walton used to rail against about being a "7 Footer" about being 300plus. Or even 250 plus for "wing" or 225 as a guard. I mean john Bagley at 185? Comeon!

So how far off do you think most of these weights are? Who are some of the most egregious you can think of?

 

[Kliq]

NBA players are quite tall but most of them have fairly narrow frames (particularly very skinny legs) and are not built like your average person, even if you take height out of the equation. Most of them have low body-fat so they can look ripped, but don't have a ton of actual muscle mass.

The listed weights are also all probably taken from when they first entered the league and are not always updated. So it's all when players are most likely at their lightest, when they are 19/20 years old, and not accounting for 10-12 years of physical growth.

Baseball-Reference lists almost every MLB player based on their rookie weight. So David Wells weighs 187lbs, for a particularly funny example.

 

[kfoss99]

Michael Jordan was listed at 195 lbs for awhile. I still don't buy that. He was 6' 6" and all muscle.

Now, maybe the heights are a lie and the weights accurate?

And another thought. The weights may be accurate. I have a cat and a small dog, they're roughly the same size. My wife and I think the cat weighs more than the dog, but I think he's two pounds lighter. The cat is just that much more dense; he's a lean, mean (loveable), killing machine.

 

[Jimbodandy]

The heights are pretty reliable nowadays. Can't speak to the weights, but I wouldn't be surprised if guys' weights aren't updated as they bulk up during their 20s.

 

[Smokey Joe]

in post 1383 of the general offseason thread, there is a picture of Jayson Tatum, Cooper Flagg and a guy leaning up against a wall looking at his phone. I totally expected Flagg to look like a beanpole, but I was amazed how thin Tatum still looks at age 25 especially his legs.
I would not be surprised if the guy leaning up against the wall weighs the most out of the three.

 

[BaseballJones]

Here are two images of Shaq later in his career. Look at him compared to KG and Kendrick Perkins.

KG was listed at 240 and Shaq just dwarfs him.

Perkins was listed at 270. Shaq is WAYYYYY bigger than Perkins. Perkins looks like a small forward trying to defend a normal center. And Perk was enormous.

Late Shaq had to be at least 350 pounds, minimum.

 

[Jimbodandy]

FWIW, I'd be willing to bet that Flagg is close to twice Tatum's body fat percentage. That's not a knock on Flagg at all, but Tatum could be under 5% and probably outweighs him by 20#. I'd bet at similar ages they looked a lot closer though.

 

[NYCSox]

No one has mentioned John "Hot Plate" Williams?

 

[Pablo's TB Lover]

You have to remember, especially looking at Shaq's Cavs photo above, the skinny legs on even larger NBA dudes. So although tall, it is not as if NBA players are distributing their apparent upper body mass over a full body height. Their legs tend to stay thin for whatever reason. (Underdeveloped muscles from adolescent growth spurts? Daily running regiment over miles of full court game action?) The large midsections or big chests could be deceptive, when their 5 foot high legs may weigh the same as my squatty 3 1/2 footers.

 

[worm0082]

Remember this guy? I think he was about 400lbs and C’s wouldn’t play him til he got down to 360.
View: https://youtu.be/Xfu4_8GT_gk

 

[Euclis20]

Here are two images of Shaq later in his career. Look at him compared to KG and Kendrick Perkins.

KG was listed at 240 and Shaq just dwarfs him.

Perkins was listed at 270. Shaq is WAYYYYY bigger than Perkins. Perkins looks like a small forward trying to defend a normal center. And Perk was enormous.

Late Shaq had to be at least 350 pounds, minimum.

The KG photo looks like Pierce standing next to Rondo. It doesn't seem too crazy because KG was always a wiry sort of guy (some of which was leftover reputation from when he was a super skinny teenager), but that Perkins pic, wow. As you note Perk was an absolute bruiser, not especially tall (most teams at that time still had at least one seven footer on the roster, and Perk was just 6'10) but there were few guys beefier, and next to Shaq he looks like the little brother who hasn't hit puberty yet. I also like that he has the standard Shaq defense ready (two hands on back/arms, ready to brace with all of the defender's strength), already knowing it won't do any good.

 

[reggiecleveland]

Basketball players are often lighter than they look. Most highly motivated guys want to play at as low a weight as possible. Trying to slide, or explode past people or jump, reducing the weight of the projectile (your body) by even a few pounds is a difference maker. I use this when I coach guys. Take a lift, like bench or squats. if you remove just 5 lbs you can feel it. Young players are motivated by dunking so it can be a real motivator. Dozens of times I have helped guys go up a level as a dunker (can't dunk to dunk, one hand to two hand, one step to no step, 180 to 360, etc) simply by reducing salt and meat, eating more sensible for a week/ ten day days, and dropping 2/3 pounds.

Even in the 80s and 90s basketball players would not work chest, lats a lot since it was useless weight, so Dwight Howard, Alonzo Mourning, MJ, etc had perfect power builds with big shoulders and triceps, but not a lot of weight on their chest, back, so playing in tank tops that show off the developed muscles, and being ripped, they are a lot lighter than they look. Just for myself when I quit playing everyday I gained ten pounds. I was still ripped. And the funny thing was people thought I had lost weight.

Just some math. NBA hoops guys are often 3-4% body fat which is shredded. But to go to 7-8% which is still six pack veins popping lean, is 8lb or if it's a forward 12-15. Also with the ridiculous metbolism, genetics of an elite power athlete they probably can't gain that weight without pound or two of muscle. So to the civilian eye an NBA guy, elite college player probably looks 10 to 20lb heavier than he is.

 

[Phil Plantier]

I just want to applaud this thread as a great addition to the offseason.

To add content:
And Thomas "Ham" Hamilton was the most confusing player I've ever seen.

Maybe we should award a Billy Paultz Award for the best NBA player in an atypical body type. An early nominee: Kenneth Lofton Jr (no relation)

 

[Kliq]

Kyle Lowry would win that award like, every year.

 

[TripleOT]

I attended a game at the Garden when Thomas Hamilton was on the Celtics roster, in street clothes due to his weight. He was a mountain. Hamilton was one of the two seven footers on the opposing team in the championship game in Hoop Dreams, with Rashard Griffith

 

[Kliq]

I read a passage in a book that was written by Hamilton's former agent. Basically when he took on Hamilton he was way over 400 lbs. He took him into his home and at one point he came home and saw that Hamilton had drunk two gallons of Orange Juice and was lying on the floor. He never really had any home structure and was basically abused as a kid, it was sad reading about it. His son, also Tommy Hamilton, had a pretty good career at DePaul and Texas Tech.

 

[reggiecleveland]

I

Maybe we should award a Billy Paultz Award for the best NBA player in an atypical body type

The Whopper played in an era when being enormous was the best thing to be.
I was a pratice guy on a team that had an old school coach who had done some stuff the be banned from the NBA (money I thingk) and NCAA (hit a player) and a guiy had told some lie and I called it a "whopper" the coach (as was his norm) snapped "You better be talking about Billy Paultz!"

 

[Devizier]

Oliver Miller comes to mind as the atypical player/size match.