Damion Lee, Nickeil Alexander-Walker and Luguentz Dort are three players who received multiple player votes in the 2021 All-Star voting in the Western Conference backcourt votes. D'Angelo Russell is not one of those players, as he received but a lone vote from fellow players. The collective fan vote put him as the No. 23 guard in the Western Conference. His weighted score had him below Lou Williams and Talen Horton-Tucker.
So it's pretty weird to think about the fact that Russell was an All-Star just two seasons ago. It's not that he's a bad player by any means; on the contrary, his stats tell the opposite story, with averages of 21.3 points, 6.0 assists and 3.3 rebounds per game in the two years since that All-Star honor. The hope is that, at just 25 years old, Russell can still improve his game, play for a team that isn't dwelling at the bottom of the standings, stay healthy, and work his way back up to All-Star status. If he successfully does that, he can probably avoid finding himself on a list like this one a couple of decades from now.
The same can't be said for the guys below. And again, the names you'll see below are not bad NBA players. No one who is elected to an All-Star team is bad. They just may not be the first names that you think of when you think about the All-Star teams of the past 25 years, which is the random cut-off date I've decided upon. The Tim Duncans, Kobe Bryants, LeBron Jameses, the Stephen Currys... these are not the players you'll find below. Instead, this will probably serve as a trip down memory lane for that one random year when a player seemed to play above his skill level. Or perhaps you'll learn something new — a "huh, I didn't know that!" type of moment, you know?
Without further ado, here are nine players who may not ring the All-Star bell when you're toiling through your memory banks trying to remember the rosters of the past quarter-century. And thank you to the "No Dunks" podcast for inspiring the idea!
Dana Barros, Philadelphia 76ers
Dana Barros figured it all out for a year with the 76ers.(Tim DeFrisco/Allsport/Getty Images)All-Star season (1994-95): 20.6 points, 3.3 rebounds, 7.5 assists, 1.8 steals, 0.0 blocks, .490/.464/.899
Career stats: 10.5 points, 1.9 rebounds, 3.3 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.1 blocks, .460/.411/.858
The sharpshooting Barros really put it all together in the 1994-95 campaign, his second in Philadelphia, after a promising young career as a bench weapon in Seattle. He led the league in three-point percentage (44.6 percent) in the 1991-92 season but only average 8.3 points per game in a much smaller sample size. Securing a starting job in Philly — and playing for a bad team that needed a go-to scorer — allowed Barros to up that role and record career numbers leading up to his lone All-Star selection. In no other season did he score more than 13.3 points, dish out more than 5.2 assists or rebound the ball more than 2.4 times per game. But for that one year, everything just clicked.
Tyrone Hill, Cleveland Cavaliers
Tyrone Hill was a steady force on the inside.(Allsport/Getty Images)All-Star season (1994-95): 13.8 points, 10.9 rebounds, 0.8 assists, 0.8 steals, 0.6 blocks, .504/---/.662
Career stats: 9.4 points, 8.6 rebounds, 0.8 assists, 0.8 steals, 0.5 blocks, .502/---/.643
Hill was as consistent an old-school big man as you can find, posting eight seasons of at least 8.0 points and 8.0 rebounds throughout his 14-year career. But was he actually that much more productive than the league average? With a career box score plus/minus of -1.9 and a Value Over Replacement Player of just 0.8, the numbers seem to suggest that this wasn't the case. Even in his All-Star season, he had a -1.3 box score plus/minus, which ranked him at exactly No. 130 out of 168 eligible players. For a point of comparison, the aforementioned Barros ranked at No. 12, meaning he was much more deserving... even if we don't necessarily recognize either player as an All-Star talent in hindsight.
Chris Gatling, Dallas Mavericks/New Jersey Nets
Chris Gatling finished the 1996-97 with the Nets.(Jamie Squire/Getty Images)All-Star season (1996-97): 19.0 points, 7.9 rebounds, 0.6 assists, 0.8 steals, 0.7 blocks, .525/.167/.717
Career stats: 10.3 points, 5.3 rebounds, 0.7 assists, 0.7 steals, 0.5 blocks, .513/.249/.660
From 1995 to 2002, Gatling moved between teams nine times, making stops with the Warriors, Heat, Mavericks, Nets, Bucks, Magic, Nuggets, Cavaliers and Heat again. The only remarkable season in that span was in 1996-97, where the Mavericks maximized his usage and value to turn him into an All-Star. He signed there as a free agent and left there as part of a nine-player swap that featured Shawn Bradley coming to Dallas. His production, neither before nor after the move, was ever the same, though he was a solid big off the bench for quite some time.
Dale Davis, Indiana Pacers
Dale Davis had many years similar to his All-Star 1999-00 season.(Ezra O. Shaw /Allsport via Getty Images)Career stats: 8.0 points, 7.9 rebounds, 0.9 assists, 0.6 steals, 1.2 blocks, .530/---/.562
Before I tell you about Davis' All-Star campaign, I'm going to see if you can guess which one it was. Here are a handful of stat lines, in no particular order, from different seasons throughout the big man's stay in Indiana.
A: 10.6 points, 9.4 rebounds, 1.6 blocks, .563 FG%
B: 11.7 points, 10.9 rebounds, 1.6 blocks, .529 FG%
C: 10.0 points, 9.9 rebounds, 1.3 blocks, .502 FG%
D: 10.4 points, 9.7 rebounds, 1.4 blocks, .538 FG%
Nothing's really standing out, eh? It's C, from his 1999-00 campaign, and I don't really understand why this was the year, out of all the other similar seasons. Why wasn't it Elton Brand, with his rookie averages of 18.2 points and 9.7 rebounds at the All-Star break? Why not Shawn Kemp and his 18.8 points and 9.2 rebounds before All-Star Weekend? I couldn't tell you.
Theo Ratliff, Philadelphia 76ers
Theo Ratliff was traded away from the Philadelphia 76ers after an All-Star first half.(Robert Skeoch /Allsport via Getty Images)All-Star season (2000-01): 12.4 points, 8.3 rebounds, 1.2 assists, 0.6 steals, 3.7 blocks, .499/---/.760
Career stats: 7.2 points, 5.7 rebounds, 0.6 assists, 0.5 steals, 2.4 blocks, .498/---/.736
If you had any sense, you wouldn't challenge the rim against the 2000-01 76ers. Though Allen Iverson was the star of the show — and rightly so — the Sixers started out the year with Theo Ratliff and his league-leading block numbers on the inside, and he was eventually dealt for Dikembe Mutombo in a six-player deal. Could the Sixers have made the Finals if Ratliff had stayed healthy and no trade was ever made? Could they have won the Finals over Shaq and the Lakers if an All-Star Ratliff was cementing the paint? I guess we'll never know. What we do know is that Ratliff would fail to make this kind of offensive impact again, never reaching double-digit points per game again in his long career.
Mehmet Okur, Utah Jazz
Mehmet Okur's shooting skills were uncommon for big men at the time.(Lisa Blumenfeld/Getty Images)All-Star season (2006-07): 17.6 points, 7.2 rebounds, 2.0 assists, 0.5 steals, 0.5 blocks, .462/.384/.765
Career stats: 13.5 points, 7.0 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 0.5 steals, 0.7 blocks, .458/.375/.797
I wonder how good Okur would be in today's NBA, with an emphasis on stretch bigs in valuable roles. After all, a 6-foot-11 presence with a 38 percent three-point stroke sounds like a pretty good fit on most any team, right? All I know is that Okur was dominant in mid-2000s basketball video games thanks to his ability to rip the net from long range.
Okur's career was short-lived, with injuries playing a part in its rapid decline toward the end, but he does have a lone All-Star appearance to show for it.
Mo Williams, Cleveland Cavaliers
Always a good player, Williams earned an All-Star selection in just one season.(Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)All-Star season (2008-09): 17.8 points, 3.4 rebounds, 4.1 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.1 blocks, .467/.436/.912
Career stats: 13.2 points, 2.8 rebounds, 4.9 assists, 0.9 steals, 0.1 blocks, .434/.378/.871
Mo Williams was always good. An explosive scorer, a crafty dribbler, a sharp shooter — he fit the mold of those quick, athletic guards who could hurt a defense in a number of ways. But an All-Star? That doesn't really come to mind. Lou Williams was never an All-Star. Monta Ellis was never an All-Star. Jamal Crawford was never an All-Star. But Mo Williams was. Who'd have thought?
His All-Star appearance probably wasn't the peak moment of his career, though.
Roy Hibbert, Indiana Pacers
Hibbert's peak didn't last long but saw him named to two All-Star teams.(Joe Robbins/Getty Images)Career stats: 10.0 points, 6.3 rebounds, 1.3 assists, 0.4 steals, 1.7 blocks, .465/---/.755
When you think of All-Star centers in the East in the early 2000s, who comes to mind? Dwight Howard, Brook Lopez, Al Horford... it's a little bit harder than you'd think, right? It turned out to be a position that was fairly depleted in terms of top-end talent, which is likely why Hibbert was elected to not one but two All-Star teams in that era despite never really being that good. His BPM in those two years was exactly 0.0, meaning he had the impact of a league average player in a typical set of 100 possessions.
Kyle Korver, Atlanta Hawks
Unstoppable three-point threat? Sure. But All-Star? Not what you'd think of for Kyle Korver.(Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)All-Star season (2014-15): 12.1 points, 4.1 rebounds, 2.6 assists, 0.7 steals, 0.6 blocks, .487/.492/.898
Career stats: 9.7 points, 3.0 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 0.7 steals, 0.3 blocks, .442/.429/.877
The sharpshooting Korver has long been a well-respected threat for a number of teams, but an All-Star? Such a one-dimensional player like Korver usually doesn't contribute enough to a team's all-around success, but he actually did a whole lot for the Hawks as the stats show. And that 49.2 percent three-point rate from deep is just stupid, ranking ninth all-time for a single season. Who's first on that list? Who else but Korver, who recorded a ridiculous 53.6 percent clip in the 2009-10 season with the Jazz, albeit with much lower volume.
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