Basketball is HUGE, at least in America! The players here earn in the order of millions. And like every other sport on the planet NBA has had its fair share of weirdness. From a player being stabbed, to another player stabbing an actual lion out in the open, NBA has it all! Here is a collection of facts that will blow you away, read on to find out!
1. The shortest and the tallest players were on the same!
Manute Bol at 7'7" and Muggsy Bogues at 5'3" were the tallest & the shortest players respectively in NBA. The interesting fact about them is that they both played for the same team during the 1987-88 season, Washington bullets.
2. Shaquille O’Neal has just 1 three-pointer to his name
Retired NBA great Shaq O'Neal has had a tremendous record of over 11,196 buckets! He has, in his entire career attempted 22 three-pointers but has been successful only once!
3. WNBA max salary – $101,000 whereas for NBA, it's over $20 Million!!
Although the viewership of Women's basketball is lower than that of Men's, the difference in salaries of the 2 divisions is way more that what you'd imagine!
4. Michael Jordan was fined every time he wore the Nike Air Jordans!
1985 saw the Nike Jordans being introduced, but Commissioner David Stern hated them so much (because they apparently clashed with the Bulls' uniform) that he fined $5,000 every time Michael wore them in the game. But Michael was least bothered as Nike paid all the fines for him!
5. Shaq had thrown an open challenge to Hakeem!
Orlando Magic's Shaquille O’Neal had sent a typed out personally delivered message to Houston Rockets' Hakeem Olajuwon challenging him to a one-on-one after the Magics lost to the Rockets pretty badly. He thought he was the better player but in a bad team!
6. Stats say that 60% of the NBA players become broke soon!
Typically NBA players go on to become millionaires, but also get broke real soon! It is amazing how stats prove that around 60% of the NBA players turned broke after approximately 5 years of retirement!
7. 39 blocks made by the SHORTEST player in NBA (5'3")
This one should probably be floating higher up in the list of weird basketball facts! Tyrone Curtis Muggsy Bogues was a blocking specialist, but the thing about him was that he was just 5ft. 3in. tall! He has a total of 39 blocks against taller players (obviously!).
8. One of the tallest NBA players killed a lion with a spear!
Manute Bol along with Gheorghe Mureșan were the tallest players in the whole of NBA! Along with this distinction, he is known to have killed a lion, while it was asleep (he was a part of the Dinka tribe of Sudan)!
9. Clippers's forward Paul "pierced" 11 times at the bar, but still, he never sat out!
On Sept. 25, 2000, Celtics forward Paul Pierce, who was only trying to stop a fight at the Buzz Club in Boston, was stabbed 11 times in the face, neck & back but still went on to play all the 82 games in the 2000-01 season!
10. Hate for Chicago Bulls from NBA Jam (video game)
The maker of the basketball game, NBA Jam hates the Chicago Bulls so much that he had written a special code that made the player miss all last-second shots! BRUTAL!
11. The fake Jordans company!
A Chinese shoe company had named its shoes Qiaodan ( pronounced as cheow-dun) and started selling basketball shoes. Today, they are so popular that they advertise and sponsor in actual NBA games!
