Bernard King was a master of the basketball court, a scoring nightmare for opposition teams. Over his career he managed to score 22.55ppg. But his final comeback from knee injury may have tarnished a legend.
In 1990 King was suiting up for Washington and averaging a solid 28.39ppg, that was until injury set in and kept him out of the game for not only the rest of the season but the entire 1991 season as well.
In 1992 he came back for the New Jersey Nets but he could no longer continue his dominance due to his knee injury. He managed 32 games that season but wasn't even half the player he once was. Dropping to a career low 6.97 points per game and never playing again.
This was a scoring drop of 21.42 from his previous years play. If we ignore the 1991 season in which he didn't play, it is the biggest year to year scoring drop by any player in NBA history (with a minimum of 30 games in his comeback season).
If we were to look at the top 3 yearly scoring drops in NBA history we would find King followed by
Jim McDaniels 1971 - 23.79ppg to 1972 - 5.56ppg
Travis Grant 1974 - 25.19ppg to 1975 - 8.0ppg
Please note this is just a statistical story, I personally think that Bernard King is a legend of the game and worthy of Hall of Fame induction. This article is just to show the massive drop (in fact the biggest) in scoring production by a player.
Coach Onski
Stats thanks to www.databasebasketball.com
Picture thanks to www.basketsession.com
Originally Posted on www.onski.blogspot.com on the 27/12/2007
In 1990 King was suiting up for Washington and averaging a solid 28.39ppg, that was until injury set in and kept him out of the game for not only the rest of the season but the entire 1991 season as well.
In 1992 he came back for the New Jersey Nets but he could no longer continue his dominance due to his knee injury. He managed 32 games that season but wasn't even half the player he once was. Dropping to a career low 6.97 points per game and never playing again.This was a scoring drop of 21.42 from his previous years play. If we ignore the 1991 season in which he didn't play, it is the biggest year to year scoring drop by any player in NBA history (with a minimum of 30 games in his comeback season).
If we were to look at the top 3 yearly scoring drops in NBA history we would find King followed by
Jim McDaniels 1971 - 23.79ppg to 1972 - 5.56ppg
Travis Grant 1974 - 25.19ppg to 1975 - 8.0ppg
Please note this is just a statistical story, I personally think that Bernard King is a legend of the game and worthy of Hall of Fame induction. This article is just to show the massive drop (in fact the biggest) in scoring production by a player.
Coach Onski
Stats thanks to www.databasebasketball.com
Picture thanks to www.basketsession.com
Originally Posted on www.onski.blogspot.com on the 27/12/2007
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