It's about time Dominique Wilkins made the Hall of Fame. Apparently, the world of basketball has finished screwing with him.
One of the greatest basketball players of all-time and a player on par with Michael Jordan when it comes to scoring brilliance, and one of the most charismatic and popular superstars of his day, Dominique Wilkins has been overlooked his entire career.
Maybe it was because he played in Atlanta. He spent 12 seasons here in Atlanta (1982-94), usually being the only worthwhile player on the floor. He singlehandedly put Atlanta on the map and kept the team in playoff contention every season. The team recorded four 50 win seasons during his time here, despite a glaring lack of talent, and an abundance of front-office incompetence. Dominique was an unstoppable scorer and a phenomenal athlete, whose incredible dunks earned him the nickname, "The Human Highlight Film." Unfortunately, despite staggering scoring performances against the likes of Michael Jordan and Larry Bird, he was always mentioned after them in discussions about the game's best player.
The team also had a general manager who had an IQ that was a third of the average retard's IQ. His name was Pete Babcock, and he thought it would be a good idea to trade the only great player that Atlanta had ever seen. Some people in Atlanta, myself included, and STILL upset about this. Instead of surrounding a great player with great talent, he traded the only scoring threat Atlanta had in the middle of one of those 50 win seasons. Atlanta would go on to lose to the New York Knicks in the semi-finals of the 1994 Eastern Conference playoffs. It would be the last time Atlanta even had a realistic hope of going to the NBA Finals, or even being a respected NBA team.
Dominique would play the rest of the '94 season with the Los Angeles Clippers, a team so historically bad that they went 30 years without reaching the playoffs. He was probably traded there, because Babcock knew that if Wilkins was any closer, 'Nique would come to his house in the night and beat the crap out of him. And Dominique would be right to do so, because Babcock traded him from a potentially championship team to the Clippers.
Next season, Dominique would sign with the hated Boston Celtics. The team that would cause Dominique Wilkins more playoff headaches than any other...and now he's playing for them. The same team that he took to seven games in the 1988 Easter Conference Finals and went shot for shot with Larry Bird IN the Boston Garden. And it never seemed to look right. He must have felt the same way, because his game seemed to suffer. He was good, but he didn't seem to be the same player. So after a season there, he bolted to Greece, to play ball for Panathinaikos Athens, a top-ranked team. They won the championship, and he won MVP honors before coming back to play for the Spurs during a season where he'd ultimately get shafted again.
This was the season that David Robinson didn't play due to a back injury. This is the year before Tim Duncan came out of Wake Forest. This is the year that the Spurs had the worst record in ages. Dominique Wilkins played for THAT team. And he showed he still had it, by still having enormous scoring games against teams like the Lakers. He averaged about 18 points and 7 boards a game for that team and to reward him for his hard work, they let him go at the end of the season, instead of listening to me and trading the rest of the team. The Spurs would go on to draft Tim Duncan and David Robinson returned the following season. In 1999, they won an NBA championship. If they had kept 'Nique on the roster, they could have won one in '97. Who needs an explosive scoring threat when you've got Vinny Del Negro and Avery Johnson?
And to pile it on even further, the NBA had released its list of the NBA's 50 Greatest Players. Dominique Wilkins was not on it. Shaquille O'Neal was on it, but Dominique Wilkins wasn't. I won't get into why Shaq shouldn't have been there, but that's not important. What's important is that 'Nique should have been. So, on top of missing the '92 Dream Team because of injury, on top of being snubbed for the '96 Olympic Team, on top of Pete Babcock making one of the stupidest trades in NBA history, on top of always being second to Michael Jordan, he couldn't even get recognized for being one of the 50 best ever, which he clearly was. I guess being one of the most feared players ever ranks lower than being the Johnny-Come-Lately-Dunk Machine known as Shaquille O'Neal.
Dominique would play one season for Teamsystem Bologna, in Italy and one riding the bench for the Orlando Magic, despite his scoring numbers when he was in, before retiring at the end of the 2000 season, completing a brilliant career that was clearly unrecognized by the NBA and the sportswriters' community. In 2001, the Atlanta Hawks would retire his number 21. In 2004, he would be inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall Of Fame. In 2006, he would be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame, but not after being snubbed in 2005, the first year he was on the ballot. I guess being the 8th all-time leading scorer (and all-time Hawks leading scorer, by far), 9-time All-Star, 2-time Dunk Contest Winner, and gold medal winner on the '94 USA World Basketball Championship Team didn't really mean much to the voters.
At the very least, Dominique was recognized by his peers and the fans who saw him play. We all knew he was one of the greatest and finally, the man is getting some of his well-deserved recognition. Thanks for being one of the last to show us how to ram a basketball down the opposing center's throat, 'Nique.
Today, Dominique is a part-owner of the team that drafted him, as well as ruined his life, the Atlanta Hawks.
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