(interbasket) - Don't get lost in the hype, Kobe Bryant may be the youngest player to
reach 20,000 points in the NBA, but it certainly doesn't mean he was the
fastest nor most efficient. 14 players reached 20,000 points before Kobe.
All these news outlets talking up this youngest-to-20,000-record has left me a little perplexed. I know it’s a nice-sounding record, but since I am a
stats-kinda-guy, I find that it's inherently flawed to judge these type of records based on age. Perhaps if all NBA players
entered the league at 18 years old, then the accomplishment would have some weight, but that’s just not the case - making all this mostly just hype.
Viewing this as an apples-to-apples comparison, Kobe’s feat isn’t
nearly as amazing-sounding. Using the amount of games-played as our
simple yet equal measure- Wilt, Jordan, Big-O, Kareem and ten other players reached 20,000 points faster than Kobe Bryant. On this list, Kobe falls to 15th. Here's the top-ten list of players that reached 20,000 points in order of the least amount of games played:
Wilt Chamberlain (499games) during the 65-66 season (7th NBA season)
Michael Jordan (620) January 08, 1993 vs Milwukee Bucks (9th)
Oscar Robertson (671) during the 1968-69 season (9th)
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (684) during the 1976-77 season (9th)
Elgin Baylor (711) during the 1968-69 season (11th)
Allen Iverson (713) January 23, 2007 vs. Denver Nuggets (11th)
Jerry West (~720) during the 1970-71 season (11th)
Shaquille O’Neal (727) March 20, 2003 vs. Sacramento Kings (11th)
George Gervin (~745) during the 1985-86 season (10th)
Researching the internet and referring to basketball-reference.com I was able to determine the top-15 list (some I had to go with approximate games played) as well as including other players in the 20,000 point-club. To see where Kobe stands and where players like Dominique Wilkins, Hakeem Olajuwon, Clyde Drexler, Larry Bird, Kevin Garnett and Charles Barkley rank on this list check out the entire list and article if you dig.
