Ballislife unveiled the first installment in a multi-part series on Thursday, documenting the dynamic ties between football and basketball, and breaking down the impressive history of college basketball players making the leap to successful NFL careers despite having little to no college football experience.
In this second installment, we’ll take a closer look at what could have been for some of the biggest and most pivotal stars in NBA history had they opted for a career on the gridiron instead of the hardwood. From the prominent players we’ve always heard tales of, such as LeBron James and Allen Iverson, to an old-time NBA Hall of Famer in John Havlicek to Jalen Suggs and Matt Barnes, who were considered Player of the Year-level competitors in both sports in high school.
LeBron James
It’s pretty obvious that LeBron would have remained a star wide receiver if he took his talents to The Horseshoe at Ohio State as an 18-year-old instead of the Quicken Loans Arena a few hours away in Cleveland. The age-old question surrounding this topic is, just how good could LeBron have been if he had decided to pass on what has become a GOAT-worthy basketball career to catch passes?
According to a 2009 ESPN interview with former Green Bay Packers executive Mark Murphy, James could have been a name in the company of some of the greatest wide receivers of all time had he stuck with the sport. Murphy even insisted that James was so good, college may not have even been necessary for his development.
“I’ve been around a lot of great receivers,” Murphy told ESPN. “I tell people that I rate my top receivers — coaching, playing or watching — as James Lofton, Jerry Rice, Steve Largent and LeBron James. People laugh at me, but it’s true. The kid had everything you could want. I felt like that was one kid that could have gone from high school to the NFL and played.”
It’s easy to say that about someone of LeBron’s stature and about someone that you know will never put that evaluation to the test, but the point remains, he was a talented wideout as an underclassman at St. Vincent-St. Mary (Akron, Ohio) before wisely giving up the sport following a wrist injury in a travel ball game the summer before his senior season.
Murphy’s theory was nearly tested in 2011, as both the Dallas Cowboys and Seattle Seahawks offered LeBron a contract during that year’s NBA lockout. James reportedly seriously considered the Cowboys’ offer and has even said that he would have made the team.
John Havlicek
Over 40 years before a young LeBron James wowed football and basketball scouts across the country as a potential two-sport wonder from Ohio, another NBA legend and fellow Ohioan, John Havlicek, was gaining similar hype. At a time when being a professional football player was a much more lucrative profession than being a professional basketball player, Havlicek focused on basketball at Ohio State after a brief stint on the football team and made himself a top prospect for the 1962 NBA Draft.
Because of his athleticism, however, the Cleveland Browns selected him with a flyer pick in the seventh round of the 1962 NFL Draft while he was still completing his senior basketball season with the Buckeyes. Havlicek actually attended training camp with the Browns and even appeared in an exhibition game, but recorded no stats and was ultimately too inexperienced to keep on the roster.
According to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, however, Havlicek played a key role in a pivotal moment of that game. Not only that, but it was also a game that was actually quite significant in NFL history in its own right.
“He appeared in only one exhibition game and did not catch a pass. However, the game account pulled from the Hall’s vast archives revealed he laid a key block that sprung Hall of Fame fullback Jim Brown for a 45-yard run against the rival Pittsburgh Steelers on Aug. 18, 1962 in the NFL’s first double header,” The Hall explained in a 2017 article.
Havlicek again received professional football contract offers from various franchises in 1966, including one from the Cleveland Browns. However, Celtics coach Red Auerbach and NBA commissioner Walter Kennedy famously and successfully urged NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle to back off the NBA star, effectively ending Havlicek’s NFL dreams.
Allen Iverson
Legendary point guard Allen Iverson first honed those skills on the football field as a quarterback, running back and wide receiver at Bethel High School in Hampton, Va. in the early 1990s. Iverson earned Virginia Associated Press High School Player of the Year honors as a junior in 1992-93 after winning Virginia 5A state championships in each sport. Iverson recorded 1,483 yards and 14 touchdowns through the air and 781 yards and 15 touchdowns on the ground that season.
Iverson’s 6’1, 165-pound frame would have made playing quarterback at the FBS level very tough in the 1990s, even though some school likely would have given him a chance and would have also received an All-American basketball player at the dame time. Could Iverson ever have put on the weight and muscle to be seriously scouted at the position professionally? Unlikely, but perhaps like fellow Virginian Ronald Curry he could have likely played college quarterback and then succeeded as a slot wide receiver or cornerback in the NFL because of his speed, shiftiness and toughness. Ultimately, his choices narrowed after the famous legal case that forced him to miss both seasons as a senior and he made the right choice by securing his future on the basketball court by attending Georgetown University.
Jalen Suggs
Current Orlando Magic point guard and former Gonzaga Bulldogs Final Four hero Jalen Suggs was widely considered a three-star football prospect coming out of Minnehaha High School in Minnesota, but some outlets had him tabbed as a four-star recruit after winning the Minnesota 4A state championship as a junior and the state’s Gatorade Player of the Year award as a senior.
While Suggs ultimately committed to a football-less school, Gonzaga, to play college basketball, he received offers to play football for some of the most prestigious programs in the country, including Georgia, Iowa, and Michigan State. Suggs threw for 2,210 yards and 25 touchdowns while gaining an additional 975 yards on the ground during his historic senior campaign in which he became the first athlete in state history to earn both Mr. Basketball and Mr. Football honors in the same school year.
Matt Barnes
Everyone knows Matt Barnes as a legit NBA forward and now as a guy with some impressive on-screen chops, but Barnes was also an incredible wide receiver at Del Campo High School in Fair Oaks, Calif., just outside Sacramento. Barnes was a two-sport All-American at Del Campo, recording 45 touchdown catches in two seasons while reportedly running a 4.34 40-yard dash with a 30-inch vertical leap. During Barnes’ senior season, he tallied 58 receptions for 1,112 yards and 28 touchdowns. If you’re doing the math, that means over 48 percent of his receptions went for a touchdown that year.
Barnes’ prep career was so prolific that it earned him an induction into the Sacramento Sports Hall of Fame and a jersey retirement at his alma mater in both sports. That area of California has produced dozens of NFL players who were far less impressive at that level than Barnes was, so it isn’t far-fetched to believe that he could have had some real success if he decided to take it to the next level.
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