The 15 Worst White NBA Ballers of the Last Twenty Years

So now that you have all had a chance to analyze and criticize my choices for the top twenty white players of the last twenty years, it’s time for me to break you guys off with my selections for the worst white ballers of the last twenty years.

There are a few things that went into my completion of this list. It’s not just about who had the least talent, but more about what you contributed to your team. As such guys like Kurt Rambis or Mark Madsen would never make this list. Yeah they weren’t known for being very talented players, but none of them were a detriment to their team. If anything their hustle and their spirit contributed more positively to a team than most would expect. The players that make this list will not only be players with poor talent, but also over-hyped and over paid players (i.e players that made All-Star salaries but never averaged more than 5.5 ppg in a season.). If the acquisition of a player single-handedly ruined a franchise, then that player is most likely going to be on this list.

As with my 20 best list, a player can qualify for this if they are white and played high school or college basketball in the U.S. As well, borderline white boys such as Aaron Williams cannot make the list.

When compiling this list I came to one conclusion. And that is that for some reason that I can’t put my finger on, GMs love to fall in love with and then overpay goofy, un-athletic white seven footers. Its one thing if the seven-footer is Andrew Bogut or Kevin McHale, and a whole other thing if the player is say Paul Shirley. The NBA and it’s fans need to have a campaign similar to the DARE to keep kids off drugs campaign. It should be something like just say no to seven foot white boys with army style crew cuts…

One disturbing trend I picked up on while compiling this list is the fact that some of these terrible players were some of the highest paid, highest drafted players of their particular time. Also, a majority of these players have championship rings. This is just completely unfair when you consider that guys like Karl Malone or John Stockton retired without rings. Lastly, how does a guy like Will Purdue play over ten years in the league when a guy with talent like Harold Miner only play four NBA seasons? It makes absolutely NO sense.

Marty Conlon
Marty Conlon makes this list not so much because he wasn’t a decent player, but because he had the ugliest looking free-throw form known to man. Let’s just put it this way: His free-throw form made Bill Cartwright’s seem like a thing of beauty. I’m probably still holding animosity toward him for deciding to seemingly only have good games against the Lakers. I remember coming to school early in the 94 season being disgraced by the fact that my Lakers had gotten their asses kicked by Conlon the night before. So I guess this is how I extract my revenge.


Paul Shirley
The Guys has pretty much given up pursuing a professional basketball career to be a full-time sports blogger. That’s all you need to know. When you look him up on Wikipedia, there’s more about his sports blogging that his actual basketball career. With the dearth of big men in the league, you know you have no game if you’re a 6’10 young big man that can’t stick with a team.

Joe Wolf
This guy gets put on the list for sporting a mullet up through the new millennium. Joe is one of the nicer guys on this list and seemingly wasn’t really overpaid. But there simply was no justification for that damn mullet. In the mid-nineties he played with Shaquille O’neal and the Orlando Magic and quickly became a fan favorite (As almost every sorry big white guy normally does). Every time he would score a bucket in Orlando they would play this ridiculous wolf howl sound effect. It would have been cool if wolf was actually intimidating, but obviously this wasn’t the case. Wolf played 11 seasons averaging 1.8 points and 3.3 rebounds per contest. With numbers like those, I’m surprised the Hawks or Sonics didn’t offer him some ridiculous 5 year, $50 million contract.

Greg Kite
The first rule of becoming an NBA GM is never to draft a 7 foot white guy from Brigham Young who has “potential”. GK was the worst player on the Celtics 84 and 86 championship teams. As McHale and Parish’s bucket boy Kite averaged a tremendous 2.5 points and 3.8 rebounds for his career.

John Koncak
Known to many as simply John Contract, in 1989 Koncak was a nothing back up center when the Hawks (who were fearful that he might sign with Detroit) bit on his bluff and signed him to a ridiculous six year $13 million deal. I know it doesn’t seem like much in today’s terms, but this deal made Koncak a higher paid player than Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson. This deal is what many critics believed open the flood gates for many sorry ass over-hyped players getting paid ridiculous long term guaranteed contracts (see: the rest of the stiffs on this list).


Jim McIlvaine
The guy single-handedly ruined the career of Shawn Kemp. You see, after Shawn Kemp spent the entire summer of 96 posturing for a new contract, the Sonics ignored him and instead spent their money on another big white stiff named Jim McIlvaine. They gave him a five year $35 million contract based on “potential”. By signing McIlvaine to a higher salary than they were paying Kemp, they totally angered both Kemp and his teammate Gary Payton and caused a team that was on the verge of wining an NBA championship to implode. Kemp would start to hit the bottle and eventually force the Sonics to trade him for another soon to be alcoholic in Vin Baker. (I guess Seattle really is a depressing city.) McIlvaine would go on to be a complete bust (who would have thunk it?), averaging a tremendous 2.7 points and 3.1 rebounds during his illustrious (?) career.


Jack Haley
When I hear Jack Haley commentate for the FSN West during Laker games I have to laugh. How does this guy have any credibility? I mean he has to be one of the worst players to EVER play in the NBA. Is there that much lack of height in the NBA that big stiffs such as Haley stay in the league for almost 10 seasons? Haley probably played two to three extra seasons because he was friendly with Dennis Rodman and deemed as the one guy that could keep him under control. This distinction caused both the Bulls and the Spurs to keep Haley on their roster while Rodman was a member of their team. Not only was Haley terrible on the court, but now off the court he has become an even worse commentator. During the 2005 season, he was the idiot that guaranteed that the Lakers had completed a deal for Carlos Boozer when no one else close to the situation knew of any such pending transaction. Haley continued this rant for three straight days until the trade deadline came and passed with no transaction occurring. L.A. Times page two columnist TJ Simers used this opportunity to grind the hell out of Haley for about a week straight. The fact that he has a championship ring and a player like Charles Barkley doesn’t just makes me sick to my stomach. Haley was just a terrible player and today he’s an even worse commentator.


Travis Knight
Travis Knight made a name for himself as a Rookie with the Lakers during the 1997 Season. A lot of GMs fell in love with him for his ability to hit an open jump shot. With the Lakers he figured out that if you are on the court with Shaq and you are smart enough to cut to the rim, even a guy with a completely weak game can seem like he has some sort of game. Shaq would hook him up with tons of lay ups, and the announcers would always comment on how good of a player Knight was. Knight even had the great Chick Hearn fooled. Speaking of fools, Knight was a free agent after his Rookie year and played his amazing cutting ability into a ridiculous deal with Boston Celtics. Of course the most brilliant GM in the world (Rick Pitino) gave him a ton of money. How does a rookie year with stats of 4.8 points and 4.5 rebounds per game equate to a seven year $22 million contract? I’m obviously in the wrong business.

Anyhow, after bamboozling Pitino, Knight would only stick around a year before being traded back to the Lakers. The Lakers reacquired him via trade by sending the Celtics Tony Battie. Battie just happened to be the same guy the Lakers had just acquired for the rights to Nick Van Exel. So basically the Lakers traded Nick at Night for Travis fucking Knight. I guess that was the one Jerry West bumble?

Knight would go on to put up (Jim) Mcilvainian type numbers for the rest of his career, finishing up with averages of 3.4 points and 3.10 rebounds for his career. Oh to be white a seven footer. Knight does have one record to hang his hat on. I believe he has the record for fastest to foul out of an NBA game.

Mike Penberthy
The Lakers picked up Penberthy for the 2001 Season to act as a three point specialist. Penberthy was a pretty accurate three point shooter, but he couldn’t do much else. He was a liability on defense and slower than the first CD burners. The fact that he only lasted 1 ¼ seasons in the league tells you all you need to know about him.

Danny Ferry
Danny definitely falls into the category of “franchise killer”. The poster child for over-hyped white Duke players, Ferry (behind Shawn Bradley) might be the worst second overall pick in the history of the NBA. After the Clippers drafted Ferry 2nd overall in 1989, Ferry refused to play for their lowly franchise and instead opted to play in Europe for a season before forcing the Clippers hand and getting traded to the up and coming Cleveland Cavaliers. The Cavs traded their young star Ron Harper for Ferry. This would probably go down as one of the more intelligent deals the Clippers would ever make as well as the deal that killed any chances the Cavs had at a championship. Ferry was a stiff with a stand still jump shot. He couldn’t run or jump, but he was white, tall, and had a daddy that was a former NBAer, so he was pretty much guaranteed to have a ten year career. Go figure. Imagine if those Cavs team from the early 90s would have had Harper starting at two guard with Mark Price instead of Craig Ehlo. I’m sure the Cavalier at YAY Sports has spent many a moment wondering the same thing.

Joe Klein
Look, just because he was a seven-footer with red hair doesn’t mean that he was destined to be the next Bill Walton. Klein is best known for his back up center days in Boston, Phoenix, and Chicago. After the Bulls won their 5th championship in 1997, Klein supposedly started crying, to which Michael jokingly reacted by saying: “What the hell are you crying for? I’m the one that went out and won the damn thing!” Somehow Joe Klein played 15 seasons. During his career he averaged around 4 points and 4 rebounds per contest. Too bad he wasn’t ever a free agent during Rick Pitino’s reign as Celtics GM, because he certainly would have been offered a 7 year, $70 million deal…based on his potential of course….

Will Perdue
Will Perdue was just not a very good NBA player. I think I can safely say that he is the worst player in the history of the NBA to have four championship rings (Yeah I know John Salley has four rings, but at least he was good at some point in his career). Perdue averaged 4.7 points and 4.9 rebounds per game over a thirteen year career. During his stint with the Bulls, he did nothing but cause grief and frustration for the Bulls coaching staff. I’m sure both he and Stacey King were major contributors to Phil Jackson’s future heart troubles. He’s another player who’s potential would always be talked about through the early part of his career. Are you kidding me?!?!?! Some of these scouts really must be blind or something, because only a blind man would put the word potential next to the name Will Perdue. That is unless we are talking about someone being potentially bad. Perdue did end up aiding the Bulls a bit when they duped the San Antonio Spurs to trading Dennis Rodman to them for the rights to Perdue. That has to be one of the more one-sided deals of the last 20 years.

Tom Tolbert
Although Tom Tolbert wasn’t that terrible, he makes this list simply because of the way he talks about his career today. The way he speaks about his playing days, you would think he was an All-Star. He’s very Jack Haley like in that sense. Tolbert was the weed carrier/towel boy/bench warmer for the famed Run TMC Warrior teams of the late 80s/early 90s. You know you’ve had a whack career when your entire wikipedia profile mentions a sentence about your playing career and a couple paragraphs about your broadcast career.

Eric Montross
Eric Montross was another in the long line of poor Boston Celtics draft picks during the early 90s. Montross made a name for himself playing for the North Carolina Tarheels. He was a member of their famed 1993 championship team that stunned the “fab five” Michigan team in the National Final. Montross was selected 9th overall by the Boston Celtics in the 1994 NBA draft. During his career, Eric averaged 4.9 points, 4.6 rebounds, 0.6 blocks and 0.4 assists per game. He played in 465 games and started 263. This would be fine for a second round pick, but is just unacceptable for a guy selected 9th overall. Again, was there such a need for the big guy in the NBA that guys like Montross could collect an NBA sized check for 11 seasons? It’s just not fair…

Todd Fuller
When Golden State Warrior fans complain of Mike Dunleavy Jr.’s ineptitude, I only have to bring up one name to make them realize that Dunleavy isn’t really that bad. Of course I am talking about none other than Todd Fuller. Fuller was the number 11 overall pick of the 1996 draft. I know this is difficult to consider, but he was actually drafted ahead of Kobe Bryant and Steve Nash. Obviously the Warriors brass knew how to run a franchise. Fuller would stick around for five years averaging a measly 3.7 points and 3 rebounds per contest.

Shawn Bradley
He was tall, and had a nose for blocking shots. But he was also the number two overall pick of the 1993 draft. With that comes the responsibility of becoming at least a halfway decent player. Bradley would go on to become more known for getting dunked on and getting into random on court altercations than actually contributing to the good of his basketball teams. Someone please tell these GMs that white plus height does not equal future all-star. Anyhow, check the You Tube highlight below. In less than one minute, Eddie Jones manages to embarrass him not once, but twice. Check it out.