Karl Malone

Karl Malone retired in 2004 with 36,928 career points — the second-highest total in NBA history at the time, surpassed only by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and still third all-time behind Abdul-Jabbar and LeBron James. He produced those points across 19 seasons and 1,476 regular-season games as perhaps the most consistently productive power forward the league has seen, averaging 25.0 points and 10.1 rebounds per game across a career that never produced a significant statistical decline until his final two seasons.

The pick-and-roll he ran with John Stockton is the most studied two-man action in basketball history. Stockton would bring the ball up the court, Malone would set the screen at the elbow or on the wing, and the resulting geometry — Stockton reading the defense as the screen was being set, Malone rolling to the rim or popping to the mid-post based on the same defensive read — required opponents to choose which player to surrender position to. Neither choice was acceptable. Over 18 seasons together in Utah, they ran the action more than any duo before them, and Stockton accumulated 15,806 career assists, 5,000 more than any other point guard in history, largely by reading where Malone was going.

His two MVP awards in 1997 and 1999 came in the seasons immediately surrounding two Finals losses to Michael Jordan's Bulls — the 1997 and 1998 series that ended the Jazz's best championship opportunities. Malone averaged 27.9 points and 9.3 rebounds per game during the 1997 Finals and 24.7 points and 9.3 rebounds in 1998. The championship did not come, but the individual production at the highest level of competition was consistent.

He grew up in Summerfield, Louisiana, played at Louisiana Tech, and spent 18 seasons in Utah before finishing with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2003-04.