Slam HS All-Americans (1994-2014)

[WillC]

It's interesting looking back at who Slam selected for their HS All-American teams going back as far as 1994.

It's amazing how many went on to be undrafted, while others are now household names.

http://basketballjournalist.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/slam-magazine-hs-all-americans-hit-or.html

[LAZERUSS]

A little off-topic, but how about this...

http://www.si.com/vault/2002/12/23/334678/his-own-worst-enemy-when-they-were-both-7-foot-phenoms-at-lsu-stanley-roberts-schooled-his-buddy-shaquille-oneal-why-then-was-roberts-such-a-bust-in-the-nba-and-why-does-everybody-still-love-him



That he can't see the damage to this day is part of the mystery
of Stanley Roberts. So is his blindness to how great a player he
could've been. Dale Brown, who was the LSU coach during Roberts's
and O'Neal's one season together, 1989--90, wasn't alone in
considering Roberts the better pro prospect. When the 17-year-old
O'Neal arrived in Baton Rouge in the summer of 1989 as the most
hotly pursued recruit in the land, Brown told him he might get a
chance to play as a freshman. After all, Roberts, a Proposition
48 sophomore heading into his first college season, had hammered
Alonzo Mourning in the McDonald's High School All-American game
in 1988 and had been just as coveted as O'Neal.

When the 19-year-old Roberts met O'Neal down on the LSU practice
court known as the Dungeon to face off for the first time, people
scrambled to drag in chairs. Might play? The first time O'Neal
got the ball, he slammed right over Roberts, and Roberts returned
the favor. The next four possessions went like that: Two 7-foot,
290-pound mastodons colliding, Boom! Six times up and down the
floor, six straight dunks. Onlookers howled, and teammates jawed
at Roberts, "This is your house! Your house!"

Then, abruptly, Roberts switched gears. He took the ball on the
wing, and as Shaq stood in the lane, waiting, never thinking to
go guard him, Roberts lofted an 18-footer over his head and in.
O'Neal was frozen--and, worse, exposed. It hit Roberts at once:
You can't come out. I got you. O'Neal's feet were still heavy,
awkward, size 22 to Roberts's 16. His game was all height and
force. Roberts rained jumpers over O'Neal, and the few times Shaq
dared to step out, Roberts cut around him and dunked. On the
other end Roberts learned quickly how to time Shaq's jump hook
and slap it away, how to shiver Shaq with a forearm to the chest
at the foul line and halt his momentum before he got into the
lane, how to frustrate him until he lost focus.

"When we played each other in the NBA, he was the only one who
ever really slowed me down," O'Neal says of Roberts. "His game is
just like mine: Big, funny, silly--but he can shoot. I can't."

[WillC]

Interesting stuff. It's crazy to think that Roberts was regarded by some as a better pro prospect than Shaq, but he probably had more refined skills at that stage of their career. I remember watching Roberts in the NBA. He was overweight but talented.

[julizaver]

A little off-topic, but how about this...

http://www.si.com/vault/2002/12/23/334678/his-own-worst-enemy-when-they-were-both-7-foot-phenoms-at-lsu-stanley-roberts-schooled-his-buddy-shaquille-oneal-why-then-was-roberts-such-a-bust-in-the-nba-and-why-does-everybody-still-love-him

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UD9ePMQERbc

[LAZERUSS]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UD9ePMQERbc

Damn...if I didn't know better, I would have thought that was Shaq.

:applause: :applause: :applause: