News; With MJ leading, '09 group moves to head of the Hall class

You could induct Michael Jordan into The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame with Oliver Robinson and John Stroeder and the group would deserve some consideration as the best Hall of Fame class ever. So when you induct him with fellow Dream Teamers David Robinson and John Stockton, along with coach Jerry Sloan, you have to wonder if there ever will be a class as good as this one.
That's no easy claim to make. It's impossible to compare players of different eras. Only one player in the NBA's inaugural season of 1946-47 averaged more than 20 points per game. The league had only 10 teams in the mid-'60s. The 3-point shot wasn't instituted until 1979 and international players didn't start making an impact until recently.
In his prime, Robinson probably would have schooled a young George Mikan in a game of one-on-one. But Mikan was the league's first star, after all, and Robinson can't compete with "GEOMIKAN v/s KNICKS" on the Madison Square Garden marquee. Jordan was the greatest player ever, but he may not have been the showman that he was had it not been for the influence of Julius Erving. And though Stockton and Derrick Rose aren't that far apart in the basketball timeline, their games have few similarities.
When it comes to making an impact, though, it's hard to argue that this class stands alone. Other classes have scored more points or won more championships. None has had Michael Jordan lead them into the hall.
Simply, Jordan is the gold standard for anyone who has ever laced 'em up. He's the originator of Kobe Bryant's on-court mannerisms, the reason LeBron James wears No. 23, the predecessor to Tiger Woods' marketing dominance and he's why this year's induction ceremony was moved from the Hall of Fame to Symphony Hall in downtown Springfield, allowing for an additional 1,500 fans to attend.
Some players are naturally gifted and some work their tails off to make the most of the ability they have. Some players are athletic and some are cerebral. Some players are sizzle and some are steak. Some players sell and some win.
Jordan did it all. His impact on the way the game is played, on the way it's marketed and on how many people watch it now is immeasurable. He is easily the most popular player the NBA has seen and arguably a more accomplished winner than anyone in the league's history.
Bill Russell and the Celtics of the '60s won more rings but competed against half as many teams as Jordan's Bulls. From 1991 to 1998, whenever Jordan played a full season, Chicago won the NBA championship. And several Hall of Famers from his era will forever wear the "never won a title" tag because of him.
One of those guys is Stockton, whose Jazz were the only team the Bulls beat twice in The Finals. The all-time leader in assists and steals, Stockton was everything you could want in a point guard. The 15,806 assists tell you how much of a distributor he was, but he also had the ability to score in the paint or on the perimeter (his series-winning three in the '97 conference finals was easily the biggest shot in Jazz history) and he was tough as nails.
Stockton had microfracture surgery at the age of 35 and went on to play six seasons afterward. This is someone who missed a total of 22 games over his 19-year career, with his recovery from the surgery accounting for 18 of the 22.
"John Stockton is the perfect point guard," Charles Barkley said recently. "There has never been a pure point guard who made better basketball decisions with the ball, ever."
Robinson is a unique player in NBA history. He was drafted No. 1 by the Spurs in 1987 but didn't begin his career until after he served a two-year commitment to the Navy, entering the league at 24. He played a position that has been manned by several of the greatest players in league history, but played it with a new level of athleticism and skill.
"He could do things that you didn't associate with that position, and he could do them at the highest possible level," NBA commissioner David Stern told NBA.com. "We were always wondering whether they would start him at guard in the All-Star Game."
And while he needed Tim Duncan to win his two rings, Robinson was doing pretty well before Duncan came to the league. He earned MVP honors in 1994-95, was named one of the 50 Greatest Players in 1996 and had been an All-Star seven times by the time Duncan left Wake Forest. In April of 2004, Robinson became the first player in more than 16 years to score 70 points or more in a game.
Robinson and Stockton, of course, were not the global marketing forces that Jordan was. But each had a tremendous impact on the franchise he played for, and neither ever left that organization.
When Robinson arrived in San Antonio, the Spurs were coming off the worst season in franchise history. He immediately led them to a 35-game turnaround in the standings and to the conference semifinals for the first time in seven years.
"Before he got there, the team was not in great shape at all financially," Stern said. "It was struggling in a small market in a series of buildings that were not really suitable. He was the glue that kept that franchise together, but also cemented its value as a community asset."
When Robinson left, the Spurs had two championships and were well on their way to becoming the benchmark for how an NBA franchise should be run. And with his Carver Academy for underprivileged children, Robinson's influence on the city of San Antonio goes well beyond the games he won with the Spurs.
When Stockton arrived in Utah, the Jazz had made the Playoffs for the first time in franchise history. And when he left, Utah had become a postseason staple for 20 straight years. Along with Karl Malone and fellow 2009 enshrinee Sloan, Stockton created a winning atmosphere in Salt Lake City that survived a few years after his departure.
"They put an exclamation mark on the proposition that a small-market team can not only survive, but can thrive and compete if it makes good choices," Stern said. "And in the case of the Jazz, those choices were Stockton, Sloan and Malone."
Of course, when you talk about making an impact across the world, you have to start with the 1992 U.S. Olympic Team, of which Jordan, Robinson and Stockton all were members. It was the greatest team ever assembled. Eight of the 12 members of the Dream Team are now Hall of Famers, with another two (Malone and Scottie Pippen) sure things to be enshrined next year.
With their dominance in Barcelona, they changed the basketball world forever, influencing young players from Argentina to China. He didn't know it at the time, but Jordan opened the eyes of a 12-year-old Pau Gasol, who would eventually make him really regret his selection of Kwame Brown in the 2001 Draft. And Robinson helped motivate a 15-year-old Manu Ginobili, who as a teammate on the Spurs eventually would help him leave the game on top.
"[The Olympics] was the event that was the catalyst for the accelerated growth of basketball on a global scale," Stern said. "It was as though you brought these people together to be appreciated for their talent, what they contributed to the game and their place in the game."
The Hall of Fame class of 1980, featuring Jerry Lucas, Oscar Robertson and Jerry West, can make a strong argument for the best-class-ever distinction. Including this year, 47 of the 50 Greatest Players (as deemed in 1996) have been enshrined in the Hall of Fame, but no more than three have entered the Hall at once.
This class, of course, is more than three-deep. C. Vivian Stringer is the third winningest coach in women's college basketball history, won a gold medal as the coach of the 2004 U.S. Women's Olympic Team and has help develop several women into WNBA players. Sloan is the fourth winningest coach in NBA history and the only one to win 1,000 games with one team.
Whether it be on individual franchises or on the game as a whole, the four NBA representatives in this year's Hall of Fame class have made a boundless impact. The cities of San Antonio and Salt Lake City would not be the same if Robinson, Stockton and Sloan had never called them home. And the NBA audience wouldn't be nearly the size that it is today had Jordan quit the game when he was cut from the varsity squad as a high school sophomore.
So on Sept. 11, the basketball world will celebrate more than some great career. It will celebrate the growth of the game.
"They represent a very exciting era," Stern said, "a time when basketball was climbing to the place on the ladder that it finds itself now."