Top 10 players who have never won an NBA championship
Winning the NBA championship is never an easy proposition for any superstar NBA player. As there are only five players per team on the floor at any given time, one superstar cannot always produce game-changing performances for his team, or for that matter in four games out of seven.
In this article, we will take a look at the top 10 players who have never won an NBA championship.
Top 10 players who have never won an NBA championship
For the sake of impartiality, the players in this list will be ranked in terms of their performances in the NBA Playoffs and the Finals (if they managed to reach that stage of the competition during their NBA careers).
Without further ado, let us start with this interesting list brimming with great players who fell just short of winning the ultimate reward.
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#10 Steve Nash - 120 playoff games, no NBA Finals appearances
Our list starts with two-time NBA Most Valuable Player Steve Nash who was able to reach the NBA playoffs in 12 of his 18 NBA seasons.
However, despite playing 120 playoff games with the Phoenix Suns, Dallas Mavericks and the LA Lakers, the floor general was not able to get past the Western Conference Finals barrier - a stage in which he endured four defeats.
During his ring-less but Hall-of-Fame-worthy career, Nash won two straight regular-season MVPs, doing so in 2004-05 and 2005-06. A prolific passer, Nash ranks third in NBA history in terms of assists made during the regular season and eighth during the playoffs.
In the playoffs, Nash averaged 17 points and almost nine assists per game on 47, 40 and 90% splits from the field, the three-point line and the FT line respectively.
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#9 John Stockton - 182 playoff games, two NBA Finals appearances
The all-time leader in regular-season assists, John Stockton also had a solid NBA Playoffs career. He played 182 games, all for the Utah Jazz, during his Hall-of-Fame career that lasted 19 years.
Winning championships or not winning them does not always indicate failure for teams and players; in some cases, it may just be a case of wrong timing. One such example was Stockon's Utah Jazz team. When they were at the peak of their powers, Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls put an end to their NBA dream twice.
Though Stockton had Karl Malone at his corner, the Jazz lost both their NBA Finals (1997 and 1998) against the Bulls in two hard-fought, all-time great NBA Finals series.
Stockton averaged 15 points and 8.8 assists in the 1997 NBA Finals while his numbers in the 1998 NBA Finals were 9.7 points and 8.7 assists per game.