Moses Malone

44
Moses Malone bigraphy, stories - American basketball player

Moses Malone : biography

March 23, 1955 –

Moses Eugene Malone (born March 23, 1955 in Petersburg, Virginia) is a retired American Hall of Fame basketball player who starred in both the American Basketball Association and the National Basketball Association. A three-time NBA MVP and one of the NBA’s 50 greatest players, Malone was the most successful prep-to-pro player of his era, going straight from Petersburg High to a 21-year career in professional basketball. By the time Malone retired after 19 seasons in the NBA he was the last former ABA player active and held numerous distinctions in both leagues, including a championship ring and NBA finals trophy won with the 1983 Philadelphia 76ers. He was nicknamed "Chairman of the Boards" and "Big Mo".

ABA career

Malone began his professional career with the Utah Stars. He later played for the ABA’s Spirits of St. Louis. In two seasons in the ABA, Malone averaged 17.2 points and 12.9 rebounds per game. Malone’s ABA career ended with the ABA–NBA merger in June 1976, when Malone moved to the NBA.

High school

Right after graduating from Petersburg High School, Malone signed a letter of intent to play for the University of Maryland. However, Malone was drafted by the ABA’s Utah Stars in 1974 and became one of the first basketball players to jump straight from high school into the professional leagues of the USA.

Post-championship

In the 1983–84 season Malone led the league in rebounding for a fourth straight season and fifth overall, finishing with 13.4 per game. Ankle injuries limited him to 71 games that season, his lowest number of appearances since 1977–78. Still, he posted a 22.7 scoring average in his second season with the Sixers and was named to the All-NBA Second Team at year’s end.

Malone was selected to play in the NBA All-Star Game for a seventh consecutive year but missed the game because of his aching ankle. He averaged 21.4 points and 13.8 rebounds in five postseason games, but Philadelphia suffered a first-round playoff upset at the hands of the New Jersey Nets.

When Malone finished the season with an average of 13.1 rebounds per game he became the first player in NBA history to lead the league in rebounding for five consecutive seasons. Wilt Chamberlain had held the previous record with two separate stretches of four straight titles in the 1960s.

An All-Star for the eighth time, Malone chalked up 24.6 points per game (ninth in the NBA) and earned his fourth selection to the All-NBA First Team. He finished third in the balloting for the league’s Most Valuable Player Award, won this season by Boston’s Larry Bird.

The nine-year NBA veteran scored his 15,000th NBA point on November 28 and grabbed his 10,000th NBA rebound on March 29. He exploded for 51 points against the Detroit Pistons on November 14.

Philadelphia advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals in 1985 but lost to Boston in five games. Malone contributed 20.2 points and 10.6 rebounds per game in the postseason.

Malone’s 10th NBA season and last with Philadelphia came to an abrupt end when on March 28 he suffered a fractured orbit of the right eye against the Milwaukee Bucks. He missed the Sixers’ last eight games and the entire postseason. Without him, Philadelphia lost to the Bucks in a seven-game Eastern Conference Semifinal series.

In 74 appearances Malone averaged 23.8 points and 11.8 rebounds. He ranked seventh in the NBA in scoring but surrendered the league’s rebounding crown for the first time in six seasons, finishing fourth behind the Detroit Pistons’ Bill Laimbeer (13.1 rpg), Philadelphia teammate Charles Barkley (12.8), and the New Jersey Nets’ Buck Williams (12.0).

Malone was an All-Star for the ninth straight season but failed to make an All-NBA Team for the first time since 1978.

Career accomplishments

Malone:

  • was named one of the NBA’s 50 Greatest Players in 1997.
  • was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2001.
  • played more seasons (21) in the NBA/ABA than any other player.
  • was both the NBA Most Valuable Player and Sporting News MVP in 1979, 1982 and 1983.
  • is the only player in NBA history to average 20 points and 10 rebounds on four different teams. Three others have done it three times, Wilt Chamberlain, Shaquille O’Neal, and George McGinnis, McGinnis accomplishing the feat a fourth season while playing in the American Basketball Association before joining the NBA
  • became the first player in NBA history to earn five consecutive rebounding titles (1980–1984).
  • did not foul out during his final 1,212 games, the longest streak without a disqualification.
  • has the highest number of offensive rebounds (6,731) since the NBA started tracking offensive and defensive rebounds separately in 1973–74
  • is second only to Karl Malone in overall (NBA and ABA) free throws made, with 9,018
  • is second behind Karl Malone in overall (NBA and ABA) free throws attempted, with 11,864
  • is seventh all time in NBA career points (27,409)