Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar dominated professional basketball for two decades with the single most unstoppable weapon in the sport's history: the skyhook. No one ever blocked it consistently. No one ever developed an effective counter. Kareem simply raised the ball to its apex — seven feet off the ground from a seven-foot-two-inch frame — and released it with a soft touch that made defense a theoretical exercise. He scored 38,387 points with that shot, a record that stood for nearly four decades.

Kareem won six championships across three decades, six MVP awards (still the most in NBA history), and was a 19-time All-Star. His career spanned from 1969 to 1989 — from the end of the Russell-Chamberlain era through the Magic-Bird renaissance. He was the connective tissue between basketball's ancient and modern eras, and he was dominant in both. His partnership with Magic Johnson on the Showtime Lakers produced five championships and some of the most entertaining basketball ever played.

Beyond basketball, Kareem is one of the most intellectually accomplished athletes in American history. A bestselling author, a cultural commentator, a martial arts practitioner who trained with Bruce Lee, and a Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient. His legacy extends far beyond the court, but his court legacy alone would rank him among the three or four greatest players ever.