Pardon that Brent Musburger stinks forever, but he’s necessary here for the clip of Greg Kite, 57 seconds in.
The important part, really, is that the NBA on CBS theme from the 1980s slaps, and if not for John Tesh and Roundball Rock, it would be remembered a lot more fondly by a lot more people. This is, in fact, one of the things that Bill Simmons said in the early 2000s that actually holds up.
Kite got rings with the 1984 and 1986 Celtics, and after 1987 only ever played in the playoffs again with the 1995 Pacers, and then only a few minutes against a Knicks team that had waived him earlier that season.
By win shares, Kite was the 27th-most valuable player in the 1983 draft, which was headlined by Clyde Drexler (14-Portland) and four guys who were among some of the top guards in the business for years: Derek Harper (11-Dallas), Dale Ellis (9-Dallas), Byron Scott (4-San Diego), and Doc Rivers (31-Atlanta). Cool late-round picks that wouldn’t get made today included Sedale Threatt (139-Philadelphia) and Manute Bol (97-San Diego).
The top pick, Ralph Sampson, wound up 18th in win shares for his draft class, actually behind Steve Stipanovich, the No. 2 overall pick out of Missouri, whom I’d never heard of before right now. Stitpanovich was all-rookie in 1983-84 and his career comparables through five years are Joakim Noah, Tree Rollins, and Mychal Thompson. But he was forced to retire after those first five seasons with a degenerative knee condition.
Wonder what those Pacers teams earlier in Reggie Miller’s career might have been like had Stipanovich been able to stay healhty. Oh well, we’ll never know, and Miller once went 3-for-18 in an elimination game at Madison Square Garden.
We Can Pod It Out 101: Being For The Benefit Of Mr. Kite!