Who is the worst player whose career highs in each stat would aggregate to the best single-game performance ever?

42 comments

1. This is a fun question

2. Timofey Mozgov

3. TJ Warren 53 points 16 rebounds 6 assists

   Saddiq Bey 51 points 17 rebounds 8 assists

4. That reads like a prime Westbrook stat line tbh

5. Brandon Jennings put up 55/11/21 with 6 steals and 3 blocks, which is arguably better than the Rondo line from a worse player

6. At the top of my head, maybe Hassan Whiteside? He’s always been an empty stats type of player.

   32 points, 25 rebounds, and 12 blocks

7. i mean, wemby would have a 50 point 20 rebound quadruple double already 

8. jamaal tinsleys is similar to rondos

   37 points, 13 rebounds, 23 assists, 8 steals, 5 blocks

9. Brandon Jennings hitting the 55/11/21 with 8 threes and 6 steals on +29.

10. Fat Lever’s line of 38-22-23-10-3 is impressive, but as a one-time All-NBA and All-Defensive member he’s probably too good of a player to win this particular contest.

    Ramon Sessions has career highs of 44-10-24-5-2 while having essentially no career accolades.

11. Lou Williams gets you a 50 point quadruple double with 3 blocks

    50/10/13/10/3

12. Nikola Vucevic

    43/29/12, 6 steals, 6 blocks, 6 3PM

13. Corey Brewer. 51 points, 18 boards, 9 assists, 6 steals, 3 blocks

    Caris LeVert. 51 points, 14 rebounds, 15 assists, 6 steals, 3 blocks

14. David Lee?

    37pts/22rebs/11ast/5stl/4blk

15. Walt Wesley’s 50/21 is pretty up there, but it’s hard to go with a player from the 70s.

    Corey Brewer’s 51/18/9 is some pretty solid work from a mid player.

16. Andre Miller – 52/12/22/9/3

17. Scott Skiles with 41 points, 12 rebounds and 30 assists

18. Elfrid Payton would have 30/15/21/7/3

19. Corey Brewer with 51 pts/18 reb/9 ast/6 stl/3 blk

20. Doug Christie, who’s known from the C-Webb era of Kings and for traumatizing people in the early days of Youtube by posting a BDSM [tape](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/4q66ef/i_have_a_repressed_memory_of_former_sacramento/) with his wife (thankfully didn’t see it myself, but I remember the news), is a good candidate. He never won any awards, got selected for an all-team, or won any rings.

    35 Pts / 15 Reb / 13 Ast / 9 Stl / 7 Blk

21. Nurkic might be up there? 33p, 31r, 10a, 5stls, 6blks

22. Serge Ibaka

    34/22/6/3/11 on 12 for 12 shooting

    Ersan Ilyasova

    34/25/6/4/3 probably isnt good enough

    Mo Williams

    52/11/15/6/4

    FVV

    54/12/20/7/6 is pretty good

    Kuzma

    41/22/13/4/4 – Jokic has probably had this statline like 5x so maybe not the greatest game but Kuzma is pretty bad relative to this

    Scott Skiles

    41/12/30/5/1 – responsible for 100+ points guaranteed is a good option

23. Tony Delk was pretty much just a journeyman bench guy his whole career. He put up:

    53 pts

    12 reb

    13 ast

    5 stl

    3 blk

    had to check it, that one 50 point game, the man was just shootin. no assists, and he somehow managed to crack 50 without any 3 pointers. (0/1 3pt shooting)

24. I believe Aaron Wiggins’ stat line would be 44 points, 14 rebounds, 9 assists, 5 steals and 4 blocks. His worst is 0, 0, 0, 0, and 0.

25. Tony Delk: 53p, 12r, 13a, 5s, 3b. Stats wouldn’t be in the “best game ever” argument, but respect for the career journeyman tha never spent more than 2 years with a team.

26. I’d like to nominate Malachai Flynn, with 50/8/11 4 steals and 3 blocks. Not the best stats but definitely the worst player I’ve seen mentioned

27. I had initially glossed over the worst player part of this post and was curious about Kevin McHale’s highs (56/18/10/3/9) and came across something curious. He had two games with 9 blocks and played less than 30 minutes in each, 28 and 27 minutes. 9 blocks in 27 minutes is fucking bananas.

28. Crazy that half of these aggregate games aren’t even as good as actual games guys have put up in the last few years.

29. My boy Theo Maledon can give you a solid 33/10/14 along with 6 steals and 4 blocks

30. Andre Drummond: 33 29 8 6 7

    Jusuf Nurkic: 33 31 10 5 6

31. MALACHI FLYNN

    Career highs are: 50 points, 8 rebounds, 11 assists, 4 steals, 3 blocks

    Career averages are: 5.5 points, 1.7 rebounds, 1.9 assists, 0.6 steals, 0.1 blocks

32. I dont think any line in this post would go down as the best of all time tbh. We’ve seen 50 point and 60 point triple doubles, 30 point/20 assist games (and even a 30/20/20 game) and nobody thinks those were remotely close to being the best performance of all time. 100 points is just too far beyond what anyone else has done.

    The 70 point guy is the only one I think has a compelling argument at all, it feels weird saying Book/Dame/Spida are the ‘worst’ players you could make an argument for but its true, and I dont even think they’d be considered as the best performance. You have to consider Wilt also had 25 rebounds in his 100 point game on top of 30 more points than even those guys. 100 points is so far beyond everyone else and has such a mystical allure Im not sure there’s a single other player that would be considered to have had the best single game performance even if you put in all of their career highs.

33. Scott Skiles put up 41 points, 12 rebounds, 30 assists, 5 steals and a block.

34. Gonna throw out Tom Chamber (60/18/9/7/6) and Kemba Walker (60/12/16/8/4).

35. Purvis Short 59/14/15/6/3

    Brandon Jennings 55/21/11/6/3

    Jamal Murray 55/15/12/6/4

    59, 55 and 55 are the 3 games in nba history of 55+ points made by someone who has never made an all star game

    So I think the answer is Brandon Jennings because once we get worse stat line than that I start questioning the “greatest stat line of all time”

36. Considering Ben Simmons very short-lived prime, 42/22/17/7/4 is pretty good

37. Draymond: 37/20/19 with 10 steals, 7 blocks and 8 3’s

38. Gerald Wallace would have 42 points, 20 rebounds, 10 assists, 8 steals and 6 blocks.

    Kevin Love would have a Wilt-ian stat line of 51 points, 31 rebounds, 10 assists, 4 steals and 4 blocks.

    Andrei Kirelenko comes in with a 31 point, 18 rebound, 11 assist, 10 blocks and 8 steal performance.

    Marcus Camby would have 37 points, 27 rebounds, 11 assists, 11 blocks, and 6 steals.

    Fat Lever has a 38 point, 22 rebound, 23 assist, 10 steals, and 3 blocks game.

39. Fred Van Vleet gets a shoutout from me: 54 points, 12 boards, 20 assists, 7 steals, 6 blocks.

40. Dana Barros, all 5’10” of him, has career highs of 50 pts, 13 boards, 19 assists, 7 steals, 2 blocks, and 6 fouls. Not the worst player (he has 1 All-star appearance) but certainly not a remarkable one. And he’s 5’10”!

41. I understand your general premise.
    I’d say most long time starters have some heavy duty career highs that would look just as good as Rondo’s.

    I randomly searched names that start with “An” on bball ref…

    Career starters:

    Andre Drummond
    33-29-8-6-7

    Andrew Bogut
    32-27-8-4-9

    Andre Miller
    52-12-22-9-3

    Andrei Kirilenko
    31-18-11-8-10

    Andre Iguodala
    34-17-16-6-4

    Kenny Anderson
    45-13-18-6-2

    Antoine Walker
    49-21-14-6-4

    Not a career starter:

    Andray Blatche
    36-19-13-6-5

42. De’Aaron Fox has made a single all-star game so maybe too good for this, but 60/13/16/6/4 would have to be up there with the best ever single-game statlines

    Also shoutout Andrew Bynum who would have 42/30/6 with 10 blocks