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Rick Barry: "I'm kind of surprised that he wants to pick up for one year and have to move and go to another city and leave a place that's been really good to him for eight years. Obviously there's something going on there for him to have made the decision to leave the Lakers. What that is, who the heck knows. I don't know if we'll ever know the real answer to that unless he decides to give it."
Rick Barry: "Certainly it would be fun to see he and Steph playing together. They may set a record for the oldest team age-wise in the history of the NBA. It's kind of crazy with all the old guys that they're signing. But the guy is remarkable. To have the season he had, the numbers he put up last year at 41 years of age, very few players in the history of the league ever put up numbers like that."
Rick Barry: "I've always been a little bit dismayed by the fact that somebody with his size, his strength, his power, his skill level, why in the world he didn't develop a low-post game. I think he would have abused people down there. And I think the reason is he's never been a great free-throw shooter. I don't think LeBron's ever shot 80% from the free-throw line in any season he's ever played, if I'm not mistaken."
But the 2006 finals remains Dwyane Wade’s basketball masterpiece, one that saw him join Michael Jordan (1993), Rick Barry (1967) and Elgin Baylor (1962) as the only players with four consecutive 35-point games in the league’s championship series. From Games 3 through 6, Wade scored 16 more points in the paint than any Mavericks player. “Bottom line, in the finals, it was kind of Jordan-esque. It really was,” Mourning told The Athletic of Wade’s performance. “He averaged almost 40 points a game in the finals. That’s getting it done. And it just took the others to kind of come together and do their part — you know, me, Shaq, (James) Posey, J-Dub (Jason Williams), Udonis (Haslem), and Antoine Walker, all of us. “We contributed in our own little ways from that perspective, but D-Wade was phenomenal to watch. He threw us on his shoulders. He just carried us.”
Dan Woike: List of NBA players to score at least 600 points in a single month • Kareem Abdul-Jabbar • Rick Barry • Walt Bellamy • Elgin Baylor • Wilt Chamberlain • Luka Dončić • James Harden • Michael Jordan • Oscar Robertson • Jerry West
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The big fella wasn’t a stellar foul shooter. Gilgeous-Alexander’s worst season of his past four from the free-throw line came in 2023-24, only his second year as an All-Star, when he shot 87.4 percent on 8.7 attempts — less than half as many average attempts as Chamberlain averaged during his streak. “My grandson criticizes Shai because he says that Shai seeks out fouls, that he’s the guy who’s looking to get fouled and to get to the line,” Meschery said. “I know players who have always done that. In my era of Frank Ramsey, John Havlicek, Sam Jones, they jumped into you. So did Paul Arizin. Paul had a wicked jump shot, but he was always jumping into you, and the referees were always calling him and putting him on the line. It’s not a strategy that hasn’t been used before. But what’s significant about Shai is, he doesn’t necessarily jump into you. He jumps sideways.” “That’s what you tried to do,” Hall of Famer Rick Barry told The Athletic. “When I drove, s—, I was trying to get fouled. I wanted to get fouled. I wanted contact. … Shai’s a 90 percent free-throw shooter. Why the hell would you not want to?”
Rick Barry doesn’t just believe the 1975 Warriors pulled off the greatest upset in NBA history with a 4-0 sweep over the Washington Bullets; he thinks the accomplishment goes even deeper than that. “Biggest upset in the history of major sports in the United States,” Barry said before Friday’s game against the Portland Trail Blazers. “I defy anybody to point something else out that was as dramatic as what we did. It was a special group of people that came together like a family, cared about one another, played the game the way it was. “We epitomized, I think, what the game of basketball should be about as far as a team goes.”
Zach Kram: Youngest 40-point scorers in a Finals game: 1. Magic Johnson, 1980 2. Rick Barry, 1967 (3x) 3. Russell Westbrook, 2012 4. Jerry West, 1962 5. Jalen Williams, tonight
The Godfather of “granny” free throws has a proposal for Mitchell Robinson: Let me fix your problem. Rick Barry, the NBA Hall of Famer, watched Robinson’s mishaps Saturday with both frustration and confidence that he can make the Knicks center a 75 percent foul shooter by going underhand.
“It’s crazy. It’s so sad that guys are so bad and not proficient at the easiest part of the game — the only part of the game where nobody is trying to stop you from what you’re supposed to be doing,” Barry said in an interview with The Post. “It makes no freaking sense. … Free throws are a critical part of the game. It’s sad. He’s definitely a candidate to me [to shoot underhanded]. He’s got to make a switch. You can’t be shooting 30, 40 percent.”
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Jorge Sierra: Last night in all-time rankings LeBron James passed Patrick Ewing in rebounds for No. 25 all-time. Stephen Curry moved ahead of Patrick Ewing in scoring for No. 26 in NBA history. Kyrie Irving tied with Rick Barry in scoring at No. 76.
Jorge Sierra: Russell Westbrook has moved past Alex English in scoring for No. 22 all-time. Also: Damian Lillard now ahead of LARRY BIRD for No. 39 in scoring... and Paul George at No. 75 after passing Rick Barry.
Barry ranks among the nation’s top age-group players and earned the Triple Crown at the U.S. Open in Naples, Fla., in April. He won the men’s 80-plus singles title, the men’s 80-plus doubles title with partner Fred Shuey and the mixed doubles 80-plus title with Susan Mathews. This week, Barry is looking to add to his medal collection by competing in multiple events at the Huntsman Senior World Games in St. George, Utah. The 80-plus mixed doubles finals take place Friday, and the singles finals are set for Saturday.