Historical rankings in terms of any sport are always difficult to do, usually with one exception. Tim Duncan is and continues to be the greatest power forward of all time, at least an inch or two above the rest.
If this is a surprise to you and I just ruined the ending then I'm sorry, but it's almost like gravity or evolution at this point—try and refute it and you look like a crazy person.
That being said, I've always found it fun and interesting to take a look at the past every few years, just to see how the evolution of a certain position in basketball has come along.
Where can you rank low-offense, high-defense guys like Dennis Rodman, or opposite guys like Dirk Nowitzki? How do certain generations hold up over others, and do people still even give a damn about what happened before Bill Russell invented defense in basketball's Big Bang Era?
Plus, I always love the conversation that pops up following a list like this. They're usually a bit heated at times, but still fun nonetheless.
Before I start out there's probably a bit of pre-ranking housekeeping that needs to be cleared up. Stats are terrific and all, but basketball analytics are not yet baseball, so you can't lean on them 100 percent.
Plus, we have to acknowledge that Wilt Chamberlain and Shaq played two different versions of basketball. It's hard to compare the two, but it's necessary when talking about history if you want to do it right.
So let's get going, starting with one of my favorite names to say in the history of the NBA.