Many accomplished tight ends throughout NFL history played basketball at a high level at some point, most notably Antonio Gates, Tony Gonzalez, and Julius Thomas.
The topic often comes up about which tight ends could have played in the NBA since the position has a lot of overlap with what is required of a powerful NBA forward, and three-time Super Bowl champion tight end Travis Kelce recently named one former tight end who he believes could have made it in the NBA.
Kelce revealed on his podcast New Heights that he believes Jimmy Graham could have made it to the league, while his brother Jason disagreed and said that “every NFL player would rather play in the NBA.”
Here we go again …
pic.twitter.com/eUhFvqdlvW https://t.co/pu2AmXqpzU
— New Heights (@newheightshow) May 7, 2024
Graham played four years for the University of Miami’s basketball team and averaged 4.0 points and 5.9 rebounds per game as a senior.
As fun as it is to imagine Jimmy Graham in the NBA, those numbers are not indicative of an NBA player.
He surely could push people around, grab a few rebounds, and block a few shots, but he shot 40 percent from the free-throw line as a senior and would have been a massive liability on offense.
As big as he was on an NFL field and in college, he was not surrounded by 7-footers in the NFL.
This debate will last forever because there’s no way of proving it wrong, and we all know that superhuman athletes believe they can do anything.
Maybe they can stick to the celebrity game during All-Star weekend where Micah Parsons dominated this season.
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