Okay, so I was chilling on the couch the other day, scrolling through basketball videos as usual, when a question popped into my head: Who’s the heaviest player in NBA history? I mean, we all know Shaq was a big dude, but was he the biggest?
My curiosity was totally piqued, so I started digging. First, I just went to Google. Typed in “heaviest NBA player” and hit enter. The search results were kind of all over the place, with different names popping up. Some said it was Shaq, others mentioned Oliver Miller, and then there was this name I’d never heard of before: Sim Bhullar.
This got me even more interested, so I started checking out some basketball forums and fan sites. I spent a good chunk of time reading through old threads and articles, you know, trying to piece together who actually held the record. It was kind of a mess, to be honest. Lots of conflicting info and old forum posts that went nowhere.
Diving Deeper
After a while, I figured I needed a more organized approach. So, I grabbed a notebook and started making a list of all the contenders. I wrote down their names, listed weights, and the years they played. I tried to find what their listed weight was when they were playing in the league.
- Shaquille O’Neal: Listed around 325 lbs, but I found some sources saying he was heavier later in his career.
- Oliver Miller: This guy was huge! Most sources said he was around 375 lbs at his heaviest.
- Sim Bhullar: He was listed at 360 lbs, and he only played a few games in the NBA, making it harder to verify.
- Eddy Curry: He was listed at 295 lbs but looked way bigger later on, probably over 350 lbs.
- Robert Traylor: I found some reports that he played at 300 lbs, but I suspect he was much heavier at times.
Then, I spent hours watching game footage. I mean, hours. I watched old games of Shaq, trying to see how he compared to Miller and Bhullar. I looked up the few clips available of those guys, trying to get a sense of their size. It was tough, though, because camera angles and the quality of old videos made it hard to judge accurately.
Finally, after all that digging, I felt like I had a pretty good grasp on the situation. While Shaq was definitely one of the heaviest, it seemed like Oliver Miller probably held the record for the heaviest player to play in the NBA at his peak weight. But honestly, it’s hard to say for sure, you know? There’s just not a lot of reliable data out there, especially for players from back in the day. It was a fun little investigation, though. Kept me busy for a few days, and I definitely learned a lot about some of the biggest dudes to ever play in the league!
One thing’s for sure, though, whoever the heaviest player really was, they all had to carry a lot of weight around the court. That’s some serious dedication to the game!
