Los Angeles Lakers: 5 best players in franchise history to never win a ring

Vlade Divac

There are a lot of Lakers fans who hold a grudge against Vlade Divac. While he did spend a large chunk of his career in Los Angeles, he also put up some pretty intense battles against the team when he played for the Sacramento Kings.

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Still, we can’t ignore the fact that he was an excellent piece of the Lakers’ lineup when he was in town. Despite joining the team as a European prospect who didn’t even speak English, he quickly made his presence felt with tough defense, reliable rebounding and effective scoring inside the paint. There was the whole flopping thing, but that’s for a different conversation.

When he was with the Lakers, he fell short in his one opportunity to win a ring. Los Angeles fell to the Chicago Bulls in five games in the 1991 NBA Finals, handing Divac a big fat “L” in his only trip to the championship round. After that, he never found his way back to the NBA’s biggest stage regardless of the team.

As it so happens, it was the Lakers who kept Divac away from the Finals during his days in Sacramento. Three years in a row, the Kings were knocked out of the playoffs by Los Angeles, including an epic Western Conference Finals showdown in 2002. Divac played a big part in all of those series, but could never quite overcome a difficult matchup with Shaquille O’Neal.

Is Divac a superstar? Not really — he only has one All-Star selection to his name. However, he was an outstanding player for the Lakers who never could add a ring to his collection.