Greatest NBA Player to wear each jersey number 00-99
Greatest NBA Player to wear each jersey number: 98, Jason Collins
Drafted in the first round of the 2001 NBA Draft, Jason Collins played 13 seasons in the NBA. Playing alongside Jason Kidd, Richard Jefferson, and Kenyon Martin for the New Jersey Nets, Collins made back-to-back NBA Finals appearances his first two seasons in the league.
Collins was a solid role player for the majority of his 13-year career, but he is acclaimed for becoming the first openly gay, active professional male athlete in the country. Several male athletes had come out as gay before Collins, but it had always been post-retirement, never in the midst of their careers like Collins did.
Not only did he make this public announcement during his playing days, but another factor that makes this so significant is that he did this during a time when many in society scoffed at the very idea of having a conversation about diversity, acceptance, and inclusion.
He decided to wear the number 98 to honor a victim of a heinous hate crime in 1998 and show solidarity to the gay community.
Honorable Mention: Hamed Haddadi
Greatest NBA Player to wear each jersey number: 96, Metta Sandiford-Artest
Spoiler alert; the athlete formerly known as Ron Artest wore seven different numbers over his 17-year career, so this may not be the only time you see his name appear in this list. Following an offseason trade from the Sacramento Kings to the Houston Rockets just before the 2008-2009 season, Metta Sandiford-Artest changed his jersey number from 93 to 96.
That season, as injuries took a toll on Tracy McGrady, Sandiford-Artest led the team in field goal attempts, and he was second on the team behind Yao Ming in points per game. He averaged 17.1 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.3 assists, and 1.5 steals per game while shooting 39.9 percent from 3-point range on 5.6 attempts per game.
With McGrady sidelined for the postseason, Yao and Sandiford-Artest helped the Rockets advance past the first round of playoffs for the first time in 12 seasons, falling just one game shy of reaching the conference finals for the first time since winning the 1995 NBA Finals.
By the end of his lone season rocking the number 96, Sandiford-Artest was named to the NBA All-Defensive Second-team, marking the sixth and final time he would make an All-League team.