SLAM #79

Originally published in SLAM 79 The 6th Man: This was brought up last issue in the tiny type along the bottom of the All-Star feature, but it merits mentioning again in a more prominent location: We’re deading the whole KMart thing. Read Lang’s entire story—the entire issue with the exception of this page, for that matter—and notice you won’t find that diminutive used once. Why not? Because, to be honest, there’s never been anything cut-rate about Kenyon Martin or his game. And if you want to get deeper, yeah, maybe there’s some guilt—after all, we’re the ones who have discounted his talent and accomplishments. Leaving him out of our Top 50 Dunkers of All Time special issue? Stupid. Not giving him a cover, even as he dunked on everyone in the NCAA for four years, was the first overall pick in ’00, then co-led his Nets to the ’02 and ’03 NBA Finals? Yeesh. So consider this a collective “our bad.” After all, Kenyon should have been a SLAM guy from the start. Less animated guys than hi...