Everyone is doing the multiverse thing these days, and if you don’t know about that yet or don’t believe me, just wait—your time is coming.
We finally got a third Michael Keaton Batman movie after a three-decade wait (which finally blew up a struggling DC universe), as well as fitting conclusions to three different Spider-Man plotlines, as well as Deadpool. We are getting a Karate Kid cross-over this year between the original and the reboot (something first seen in Star Trek Generations (and again in the 2009 reboot) and later in XMen Days of Future Past and I’m sure there are other examples), there is yet another Superman debuting this summer, and somehow Robert Downey Jr will be playing a role in the Marvel universe that is NOT Iron Man in the latest reboot (third overall) of the Fantastic Four.
The movie industry is definitely out of original ideas, but they have seemingly found a cheat code to bust open the multiverse and make things somewhat connectable if you have the free space in your memory banks to play along. It means no character is off-limits within any specific time period.
With that in mind, we thought that maybe there should be something like a Space Jam multiverse where you can pull players from different eras and relocate them to a time more beneficial to their style, or perhaps when modern medicine was available, that could have helped their career?
We asked Bryant Knox (BK) and Casey Mabbott (CM) to put on their outside-the-box thinking caps and answer some quirky questions on what they would do if they had control over time and space when it comes to the NBA. What players will they help? Will any players be forced to go back in time against their will and to the detriment of their career? Will any previous deals be reversed? We shall see what the two Time Lords have in store for us below.
Give One Player In NBA History The Gift Of Modern Medicine, Then Return Them To Their Normal Timeline (Can’t Be Bill Walton)
BK: “What if?” is a question we ask about so many players throughout NBA history. Few players were considered next in line to become “face of the league,” like Anfernee “Penny” Hardaway.
Penny’s career and his overall stardom were ready to take off in the mid-’90s. The league braced for Michael Jordan’s retirement, and Hardaway looked ready to take over the NBA before knee injuries stopped that plan.
I’d give Penny another shot at stardom because, as an NBA fan, the idea of a healthy, prime Penny battling it out with Kobe Bryant (and many others) is a dream scenario. As a Blazers fan, I’d like to say that Penny’s clean bill of health keeps Shaquille O’Neal in Orlando and out of the Western Conference, but Shaq made the decision to bolt for L.A. before Hardaway’s knees became an issue.
CM: I’m going to give Grant Hill ankle surgery. Hill was one of the most prolific players in the late 90s, making the Pistons relevant in ways they had not been since the Bulls swept them in 1991. An ankle injury as the world climbed into the next millennium shifted his career in ways rarely seen for superstars, and he went from one of the best to one of the biggest what-ifs in league history.
Hill rounded out an admirable career with stops on multiple teams and had a run as a distinguished role player in Phoenix, but he was never the same incredible talent we saw in the 90s that inspired an entire generation of kids to drink Sprite even though it doesn’t have any thirst-quenching properties. Hill’s trade to Orlando did help the Pistons build their title-winning team that ironically knocked Hill’s Magic out of the playoffs.
Hill never achieved the professional glory he was so close to achieving before he was hurt, and it’s possible that modern training practices and knowledge of sports medicine could have kept him on the surge he was on.
Bring A Player From NBA History To Present Day To See If Their Game Would Translate To The Modern Era
BK: Clifford Robinson’s career spanned 18 seasons, a remarkable feat in and of itself. He played from 1989 until 2007, so he was part of the era that saw bigs starting to spread the floor, shoot from deep, and make plays away from the rim. However, teams during his prime years weren’t yet ready to send 6’10” out to the perimeter regularly, or at all.
Over the course of his career, Uncle Cliffy shot 35.6 percent from the three-point line on 2.5 attempts per game. But check out his 1994-95 season, a campaign in which he jumped from a career average of 0.5 three-point attempts per game to 5.1. He completed 37.1 percent of those shots and upped it to 37.8 percent on 6.0 attempts the year later.
Unfortunately for Cliff, those attempts dropped to 4.3 the following season, and after leaving Portland, they plummeted to 2.8 deep shots per night across 10 seasons and four teams.
With Cliff’s ability to also defend multiple positions both at and away from the rim, he could’ve become a perennial All-Star had teams unleashed him out to the perimeter, something that would’ve been not just possible, but a requirement in today’s game.
CM: I’m going to bring Bill Walton to the present day. This is a big man’s league again, and with all the talk about Jokic and what a generational center can be in today’s NBA, I think Walton could have been one of the all time greats in today’s game – and that’s saying something since even people outside of the NW consider him one of the best ever.
This would also serve a double purpose, as Walton would benefit from modern training and surgery, which may have prolonged his career. Some Blazers fans will see this as a removal of their only championship in the trophy case, but it could also open the door to championships we don’t have yet. You might call that breaking the rules since the first topic clearly stated that Walton cannot be allowed to work with modern medicine, but we aren’t sending him back to his normal timeline. Like 2009 Star Trek, we are creating a different timeline altogether and seeing if he changes his career trajectory.
Walton was a monster in the middle and had an equally gifted game on both sides of the court. He could shoot, he could pass, he could block, he could steal, and he could rebound with just about anyone. A young Walton who can take nights off, wear modern footwear, and have access to space-age (compared to 70s era sports medicine) treatments would undoubtedly help him out. Who knows, maybe he could even learn to shoot a three-pointer once in a while and be a true unicorn? He never attempted a three-point shot in his entire career, so you have to assume he would struggle with it, but for a guy with seemingly endless athleticism, who knows – maybe he just needs the right coach and the right push to do it.
Send A Player To A Different Era Where Their Game May Have Been More Dominant. Or If You Need To Get A Specific Player Off The Board So Your Team Can Flourish – Send Them Away
BK: My first instinct was to try and find someone in today’s game who is outskilled but physically holds his own. That type of player could’ve had a different career when bigs weren’t expected to be shooters and playmakers. But then I took a step back, and I thought to myself, “Who could we send back not to make good but great? Who can we send back who is already great but might’ve gone down as the GOAT?”
Nikola Jokić is the choice. He thrives in 2025 despite lacking the athleticism we’ve come to expect from the elites. He doesn’t just compete with the world’s greatest athletes; he outclasses them on a nightly basis, doing things and recording box scores we never thought we’d see.
Of course, The Joker already has his flowers. We’ve given them to him in the form of multiple MVPs, and winning a title back in 2023 eliminated every last bit of the “Jokić is not a star” discourse. But had he played when nobody was expected to be athletic—let’s say during the early-60s—it wouldn’t be known as the Wilt Chamberlain or Oscar Robertson era—it’d be known as The Joker Era. And how cool does that sound?
CM: I’m going the supervillain route here, with a two-part answer. I am going to send a rookie Michael Jordan to Washington in the late 90s so we can settle the debate about whether he could hang with the athletes in the league currently. I am also taking him and the Bulls off the board in the 90s to ideally give the Blazers a better shot at a title during Drexler’s prime.
The other half of this is that it will also settle the debate of who was better between Jordan, Kobe, and LeBron. Let’s just put them in their prime at the same time and see what happens. The interesting part about the Jordan vs. LeBron debate is that Kobe had the better career when he and LeBron were both at the top of their games, and not many people would say Kobe was a better player than Jordan, so doesn’t that give us our answer?
But fair is fair. We saw Jordan on a struggling Bulls team before he was an annual champion, just as we saw LeBron on a struggling Cavs team before he went nuclear. So the objective move would be to put Kobe on a struggling team. We will keep him in Charlotte for a few years and then let him be traded to L.A. to team with Shaq just when Phil gets there.
Bring Any Coach From Portland Trail Blazers’ History To Be The Coach Today
CM: I want to see what Rick Adelman can do with the Blazers’ current lineup. That guy got so much out of the early 90s Blazers, it would be interesting to see what he could do with a team when he doesn’t need to worry about an all-time great standing in his way. Right now, there aren’t any once-in-a-lifetime players in their prime to get through for a title, and somehow, Portland is one of the worst teams in the league. The deck is finally favorable, and they can’t break through that wall. I think Rick could build a system and a team that could compete in today’s NBA. If he could build one of the best tests for Michael Jordan, he can certainly build a winner today.
BK: I hate to steal Casey’s response, but there’s no better answer than Rick Adelman. Casey’s right when he says this guy “got so much out of” his guys. You simply can’t “knock” him for having so much talent to work with, because he made it work, he showed improvement through his players every year, and he was always a winner. Unfortunately, as good as they were, the Blazers were always in the Los Angeles Lakers’ (and Chicago Bulls’) shadow. I’d love to give him another shot with Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson long retired.
Change Any Deal Or Draft Pick League History (Cannot Move Michael Jordan To Portland)
BK: LeBron James (strongly) hinted that the NBA orchestrated the Cleveland Cavaliers’ 2003 draft lottery win so Cleveland could draft the hometown kid, LeBron James. The quote came from a recent sitdown with ESPN’s Pat McAfee.
I’m going to let my conspiracy mind run wild and say this is true. And as a result, I’m giving the Detroit Pistons—who ended up with Darko Miličić—LeBron to pair with Ben Wallace, Rasheed Wallace, Tayshaun Prince, Rip Hamilton, and Chauncey Billups.
I’m not a Pistons fan, but that is wild to think about. It makes any basketball fan salivate imagining that Pistons team—one that took down the Gary Payton-Karl Malone Super Lakers in a Finals matchup—with LeBron.
There’s no guarantee that LeBron will stay where he was drafted, but winning a title early in Detroit may … have kept him from “The Decision” to join Dwyane Wade and the Miami Heat.
Everything we knew about 2000s and 2010s dynasties could’ve changed with this reality shift. Absolutely wild.
CM: I’m going to keep Shaq in L.A. I’m tired of hearing how great Shaq and Kobe were and how much they could have accomplished if they had worked things out after losing their only Finals series together. Let’s push them back together and get Phil to work things out. Maybe even fly in Jordan and Pippen to talk to them, I’m sure they had some tough days they had to figure out, and while they didn’t have a lost championship to relate to, one could argue they did have two of them in 1994 and 1995. Maybe they wind up disrupting the Spurs dynasty, or maybe it turns out the three titles they won when they were apart could have been three or more together. At least, we would know one way or another.
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