Brett Pollakoff ranked the 12 best NBA players to never win a ring, and John Stockton and Karl Malone landed in the top two spots.

Pollakoff had Stockton at No. 2, saying, “Stockton played 19 NBA seasons and led the league in assists for nine straight years from 1988-96. Not only is he the all-time leader in total assists in NBA history, but the player in second place (Jason Kidd) trails him by more than 3,700 on the list.”

Pollakoff then looked at the career accomplishments of Malone, who had he had ranked No. 1, saying, “Malone was a 14-time All-Star who played 19 NBA seasons and was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2010. He’s second on the all-time career scoring list with 36,928 (behind only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and he and Stockton made for one of the most consistent tandems in league history).”

Pollakoff then looked at how Malone missed out on winning a championship, saying, “Malone made it to the Finals twice with the Utah Jazz, losing to Michael Jordan’s Bulls in both ’97 and ’98. He tried to chase a ring in his final NBA season with the Lakers in 2004, but a star-studded L.A. squad that included Malone, Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal and Gary Payton was upset by the Detroit Pistons in a series that lasted just five games.”

Other players to make the list were Charles Barkley, Allen Iverson, Steve Nash, Patrick Ewing, George Gervin and Elgin Baylor.

‘The BYU effect’ in the NCAA regional

Eric Single of Sports Illustrated gave five early impressions from the college baseball tournament, and one of them was all about BYU.

Single brings up what he calls, “the BYU effect,” where the Stanford regional — where BYU is playing — is starting a day earlier than everyone else to accommodate the Cougars policy to not participate in athletic events on Sundays.

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