Elite Basketball Players in the Last Two Decades

Most often your mind wanders around three cities when you think of cream of the crop basketball players — Philadelphia, Chicago, and New York. These US cities are often referred to as the basketball meccas for the fact that these cities have produced the top-notch elite basketball players throughout the history of the NBA. But are these cities still pretty high on the list of top basketball players producing cities? Are there any other cities that have entered the pipeline? With the NBA being the ever-growing basketball landscape, some additions to the list should not anyway surprise you.

We have created a list of three new cities on the list, and the elite basketball players it had produced in the last two decades. Let's read the article.

Chicago: Chicago still finds a celebrated place, like any other time, in this list of top basketball players producing cities. The list of players the city has produced include Dwyane Wade (2003), Tony Allen (2004), Derrick Rose (2008), Patrick Beverley (2009), and Anthony Davis (2012).

Philadelphia: The city has produced many of the quality rotation players over the two decades. It does not bother about not having the star power like many of the top-notch cities. List of the best basketball players the city has produced includes Jameer Nelson (2004), Kyle Lowry (2006), Tyreke Evans (2009), Markieff Morris (2011), and Marcus Morris (2011).

Los Angeles: Containing the massive population of the United States, it’s no surprise that the state produces immensely a huge number of top-notch basketball players. The cream of the crop players in the area includes Russell Westbrook (2008), James Harden (2009), Paul George (2010), Kawhi Leonard (2011), and Klay Thompson (2011).

New Jersey: The New Jersey is less than 9,000 square miles, which is even half of the size of Los Angeles County but has double the population. The city is among the top cities that have produced top-notch players in the last two decades. The top five players from the list included Luol Deng (2004), J.R. Smith (2004), Andrew Bynum (2005), Kyrie Irving (2011), Karl-Anthony Towns (2015). In addition to this other names in the list would include Jay Williams Troy Murphy (2001), (2002), Dahntay Jones (2003), Randy Foye (2006), Michael Kidd-Gilchrist (2012), Kenneth Faried (2011), and Kyle Anderson (2014).

Houston, Texas: Undoubtedly, Houston has produced some tremendously wonderful basketball-players through the last two decades. Jimmy Butler leading the list, there are many superb performers who have been discovered on this land. The most outstanding players in the list include Emeka Okafor (2004), DeAndre Jordan (2008), Jimmy Butler (2011), Justise Winslow (2015), and De'Aaron Fox (2017). In addition to this list of the top five other players in the list includes TJ Ford (2003), Daniel, “Boobie” Gibson (2006), Gerald Green (2005), Jonathon Simmons (2015), Danuel House (2016), Justin Jackson (2017), and Carsen Edwards (2019).

Seattle, Washington: The city has a solid roster of NBA players today. In the last few years, Seattle has particularly shot to fame for being one of the cities that produce some topmost basketball players. This list of top five NBA players from Seattle includes Jamal Crawford (2000), Brandon Roy (2006), Avery Bradley (2010), Isaiah Thomas (2011), and Zach LaVine (2014). Other notable players in the list include Nate Robinson (2005), Marvin Williams (2005), Rodney Stuckey (2007), Aaron Brooks (2007), Spencer Hawes (2007), and Kevin Porter Jr. (2019).

Dallas, Texas: While Dallas may not have that depth as the other cities, it definitely has some of the best picks who have had the best start to their career and will have a better future in the years to come. The topmost promising players of the list include Kenyon Martin (2000), Chris Bosh (2003), Deron Williams (2005), LaMarcus Aldridge (2006), and Marcus Smart (2014). In addition to this, the other elite players of the list are C.J. Miles (2005), Darrell Arthur (2008), Julius Randle (2014), and Myles Turner (2015).