20 NBA Duos That Never Lived Up to Their Full Potential

If you follow the classic way of creating an NBA team, you want to put a superstar, like Michael Jordan and team him with a player who compliments him well, like Scottie Pippen.  Together they raise each other to another level where they probably wouldn't be otherwise.

Without Scottie, Jordan may not have won six rings, without Jordan, Pippen definitely wouldn't have won six rings and he probably wouldn't be considered one of the 50 best NBA players of all-time.

But, put them together and you have an NBA duo for the ages.

That's the goal when putting together a team.  Getting at least those two guys that play so well together that they become a single entity, and if you can put three guys together (think 80s Lakers or Celtics) then even better.

But, what happens when the GM's vision just doesn't pan out?

Well, things like Allen Iverson and Chris Webber come together, or anyone who has ever played with Stephon Marbury.

You remember the all-time great duos and the most disappointing duos.  Usually the stories about the latter are much more entertaining but have much more disappointing consequences.

These are their stories.

20. Hakeem Olajuwon and Vince Carter

It's bad enough that we all had to see Hakeem Olajuwon wear purple, let alone see him play on this depressing team for a year.

The team itself wasn't all bad, finishing 42-40, but seeing Hakeem play in anything other than a Rockets jersey.

Carter was the clear number one on this team, then there were about seven other guys who played basketball with him, Hakeem being the top billed of them all, not necessarily the best of them all.

Still, to imagine Carter possibly playing with Olajuwon at any other point in the big man's career makes me wonder how good they would have been together, instead this just depresses me.

19. Bob McAdoo and Earl Monroe

After the Knicks won their last title in 1975, they were clearly trying to do two things that almost never work in the NBA.

They were trying to get the last out of their old guard while simultaneously brining in a new guy to stave off a total team collapse.

Well, Earl Monroe (and Walt Frazier for about a year) was clearly falling apart quicker than anyone imagined and Bob McAdoo unexpectedly declined in what should have been the peak of his career.

Going from about 30 points a game to down around 24 when he was just 25 years old hurt the late 70s Knicks as they ended up making it to the second round of the playoffs at their best.

They were together for just under two full seasons with the Knicks missing the playoffs at 40-42 in 1977 and 43-39 in 1978 in which they lost in the second round of the playoffs.

18. Zach Randolph and Eddy Curry

In the 2007 offseason, the New York Knicks were setting up a veritable twin towers in their frontcourt bringing in Zach Randolph to team with Eddy Curry.  Curry was coming off his best season as a Knick (this was still before he ballooned up to his current playing weight which will be reported just as soon as they find a scale that reads large enough to figure it out) and Zach Randolph was good, but coming from the Jail Blazers.

Well, Curry fell into disrepair and only played 59 games that season while Randolph just didn't seem to fit in with the system as he averaged nearly five fewer points than the previous season.

Randolph lasted just 11 games into the next season before being traded to the Clippers and Eddy Curry went to a buffet that year and never was the same.

17. Carlos Boozer and Derrick Rose

I'm not sold that this one is going to be a complete wash quite yet, but with the way Carlos Boozer looked last year it's going to take a lot for him to climb out of the doghouse.

Brought in to Chicago as what people thought was a player equal to Chris Bosh at a better value, Boozer proceeded to continue to have injury troubles and play terrible defense in the playoffs.

The Bulls have a chance to turn him around, but if they don't act quick Boozer could end up being a lost cause and cap space killer.

It's never fun (as a fan) to think of what could have been.

16. Jason Richardson and Baron Davis

Apart, Baron Davis and Jason Richardson were two of the flashiest, most entertaining basketball players in the league in the middle of the 2000s.

They got put together when Davis was traded to the Warriors in 2005 and the basketball world looked like it was in trouble, but perhaps we mistook their flashiness for basketball compatibility.

Of course, it's hard to call them a failed duo because of what they did to the Dallas Mavericks in the first round of the playoffs in 2007, but the rest of their resume isn't impressive at all.

In the two seasons prior to their stunning upset of the Mavericks, the Warriors finished 34-48 twice, missing the playoffs.

They were always fun and exciting to watch, but they were never a very good combination of players if you wanted to win games.

15. Gail Goodrich and Pistol Pete

Pistol Pete was a flashy and exciting player, but he was never really too successful in the NBA.

However, when the Jazz went out and signed Gail Goodrich away from the Lakers in 1978, things were looking like the Pistol could get his way to a championship, especially with Truck Robinson joining the duo.

The two played fine together, but the team ended up going 39-43 and 26-56 with Maravich and Goodrich as their go-to guys.

To make matters even worse, when the Jazz signed Goodrich they had to give the Lakers some draft picks in return, one of which ending up turning into Magic Johnson.

14. Jerry Stackhouse and Grant Hill

Back in 1998, the Detroit Pistons' fans were happy even though their team had just gone 37-45.

They had Grant Hill, the guy who was supposed to be the next Michael Jordan and they had just seen Jerry Stackhouse come over from Philadelphia and fit right in to their system, plus they had a decent array of role players.

They had what looked to be the beginnings of a great duo, and then everything went south.

The lockout in 1998 led to less development from the two as a team as had been hoped as the team went 29-21 and lost in the first round of the playoffs.

The next season Hill and Stackhouse averaged nearly 50 points a game together, but the team finished 42-40 and was swept in the first round of the playoffs.

After the season, Hill bolted for Orlando and Detroit was stuck with just Stackhouse.

13. Carmelo Anthony and Allen Iverson

After his falling out with basically everyone on the 76ers, the Denver Nuggets jumped all over Allen Iverson, trading basically Andre Miller and a pile of bicycle tires for one of the best scorers in the game.

Everything was looking rosy until the end of Iverson's second year with the Nuggets and 1-8 record in the playoffs.

After just three games with the team in 2008, the Nuggets shipped Iverson to Detroit for Chauncey Billups, a player they were much more successful with.

12. Grant Hill and Steve Francis

When the Magic traded away Tracy McGrady, the guy the brought back was Steve Francis, and it just so happened that he played with Grant Hill in his healthiest season with the Magic.

Francis and Hill were a formidable force in Orlando, each averaging around 20 points and playing together well, their record just didn't reflect this.

The Magic, however, finished just 36-46 and Steve Francis was traded to the Knicks in the offseason where he would go on to form even more depressing duos

11. Jim Jackson and Jamal Mashburn

Remember the '90s?  Simple times when we thought guys like Jim Jackson and Jamal Mashburn could be star players?

Dallas looked like they were sitting pretty, drafting Jackson out of Ohio State in 1992 and Mashburn out of Kentucky in 1993 both with the fourth pick in the first round.

So what did they end up doing?  Well the Mavericks won all of 13 games in their first year together in 1994 which led them to add Jason Kidd with the second pick in the first round in 1994. 

They were set up from there right?  Not exactly.

They won 36 and 26 games respectively in the next two years before trading away Mashburn and Jackson within three days of each other in 1997.

10. Mitch Richmond and Juwan Howard

Throwing Mitch Richmond onto a team during the latter stages of the peak of his career to go along with Juwan Howard, who was entering the peak of his basketball days just seemed like it was going to work.

The two were just basketball players, they sounded like basketball players, they looked like basketball players, they seemed like two guys who would play well together.

Well, three seasons and all of 66 wins later and Howard was traded to the Mavericks and Richmond was signed by the Lakers.

It was impossible to foresee just how quickly Richmond was going to take a downturn in production and that Howard had actually peaked as a player in his first few years as a Bullet, only to sustain that pace for a good chunk of his career and not really build on it.

9. Allan Houston and Latrell Sprewell

Thank the heavens for the 2000s Knicks, because without them there would be far less fodder for insults during that particular decade.

They made so many questionable decisions that this is the second time I'm writing about them in this particular column and I still have two more times to go.

Of all the guards that the Knicks signed with the hopes of running their team, Allan Houston was at least level-headed, Sprewell, however, was not.

From 1999 to 2003 the two played together, peaking in their first season together when the Knicks made the Finals without Patrick Ewing.

From there they won 50, 48, 30 and 37 games over the next four years, losing in the Eastern Conference Finals in 2000 and in the first round in 2001.

From 2002 up until last season they were the New York Knicks that we've all come to know and love over the last decade.

8. LeBron James and Shaquille O'Neal

This one sounded bad on paper, but when you factor in the fact that Shaq was roughly 392 pound overweight and 37 years old it seemed even worse.

Critics said he would clog up the lane which would keep LeBron from driving in as easily as he was able to, and he did, that is until he got injured, at which point the lane was nice and wide open.

The Cavs couldn't do anything in terms of free agency in the 2009 offseason because they got Shaq, and then when the 2010 offseason rolled around--well, we all know what happened there.

7. Scottie Pippen and Charles Barkley

If there were two players who never should have played together in the 90s, it was Charles Barkley and Scottie Pippen.

Is there really no way that anyone foresaw the two players getting on each others nerves, fighting and eventually ruining any chances their team had of having a good season?

Houston, however, assembled  what looked to be a super-team on paper with Pippen, Barkley and Hakeem Olajuwon, albeit all at the latter parts of their careers.

The team went 31-19, but they ended up losing to the Lakers in the first round of the playoffs.

Pippen said of Barkley after leaving the Rockets, ''He's a very selfish guy. He doesn't show the desire to want to win. That's my reason for wanting to get away from playing with him, because he just doesn't show the dedication.''

He then said he would never apologize to Barkley, that instead Barkley should apologize to him for having to come play with his, "fat butt."

Fun times had by all in Houston it seems.

6. Allen Iverson and Chris Webber

Could you imagine what these two guys could have done if they played together at the peaks of their careers?

Unfortunately for both of them, they happened across each other's paths late in the 2005 season, meaning the only full season they played together was 2006 when Iverson was sparring with the front office and anyone else who would listen.

The two put up huge numbers, combining for 53 points a game and actually complimenting each other well.

The rest of the team, however, was still young and they ended up winning just 38 games and missing the playoffs altogether.

5. Grant Hill and Tracy McGrady

Chalk this duo's death up to injuries more than anything else.

In his six seasons with the Orlando Magic, Grant Hill maxed out at 67 games in 2005 and played fewer than 30 games four different times.

Imagine what could have been if these two were healthy together for full seasons at a time and not just weeks at a time as it seemed.

McGrady was at his best in Magic pinstripes and Grant Hill was one of the ten best players in the league before he came to Orlando and his body fell apart.

This is depressing, let's move on.

4. Allan Houston and Stephon Marbury

I really wish I could have been in the room when someone told Allan Houston that he would be playing with Stephon Marbury.

Think about it, Marbury was already in full-blown crazy person mode having forged his own way out of Minnesota because he couldn't handle being overshadowed by Kevin Garnett and then doing crazy things in New Jersey and Phoenix up until 2004.

After just getting done playing with Latrell Sprewell, who is a completely different type of crazy, Houston got to play with Marbury.

No wonder he played the rest of that season and retired after injuring his knee the next season.

3. Steve Francis and Stephon Marbury

Hey, here's an idea, let's pair crazy old Stephon Marbury, who like I said about 30 seconds ago couldn't handle being in the spotlight with Kevin Garnett with a guy that calls himself Stevie Franchise.  That can't go bad...right?

The two played together for a season-and-a-half with Francis battling injuries most of the time and Marbury eating vaseline until Francis was traded to the Trail Blazers for Zach Randolph so they could form yet another disappointing duo that I mentioned earlier.

Good work Knicks, we're all impressed.

2. Stephon Marbury and Kevin Garnett

I will stand by my thought that if Stephon Marbury wasn't an egotistical psychopath who insists upon being the star player on his team that the Timberwolves would have won a title with Garnett and the current landscape of basketball would look completely different.

Marbury put up great numbers in his rookie and sophomore seasons with Minnesota, averaging 15 and 17 points respectively and showing rapid improvement.

Alas, he feuded openly with Timberwolves front office and forced a trade by the middle of the 1999 season.

It pains me to think about what Garnett could have done with a not insane Marbury as his point guard instead of Sam Cassell and a shamble of others.

1. Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady

For five years, Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady trolled the court together in Houston.  One of the three best centers of the 2000s compared with one of the ten best small forwards.  Seems like a can't-lose situation doesn't it?

Well, we all pretty much know how this story goes.  The Rockets won over 50 games four times with the duo, but the only time they made it out of the first round of the playoffs was in 2009 when Tracy McGrady went down with an injury and played just 35 games.

It's really too bad, too, because these two were seriously fun to watch together.

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