(ThyBlackMan.com) When you think great winners in basketball some names automatically come to mind: Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, Bill Russell, Larry Bird. How about Mario Chalmers, starting point guard for the 2011-’12 NBA champion Miami Heat? Not exactly who you had in mind huh? Last night Mr. Chalmers joined an elite group of ballers that have won championships on at all of the traditional levels of basketball: high school, college and of course the NBA.
The Olympics are more political than anything else so I won’t consider them a level that all players get a chance to play on, respectively. That group is a lot smaller than any conceivable genre in professional basketball. A player would have had to be a winner from an early age everywhere he played throughout his (we are going to focus on men’s basketball with all due respect to Lisa 
Leslie, Dawn Staley, Cheryl Swoopes, Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi to name a few) entire career.
Chalmers was part of back to back state champions at Bartlett High School in Anchorage, Alaska-where he also was named Class 4A State Player of the Year three times in a row-won a championship at the University of Kansas in 2008. His game tying last second three pointer to force what was to be a sure win for the Memphis Tigers is forever included on any and every NCAA basketball March Madness video loop. With all due respect it should be, that Memphis team was awesome and deserved to win a championship just not on Chalmers watch.
The group of players with championship rings at all levels is small indeed. It does not include Michael Jordan (no high school ring), Larry Bird (no high school or college ring-lost to Magic and Michigan State in that classic 1979 matchup), Oscar Robertson (back to back Indiana State Championships at Crispus Attucks High School, but no college rings at Cincinnati), even the great Wilt Chamberlin does rate (no college ring-lost to North Carolina in 1957).
This list is a rare one indeed. For all of their talents Lebron James isn’t even on it (he didn’t play on college). Not Shaq, not Jerry West, not Dwayne Wade (he does have two NBA championships however), not Jason Kidd (no college ring) or Isiah Thomas (believe it or not no high school ring). Special group.
Magic Johnson, Bill Russell, Kareem Abdul Jabber and Mario Chalmers. Take that world. Shout out to Anchorage, Alaska’s finest, well deserved.
Staff Writer; Donnell Suggs
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