1) Teammates of both Chicago Bulls legend MJ, and LeBron: Brendan Haywood
And the final name on this list is also the one with the most underrated longevity. Fellow former Tar Heel and seven-footer Brendan Haywood played in more than 800 career regular season games. Although most didn’t recognize that Haywood was around for that long in the NBA. That is a credit to certain parts of his game when he came off the bench in a second or third unit.
Haywood also got to win an NBA Championship during the 2010-11 season, playing with the Dallas Mavericks. Most of Haywood’s career was spent with the Wizards (nine seasons and 579 games played, 450 of which he started in). He also played for the Mavericks for three seasons, Charlotte Bobcats (now the Hornets) for one, and Cavaliers for one.
That one season with the Cavaliers was the one opportunity for Haywood to be a LeBron teammate. He was also a teammate of Jordan’s for the first two years of his NBA career, with the Wizards in the early 2000’s. There were also more than 50 playoff games played for Haywood (just shy of 30 of which he started in).
Haywood averaged 6.3 points per game, 4.9 rebounds, 0.5 assists, 0.6 steals, and 1.3 blocks, in his more than 50 playoff appearances. And in the regular season, Haywood averaged 6.8 points per game, 6.0 rebounds, 0.5 assists, 0.4 steals, and 1.4 blocks. Haywood also shot 52.8 percent from the field and 58.7 percent from the free-throw line.