John Salley

Highlights

He is the first player to play on three different NBA Championship teams (Pistons, Bulls, Lakers)

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John Thomas "Spider" Salley is a retired NBA player, and currently a talk show host. He is a 1988 graduate of the Georgia Institute of Technology College of Management.

At 6'11", Salley played both power forward and center for the Detroit Pistons, Miami Heat, Toronto Raptors, Chicago Bulls, and Los Angeles Lakers. He gained the nickname "Spider" for his in-your-face style of guarding his opponent. Salley is also the first player in NBA history to play on three different championship-winning franchises.

He was drafted by the Detroit Pistons in the first round of the 1986 NBA Draft out of Georgia Tech. He is among the Pistons' all-time leaders in blocked shots, holds Georgia Tech's blocked shot record, and has had his jersey number 22 retired?a very rare honor in college basketball. After joining the Pistons, he became close friends with Adrian Dantley, who taught him proper nutrition, how to exercise, and how to conduct himself off the court. Salley, for his part, called Dantley "The Teacher." Salley would become good friends with comedian Eddie Murphy and made several appearances at comedy clubs in the off-season. In 1989 and 1990, he played on two Pistons championship teams.

He was traded to the Miami Heat in 1992 and, a few years after that, was left unprotected by Miami in the 1995 expansion draft. Following a short stint with the inaugural Toronto Raptors team where he received little playing time, he negotiated a buyout of his contract in order to sign with the Chicago Bulls, where he helped Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and former Pistons teammates Dennis Rodman and James Edwards, lead the Bulls to a record-breaking 72-win season, after which Salley retired. However, in 1996, he came out of retirement to join Greek side Panathinaikos only for a few games.

In 1999, he joined a Lakers team led by Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O'Neal. He provided a veteran post presence and locker room leadership to the Lakers en route to their first of three consecutive NBA championships from 2000?2002; he retired again following the first championship season after proudly proclaiming that he had won "three championship rings, with three different teams, in three different decades and two different milleniums."

Currently, he is one of the hosts of The Best Damn Sports Show Period on Fox Sports Network. Salley hosted The John Salley Block Party, a radio morning show on Los Angeles station 100.3 The Beat from May 2005 - 2006. For a short time, Salley provided analysis for NBC's NBA Showtime.

In 2006, Salley was named the Commissioner of the American Basketball Association.

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