National Basketball Association

Top 50 NBA players from last 50 years: Dominique Wilkins ranks No. 46

Updated Apr. 20, 2022 12:09 p.m. ET

Editor's Note: As part of a new series for his podcast "What’s Wright with Nick Wright," FOX Sports commentator Nick Wright is ranking the 50 best NBA players of the last 50 years. The countdown continues today with player No. 46, Dominique Wilkins.

Dominique Wilkins’ career highlights:

Nine-time All-Star
One-time first-team All-NBA, four-time second-team, two-time third-team
1986 scoring champion
1986 MVP runner-up
24.8 PPG

They called him the "Human Highlight Film."

For over a decade, Dominique Wilkins unleashed one of the most lethal offensive arsenals the NBA has ever seen. His catalog of dunks is as strong as anyone’s to step foot on the hardwood. That includes Michael Jordan, whose battles with Wilkins in the Slam Dunk Contest remain among the most iconic imagery in league history. They’d split their two duels, with Wilkins competing in three more of the aerial exhibitions.

And perhaps that’s the problem.

"The legend of that dunk contest overshadows how good he was," Wright said. "When you ask guys who played against him, he was a dominant scorer."

Dominique Wilkins is No. 46 on Nick Wright's Top 50

The 14th all-time leading scorer in NBA history, former Atlanta Hawks star Dominique Wilkins is No. 46 on Nick Wright's Top 50 NBA Players of the Last 50 Years. Wilkins averaged 25 points per game for his career, and while he never won a championship, Nick doesn't knock him for it because of the competition at the time — including Larry Bird's Boston Celtics.

In 1996, Wilkins was widely considered a glaring omission for the NBA’s 50th Anniversary Team. At the time, he ranked ahead of Jordan on the all-time scoring list. More than 25 years later, he still sits 14th, while posting the eighth-highest career average since 1980.

The NBA righted its wrong last fall by including Wilkins on the 75th Anniversary Team. There wouldn’t be a debate if his teams had just advanced further in the playoffs. 'Nique never did reach the conference finals and he made it out of the first round only three times. Then again, not one of his teammates earned multiple All-Star nods during a 12-year run in Atlanta.

It helps explain postseason defeats to the Celtics, Pistons and Bulls.

"I’m not holding it against Dominique that he was not able to get past teams that were just clearly and obviously more talented," Wright said. "If he had more playoff success, he skyrockets up this list."

That’s not to suggest Wilkins didn’t do his part. His playoff output (25.4 points, 6.7 rebounds) was even a tick higher than his regular-season rates. In the 1988 Eastern Conference Semifinals, he went toe-to-toe with Larry Bird, posting 35-10-4 in Game 6 and scoring 47 points at the Boston Garden in Game 7. The Hawks lost both games, however, by two points.

After rupturing his Achilles in 1992, an injury that ended others’ careers, a 33-year-old Wilkins returned the following season and put up 29.9 per game. Between 1984-94, he garnered nine consecutive All-Star nods, three top-five MVP finishes and averaged 28.0 points and 7.0 rebounds.

"I think a lot of people would argue that Dominique in a vacuum was better than Clyde Drexler," Wright said. "But Clyde Drexler went to three Finals, two as the best player, and won a title as the second-best guy. That part has to matter, but it can’t be all that matters."