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Rank 112Up 2
#11 in Greatest Playoff Performers
of 16 ranked entries
Dwyane Wade
Miami Heat
Averaged close to 35 points a game across the 2006 Finals, including a fourth-quarter takeover in Game 5 down 13 points, to drag a Shaq-led Heat team back from an 0-2 series deficit. Recorded specifics: team Miami Heat, signature run 2006, finals mvps 1. Panel highlighted nearly 35 points a game across the 2006 Finals, erased a 0-2 series deficit with four straight wins and 2006 Finals MVP at just 24 years old. The reservation on record is heavy free-throw volume in that series drew lasting criticism of the officiating.
Underdog run
Score breakdown
How Dwyane Wade earned 80.8
Each criterion is scored independently, then combined using the weights published on Greatest Playoff Performers.
- Big-stage productionweight 30%
- 78.8
- Signature moment magnitudeweight 25%
- 80.3
- Team success deliveredweight 25%
- 81.7
- Poise under elimination pressureweight 20%
- 83.1
On the record
Recorded detail
| Team | Miami Heat |
|---|---|
| Signature run | 2006 |
| Finals MVPs | 1 |
| Rating | 8.5 |
Panel verdict
Strengths and reservations
What it gets right
- Nearly 35 points a game across the 2006 Finals
- Erased a 0-2 series deficit with four straight wins
- 2006 Finals MVP at just 24 years old
Where it gives ground
- Heavy free-throw volume in that series drew lasting criticism of the officiating
1 appearance
Where this entry ranks
From the same list
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Basketball · Chicago Bulls · 1984–2003
Six trips to the Finals, six championships, six Finals MVPs — a title-conversion rate nothing else in team sports has matched. The competitive ferocity is as much the legend as the fadeaway.
96.4/100 Top 49 score—No change
Rank 02Editor’s pickLeBron James
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Rank 03Editor’s pickMagic Johnson
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Started at center as a rookie in the deciding Finals game with Kareem injured and dropped 42 points — the single boldest positional statement the sport has produced. Five titles followed from a 6’9” point guard nobody could match up against.
93.2/100 Top 49 score—No change
Rank 04Shaquille O’Neal
Center · Magic, Lakers, Heat · 1992–2011
The most physically dominant force the league has produced, backed up by three straight Finals MVPs during the Lakers’ 2000-2002 three-peat that no defense had an honest answer for.
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Rank 05Tim Duncan
Power Forward · San Antonio Spurs · 1997–2016
“The Big Fundamental” won five championships across three different decades of Spurs rosters without ever posting the gaudy numbers his impact deserved — the definition of winning quietly.
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Rank 06Larry Bird
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Three consecutive MVPs and three championships, produced by a shooting touch and court vision that made the Celtics-Lakers rivalry of the 1980s the sport’s defining commercial moment.
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Rank 07Kobe Bryant
Shooting Guard · Los Angeles Lakers · 1996–2016
Five championships and an 81-point game — second all-time behind only Wilt’s 100 — built on a relentlessness that became its own cultural shorthand: Mamba Mentality.
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Rank 08Hakeem Olajuwon
Center · Houston Rockets · 1984–2002
The only player in NBA history to win MVP, Defensive Player of the Year and Finals MVP in the same season, produced by footwork — the Dream Shake — that still gets taught to NBA big men today.
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Top 49 rankings are editorial. Scores are produced from the published criteria on each list and are refreshed on the cadence stated there. Figures shown across this section are curated demonstration data.