The hoopla surrounding ESPN’s documentary about the Fab Five is ridiculous considering they never accomplished anything on the basketball court that mattered.
The Fab Five weren’t fabulous at all, in fact they were failures. As a group during their days at Michigan, they never won an NCAA championship. The Wolverines reached the title game in 1992 and 1993, but fell to superior Duke and North Carolina teams.
For all their talk about how they hated Duke and looked upon the black players on the Blue Devils’ team as Uncle Toms, it was Duke that humiliated them in the 1992 NCAA title game by defeating the Wolverines 71-51.
When their college basketball days came to an end, four members of the group – Jalen Rose, Chris Webber, Juwan Howard and Jimmy King – would play in the NBA. The fifth member of the Fab Five, Ray Jackson, was never drafted.
King had a limited NBA career amounting to three seasons, while Rose and Webber enjoyed some success during their time in the league. Howard is playing in his 17th season in the NBA, this year coming off the bench for the Miami Heat.
But just as they failed to accomplish anything in college, the Fab Five have never won an NBA championship.
Rose came the closest to an NBA title as a member of the Indiana Pacers during the 2000-01 season when they reached the finals against the Los Angeles Lakers, but lost the series in six games.
The Fab Five brought a supposed to new wave to college basketball, more specifically, they brought hip-hop culture into the limelight. But that culture, along with the baggy shorts, black socks and lots of bling never won them anything.
The group will be remembered as the best recruiting class in the history of college basketball. But being remembered as a great recruiting class isn’t much to hang your hats on, especially given that their most important goals were never achieved.
The Fab Five wasn’t too fabulous, unless we’re talking about fabulous failures.
