who has the highests wing span ever listed

on defensive specifically, long arms increase the amount of space you can cover without moving your feet.....basically, long arms increase the number of deflections and steals you get BUT of course this is assuming that the player knows how to use their reach to do these things

Just look at Scottie Pippen, Kevin Garnett, and Andrei Kirilenko if you want to see how length helps you.

Manute Bol

Manute Bol(he can dunk without jump, but he is 7-7) and Priest Lauderdale(he can touch the rim without jump and he is 7-3).

Kevin McHale's arms stretched out gave him an 8' wingspan. Ive seen it at the hall of fame, he has the highest wingspan.

Shagari Alleyne's is 8'1

standing reach does not equal wingspan

MemphisX said:

standing reach does not equal wingspan

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A high reach doesn't measure wingspan, but does indicate a large wingspan. You get two people the same height, the one who reaches higher will almost invariably have the bigger wingspan (people the same height don't vary that much in shoulder height).

Some facts about Bol: (source: http://www.interbasket.net/players/manute.htm)
* He first played basketball at age 18 and chipped his teeth on the rim when he first tried to dunk
* Bol joined the minor-league Rhode Island Gulls. While there, Bol twice blocked an unheard-of 18 shots in a game!
* He was briefly Minister of Sports and Culture in Sudan

EDIT: Bol has the largest wingspan in NBA history, at an amazing 8'6" !!! (source: http://www.freewebs.com/nbagiants/ )

8'6. Holy ****.

I think Shaq's is close to 8 feet. There's a reason he's still dunking so much these days despite having difficulty getting off the ground.

Does anyone know who has the hightest wingspan to height ratio.

mysterio said:

(people the same height don't vary that much in shoulder height).

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they certainly can

and dont forget shoulder width

mo76 said:

Does anyone know who has the hightest wingspan to height ratio.

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I know Brandan Wright (prospect playing in HS) has a 8 foot wingspan and he's 6-9

mo76 said:

Does anyone know who has the hightest wingspan to height ratio.

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I'm sure there are a lot better examples but Wade's is pretty damn freakish. Prince also comes to mind, despite being pretty tall.

I believe Ostertag can touch the rim without jumping.

mo76 said:

Does anyone know who has the hightest wingspan to height ratio.

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Maybe Phil Jackson because he's only 6,8" (80 inches) tall w/o shoes on but his arms are said to as long as 42 inches each! If you do the simple math, that's more than half his own height in each arm's length so just from the length of his two arms, his wingspan is longer than his height (and that doesn't include the breadth of his wide shoulders). That's crazy long arms and arm span!

mysterio said:

A high reach doesn't measure wingspan, but does indicate a large wingspan. You get two people the same height, the one who reaches higher will almost invariably have the bigger wingspan (people the same height don't vary that much in shoulder height).

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Depends on how much do you mean by not so much difference in shoulder height for two people of the same height, but i guess two people of the same height can vary as much as 2 to 3 inches in shoulder height (which is actually pretty big). And as for shoulder breath, that also influences armspan. Although a person with a much longer armspan (like Yao's armspan 7,5" vs Shagari's 8,1") should have longer arms as well, somebody with only slightly longer armspan doesn't necessarily have longer arms (it could be from shoulder width). BTW, although Yao Ming's wing span is rather short for his height, I don't think anybody in the Nba has a higher standing reach than him which doesn't give him that much of a disadvantage. In short standing reach is more important than wingspan.

more interesting who has the highest
standing reach + no running start vertical

out of the last few drafts its Greg Oden and Tyrus Thomas