Lesser-known NBA players taking best shots as analysts

0 Comments | USA TODAY, June, 2005 | by Michael Hiestand

The NBA TV analysts at the top of the national heap include some who were All-Stars or even MVPs as players -- ABC/ESPN's Bill Walton and TNT's Charles Barkley, Doug Collins and Magic Johnson.

But the TV elite also includes plenty of former role players, such as ABC's Steve Jones, TNT's Steve Kerr and ESPN's Tim Legler, Tom Tolbert and Greg Anthony -- who weren't widely known beyond savvy fans.

Legler got a one-year tryout at ESPN, for the 2000-01 season, while he was attending the prestigious Wharton business school of the University of Pennsylvania. And in juggling both, he says, "The most difficult thing was that I was also going through a divorce, with kids that were 2 and 5."

As a player who didn't start a game until his 10th NBA season, there wasn't...