Allen Iverson, Kobe Bryant, Metta World Peace, Kevin Durant, Gary Payton, Brian Shaw, Dana Barros, Dennis Scott, Malik Sealy, Elton Brand, Steve Francis, Isaiah Rider, Tony Parker, Iman Shumpert, Damian Lillard and, of course…Shaq have made rap singles and in some cases, entire albums.

Here, we aim to explore the finer points of 5 additional NBA rappers & their songs that warrant commentary.

#5:  Cedric Ceballos, Flow On from the 1994 album “BBall’s Best Kept Secret” (featuring Warren G)

Surprisingly good.  Yes, he takes the rather obvious approach of weaving basketball into the song and video but he pulls it off.  A graduate of Cal St. Fullerton, Ced spent 10 yrs in the NBA as a player but after retirement was hired by the Phoenix Suns as their in-arena emcee.  CC prob could have had a full career in music if that whole basketball thing didn’t happen.

#4: Joe Smith, Heart of a Lion from the 2009 album “The Beginning”

Surprisingly not awful.  Although not flawlessly executed, Joe scores bonus points for degree of difficulty by choosing such a rapid pace.  This could have gone horribly wrong for him…instead it was just good enough to avoid national ridicule which, frankly, should be the goal of all these guys.

#3:  Chris Webber, Gangsta Gangsta from the 1999 album “2 much drama” (featuring Kurupt)

Not surprisingly, it’s bad. Somewhere between calling a phantom time-out and calling games on TNT, this happened.  Not horrific…but just not for him.  Those flailing arms fail to keep the proper rhythm and he’s talking about babysitters and lettuce and whatnot.  Nice try but thank you for stopping.

#2: Jason Kidd, What the Kidd Did from the 1994 album “BBall’s Best Kept Secret” (featuring Money B)

Predictably awful. The breathy-whisper approach may have worked w/ a few ladies over the years but it’s creeps me out in a rap song.  Secondly, using his last name as a play on words in the song and the title is the most unimaginative move in the history of sound.  We’d all be better off if What the Kidd Did was not rap.

#1: Delonte West, Livin Life Fast from the 2011 album “The Lockout”

Oh boy.  This would be an example of that whole ‘national ridicule’ thing if he were a bit more famous but most casual bball fans only know him as the guy with neck-tats who has OCD and banged LeBron’s mom.  Easily the scariest thing about this…it was just 4 yrs ago. Many of these other mis-guided rap songs/vids can be laughed off as “back in the day” kind of stuff.  Not this one. While high and playing video games at Fuddruckers they thought…hey let’s shoot a rap video.  Really Livin the Fast Life at the arcade bruh.

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