Tyson Chandler is now in royal company

With 8:48 remaining in the fourth quarter against the Indiana Pacers on January 14, 2018, Tyson Chandler accomplished something that only 39 players in the history of the league had accomplished before him: he grabbed his 10,000th career rebound.

A generally under-celebrated statistic, grabbing a rebound is something that any player can do on any given possession. However, some players have a better knack for the job – with height playing an important role – and excel at a rate throughout their career that sets them apart from the rest. Tyson Chandler is one of those players. An athletic center with the will and ability to grab every possible rebound that comes into his sphere of influence, devouring them up whether in an attempt to end an opponent’s possession, or keep his team’s hopes of scoring alive.

For Chandler, his journey to this 10,000th rebound began all the way back to November 2, 2001 with the Chicago Bulls, the second game of his NBA career, when Antonie Walker of the Boston Celtics had a short 3-foot shot blocked by Eddy Curry. Chandler gobbled up the ball, a record rebound, passed it out quickly (my presumption is that the pass went to Greg Anthony) leading to a fastbreak and a 16-foot jumper by Marcus Fizer.

16 and a half years later, Chandler has taken that skill-set of rebounding with impunity and made it a corner-stone of his career, coupled with his freakish athleticism for a man his size and a defensive ability that is rivaled by few in league history, and Chandler’s skills at rebounding would not only help him earn three All-NBA Defensive First Team honors, but an NBA Championship in 2011, but a Defensive Player of the Year award in 2012.

Phoenix Suns

While Chandler is the 40th player all-time to snag 10,000 rebounds, he is not the first member of the 10k rebound club to have played for the Phoenix Suns during his career. Shaquille O’Neal, Paul Silas, Shawn Marion, and Charles Barkley have all too grabbed 10,000 boards in their careers, Marion grabbing the most in a Suns uniform (6,616), followed by Barkley’s 3,232, Silas’ 2,886, (Chandler currently has 1,442 as of January 15, 2017), and O’Neal’s 929.

(Although he never played for the Phoenix Suns, the franchise’s first ever Head Coach, Johnny “Red” Kerr, did grab 10,000 rebounds in his career, 10,092 to be exact.)

The date of Chandler’s 10,000th rebound was helped a bit with a particular outing almost exactly two years to the day when he snagged a franchise-tying 27 rebounds against the Atlanta Hawks on January 23, 2016 – his second 20+ rebound game in a row. Almost tripling his career rebounding average in one night (he averages 9.4 a game), Chandler tied Paul Silas who had held the record all to himself for 45 years after grabbing 27 against the Cincinnati Royals on January 18, 1971.

Chandler is not the first player to snag his 10,000th rebound in a Suns uniform though, with Sir Charles Barkley – the reason for the reference of royalty – doing so first all the way back in 1996.

Following the firing of Paul Westphal as head coach and the struggling through a terribly down year filled with injuries and roster mis-management, and a bubbling up distrust of one another between Barkley and Suns then Owner Jerry Colangelo, the franchise and it’s fans longed for something to cheer about, and to use to cheer up.

For one night at least, Charles Barkley achieving a career milestone gave everyone involved a reason to celebrate and smile.

With 8:20 remaining in the first quarter in what would ultimately be an overtime victory over the expansion Vancouver Grizzlies on February 6, 1996, Barkley grabbed his first board of the night, one that in any other situation would be an over-looked early rebound, although at that moment it was the 10,000th of his illustrious career. Taking a missed Kevin Johnson layup out of the air (Barkley missed the easy put-back but immediately grabbed his 10,001st career rebound and put it in for a 9-4 lead), Barkey (who had scored his 20,000th point only 11 days prior against the New Jersey Nets) reveled in the moment with 19,023 cheering fans whose celebration held up the game for several minutes. With high-fives, smiles, and a butt-pat by interim Head Coach Cotton Fitzsimmons, Suns fans valley-wide once again reveled in awe at Barkley’s career, and the ferociousness and ferocity with which he reached that milestone.

While Chandler has reached the career milestone in 1,066 games, Barkley achieved it in only 862, although their history-making game did come with two peculiarities: each player finished their respective game with 14 rebounds, and both set their mark in Phoenix.

Next: Davon Reed's underwhelming NBA debut is something to build upon

For those of you keeping score, the next closest player to 10,000 rebounds in the NBA is LeBron James who currently has grabbed 8,043. The player currently on the Suns roster who is closest to 10,000 in his career is Greg Monroe who sits at 4,850.