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This is Wayback Wednesday, your midweek blast from the past! From retrospectives of basketball games and their interesting features, to republished articles and looking at NBA history through the lens of the virtual hardwood, Wednesdays at the NLSC are for going back in time. This week, I’m taking a look back at the players in the default rosters of NBA 2K14 PS4/X1 who are still active as of 2023.
Can you believe that NBA 2K14 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One is coming up on ten years old? As I’ve discussed in previous articles and on the NLSC Podcast, it took me a while, but I’ve certainly warmed up to the landmark release! However, while the game itself still holds up extraordinarily well, the snapshot of the NBA that it captures is naturally now quite outdated. A recent perusal of the default rosters made it clear just how much turnover there is in the league over the span of a decade. In fact, some sweeping changes occurred not too long after NBA 2K14’s release!
How many players from the default rosters of NBA 2K14 PS4/X1 are still active as of 2023? Just 73 as of writing, though others were still active as of last season, and may still find a spot in the NBA. When I made a similar comparison with NBA Live 10 back in 2021, only 44 players from the 2010 campaign were still in the league. On top of that, less than 20 players had stints that spanned from the launch of the PS4 and X1 through to the arrival of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. Indeed, including a couple that I forgot, only five players are still with the same team a decade later. As we prepare to tip off another NBA campaign, let’s also take a look back…way back…
As you might expect, three of the five players who are still on the same team that they played for when NBA 2K14 was released are the Golden State Warriors’ trio of Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green. They’re not the only active Warriors who were around for NBA 2K14, however. This season they’re joined by Chris Paul, Rudy Gay, and Cory Joseph. The Milwaukee Bucks also have six players who were in NBA 2K14, namely Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton – the two players who haven’t changed teams since 2013 that I previously forgot to mention – as well as Brook Lopez, Robin Lopez, Jae Crowder, and the newly-acquired Damian Lillard.
Dame of course is one of the biggest stories of the offseason, finally moving on after being Mr. Trail Blazer for more than a decade. With Udonis Haslem officially retiring after 20 years with the Miami Heat, Lillard was one of the last players along with the Bucks’ duo and Warriors’ trio to still be with the same team he was playing for back in NBA 2K14. As you may have seen, Dame did try to rescind his trade demand, but Portland clearly considered that bridge burned. And speaking of burned bridges, it remains to be seen whether James Harden will still be in Philadelphia when the season ends. If he gets his way, he won’t be playing for Daryl Morey for too much longer!
In the meantime, that gives the 76ers five active players who have been around since NBA 2K14, specifically Harden, Pat Beverley, Tobias Harris, Danny Green, and P.J. Tucker; enough for a small ball showdown with the Warriors or Bucks. The Clippers can also field a full lineup plus one, with the trio of Kawhi Leonard, Paul George, and Russell Westbrook being joined by Marcus Morris Sr., Mason Plumlee, and Nicolas Batum. Marcus’ twin brother Markieff is still active with the Dallas Mavericks, as are Kyrie Irving and Tim Hardaway Jr. New Orleans also has three players from NBA 2K14, as C.J. McCollum, Jonas Valanciunas, and Cody Zeller are active Pelicans.
The defending champion Denver Nuggets have four players who can be found in NBA 2K14, namely Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Reggie Jackson, Justin Holiday, and DeAndre Jordan. Toronto can likewise almost field a starting five, with Otto Porter Jr., Thaddeus Young, Garrett Temple, and Dennis Schroeder. Phoenix (Kevin Durant, Bradley Beal, Eric Gordon), Minnesota (Rudy Gobert, Mike Conley, Austin Rivers), Sacramento (Harrison Barnes, JaVale McGee, Alex Len), Miami (Jimmy Butler, Kyle Lowry, Kevin Love), and Chicago (DeMar DeRozan, Andre Drummond, Nikola Vucevic) round out the teams in NBA 2K14 with three players still active in 2023.
Teams with two active players in NBA 2K14’s default rosters include Cleveland (Ricky Rubio, Tristan Thompson), Boston (Jrue Holiday, Al Horford), Memphis (Derrick Rose, Steven Adams), Atlanta (Patrick Mills, Wesley Matthews), the Lakers (LeBron James, Anthony Davis), Detroit (Alec Burks, Bojan Bogdanovic), Houston (Jeff Green, Reggie Bullock), and Washington (Danilo Gallinari, Taj Gibson). LeBron is also now officially the oldest player in the league, a development that makes me feel old as I was born two and a half months before him! Since Carmelo Anthony has called it a day, LeBron is also officially the last man standing from the Class of 2003.
Running through the teams that have just one active player from the default rosters of NBA 2K14 PS4/X1, Charlotte has Gordon Hayward, Utah has Kelly Olynyk, New York has Evan Fournier, Orlando has Joe Ingles, and finally, Oklahoma City has Victor Oladipo. Incidentally, Joe Ingles is in the game via a EuroLeague cameo, as is Bojan Bogdanovic for that matter. Other players in NBA 2K14 that were active as of last year but aren’t signed on for the 2024 season as yet include Ish Smith (Denver), Blake Griffin (Boston), and Kemba Walker (Dallas, briefly). A handful of other players from NBA 2K14 were still active this decade, including as recently as 2022.
When NBA 2K14 PS4/X1 launched, it featured 24 active second-generation players in its rosters (including Free Agents): Kobe Bryant, Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, Al Horford, Ronnie Brewer, Brian Cook, Jae Crowder, Ed Davis, Austin Daye, Mike Dunleavy Jr., Tim Hardaway Jr., Gerald Henderson Jr., Xavier Henry, Kevin Love, John Lucas III, Cory Higgins, Wesley Matthews, A.J. Price, Glen Rice Jr., Austin Rivers, Jeffery Taylor, Garrett Temple, Luke Walton, and Damien Wilkins. Ten years later, nine of those players found in NBA 2K14 are still active in the NBA (Curry, Thompson, Horford, Hardaway Jr., Love, Matthews, Temple, Crowder, and Rivers).
And, just in case you don’t feel old enough from the trivia I’ve covered so far, now that ten years have passed, one of the players who was active when NBA 2K14 was released now has a son in the NBA! That player is of course former number one pick Kenyon Martin, who in 2013 was in the twilight of his career and playing for the New York Knicks. His son Kenyon Martin Jr., who was just 12 at the time, is now entering his fourth season with the Houston Rockets. So, for those keeping track, there are just 73 players from NBA 2K14’s default rosters still active in 2023, only five never left their team, one has returned, and a veteran in 2013 now has a son playing in the NBA!
Now, needless to say, “the NBA changes a lot within the span of a decade” is hardly a profound statement, or a mind-blowing discovery in and of itself. That’s not the point here, though. For some of us – particularly those of us who were already in our 20s or 30s in 2013 – the past ten years have seemingly gone by in a blink. Beyond that, it’s interesting to reflect on which players are still active and where they are, and the new stars and up-and-comers of 2013 who are now the league’s elder statesmen as of 2023. There have been some surprising moves, and history has been made, such as LeBron James passing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar for the all-time lead in regular season scoring.
It’s also fun to take these 73 players and “update” NBA 2K14’s rosters. Not only is it interesting to see how many teams can field a full lineup – just four, as it happens – but it’s entertaining to see those players donning the jerseys of their future clubs. To that end, I present a gallery of screenshots of players still active in 2023, appearing on their current teams in NBA 2K14 PS4! In some cases, I’ve used a throwback that’s similar in design to a modern uniform for better effect. As for NBA 2K14, it remains a classic with some familiar faces in its default roster, albeit in different places. It’s likely that at least some of them will wear other jerseys before it’s all said and done!
Active Players In NBA 2K14 On Their 2023 Teams
