Starting in the 1999-00 season, NBA 2K became a staple of basketball gaming, eventually becoming the most popular game for NBA aficionados.
An important aspect of NBA 2K and something that’s become quite the prestigious honor is finding out which player will be the game’s cover athlete every year.
For the first five editions of the game, from the original NBA 2K through ESPN NBA Basketball (2K4), the cover athlete was Allen Iverson. Then came Ben Wallace, then Shaquille O’Neal, and then multiple other superstars after them.
Kobe Bryant aka Black Mamba leads the way so far with six different covers (2K10, 2K17, and two editions for 2K21 and 2K24), followed by Iverson (2K, 2K1, 2K2, 2K3 and 2K4) and Michael Jordan (2K11, 2K12, 2K16 and two 2K23 editions).
Below is a gallery of every NBA 2K cover in the game’s history.
