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This is Part 2 of Act Like You Know .  Part 1 can be found here.

Let’s skip the intro and get right to it — NBA players who’ve tried their hand at ’serious’ acting…or at least more than just playing themselves on the big screen.

1.  Shaquille O’Neal:  Much like his rapping career, the Big Aristotle has very little going for him in his movies.  His two big headliners, Kazaam (1996) and Steel (1997), both fell way short of expectations on all fronts.  I could use another free throw joke here, let’s stick to the facts (and percentages).

Kazaam find Shaq playing a genie who grants three wishes to a young boy, after being released from an abandoned magic boom box…and he somehow becomes a famous rapper in the process (no, seriously).  I actually remember watching it as a kid in the theater with my parents, and desperately hoping the boy’s next wish would be for the movie to end.  Not surprisingly, Kazaam received negative reviews from just about every critic, giving it an unbeatable Rotten Tomatoes score of 0%.

Here’s a clip of Shaq and the kid passing the mic — don’t say I didn’t warn you.

In Steel, which is based on a DC Comics superhero, John Henry Irons (Shaq) creates a military suit out of junkyard scraps to fight an evil street gang.  According to Wikipedia, the film cost an estimated $16 million to produce, but grossed under $1.7 million at the box office.  Shaq was also nominated for a Razzie Award for Worst Actor, but couldn’t even beat out Kevin Costner (The Postman) for that honor.  By the way, I’m not a comic book guy, and maybe someone can point out the differences in the comments, but, um, isn’t this just like the backstory for Ironman?

2. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar:  In addition to making cameos on several popular TV shows, including Diff’rent Strokes, Full House, and 21 Jump Street, Kareem has been featured in a handful of movies.  In Airplane (1980), he plays co-pilot Roger Murdock, who pretends he’s not actually the NBA star.  His acting isn’t spectacular, but he ends up playing an unforgettable role in the movie.  Much to his credit, Kareem isn’t above making fun of himself, especially his bad rap as as a defender:

Kareem’s other famous movie appearance is his memorable fight scene against Bruce Lee in Game of Death (1978).  It may not be a speaking part, but his towering martial artist is more believable than all of Shaq’s characters combined.  Unfortunately, Abdul-Jabbar didn’t stop there, and went on to star in the horrendous, straight-to-video clunker, Slam Dunk Ernest (1995).  Kareem plays the “Archangel of Basketball,” who gives Ernest a magical pair of shoes that allow him to jump higher than every other player (hmm…I’m on to you, Bow Wow).  Just one question for the Hall of Famer — why???

3.  Dennis Rodman: Yeah, there’s not much to be said for Rodman’s acting career. In Double Team (1997), he plays Yaz, a crazy arms dealer who teams up with Jean-Claude Van Damme to track down a bad guy. The movie is as lame as it sounds, and even throws in a few corny basketball jokes (shooting a skull like a free throw!).  Rodman ended up winning three “Golden Raspberry Awards,” including Worst Supporting Actor and Worst New Star.  Incredibly, “The Worm” is also the leading man in Simon Sez (1999), in which he plays an Interpol agent who lives in the cellar of a French monastery and in a stark contrast, tries to stop an evil arms dealer.  The movie is over-the-top, ridiculous, and unwatchable, tying Shaq for worst score possible (though Rodman is still infinitely better than costar Dane Cook).

Rodman also has two movies on his IMDB page that I’ve never seen and couldn’t find much about: Coming Attractions (2006) and The Minis (2008).  It should be noted that the plot summary for the latter reads:  “Dwarfs playing basketball…with Dennis Rodman.”  Looks like a genius idea to me.

4.  Ray Allen: Allen played high school basketball star Jesus Shuttlesworth in Spike Lee’s He Got Game, and surprisingly held his own against the likes of accredited actors Denzel Washington and Rosario Dawson. On the surface, it’s another basketball movie, and even features several NBA players — Travis Best, Rick Fox, John Wallace, Walter McCarty — as Allen’s teammates. Yet, it’s really more about a strained relationship between an incarcerated father and his son, as well as the role that basketball plays in each of their lives.  While he received mixed reviews for his performance, Allen is credible and has a few moving scenes with Washington.  His only other notable role was as a basketball player (shocking) in Harvard Man, where he gets little screen time and doesn’t contribute much to the plot.

5. Darius Miles: In The Perfect Score, Miles plays a star basketball player who needs to pass the SAT in order to get into college.  As expected, he’s wooden and detached, though in fairness, his character is supposed to be somewhat quiet and nonverbal.  His performance is also miles (get it) above his two-line cameo in Van Wilder, so at least he’s improving.  The good news is that he’ll have a lot of free time now, since his NBA career appears to be officially over.

Honorable Mention:

*Rick Fox: After getting minor roles in several movies — including Blue Chips, Eddie, and He Got Game — Fox has attempted a serious Hollywood career.  He’s had multi-episode stints on numerous television shows, including Oz, One Tree Hill, Ugly Betty, and Dirt.  That may be enough to put him at #5 on the list, but, well, he’s still Rick Fox.

*Wilt Chamberlain: Wilt’s only credited movie role is as Bombaata, a warrior on a mission to kill Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character in Conan the Destroyer (1984).  But I’m willing to bet that at least one of his 20,000 female companions has filmed a better performance.