Moses Malone was the best Blazer that never was. I was so stoked when we got him and royally bummed when the Blazers traded him. It was a cheapskate move, that ended up costing us the following injury plagued year. IIRC: It was for a draft pick that ended up being Mychal Thompson? Meh. RIP Big Guy.
Not to sound insensitive, but look to how short the life expectancy is of large breed dogs for your answer.
Thompson was seen as a once in a decade kind of player. However, the pick was used to draft Rick Robey, according to basketball-reference.com...
Harry Glickman was Buffaloed for #3 (became Robey), a pick which he traded 2 years later for #1 (became Mychal). http://prosportstransactions.com/basketball/DraftTrades/Years/1978.htm
It's not making me feel any better...... We traded Moses Malone AND Johnny Davis and ended up with Mychal Thompson? Oops!
I'm sure someone somewhere must have studied whether extra height is correlated with excess mortality. I'd be interested. It is known that excess weight correlates. Not sure about height - we did not evolve at 7' tall. Could that put additional strain on heart, lungs, kidneys in the way that excess weight does? Can't really compare with dog breeds as most dog breeds have been heavily "customized". Few dogs are close to the wild type. Regardless. RIP.
The hormones which caused extra growth may be released into the system (in decreasing amount) all of the person's life...a continuous "infection" putting stress on organs and cells. Also, a big guy needs many calories, and the easy fast way is to eat unhealthy food.
Heat rises, germs travel upwards, the taller you are the more germs get to your nostrils...being that tall could very well be risky!
ahhh... being 6'4 and usually taller than my peers.. you just deflated my happiness of living life in the clouds.....sigh...
The biggest disadvantage I found in Asia was that if you're taller than most people waiting for a train, their umbrellas drip on your shoulders
Well then, why does the same not apply to smaller breeds that are equally far removed from their wild roots? Most tall people have tall, shorter lived parents. The genetic patterns aren't all that dissimilar.
More short trees die than tall trees, but if no one is there to hear it, does a short death really thud like a tall one? My point, obviously, is that after an ecosystem's lifetime of hogging the sunlight, a tall fall brings down all the surrounding shorties with it. So the squirrels prefer to hide their nuts under the big guys.
I'm no dog expert, but don't a lot of toy dogs also have shorter lives? I'd like to see actuarial (I think that's the right word) tables based on height. A project for when I'm bored and doing some googling.
I'm not sure. They tend to have a lot of health/neurotic issues but as far as I know they live a lot longer than large breeds. I haven't seen specific studies, but it's commonly accepted among health professionals that being significantly taller and/or bigger than average places a lot of stress on internal organs and less essential stuff like joints. Shorter average lifespan is the outcome.
I have to say, when someone mis-states the second law of thermodynamics they tend to lose credibility. That being said there is tall and tall, if you know what I mean. There is clear evidence that better nutrition, for example, is correlated with height. The agricultural revolution and loss of gatherer/hunter correlated with lower nutrition and loss of height. Modern humans are much taller than their counterparts 500 years ago. We see this in immigrant populations who come from impoverished countries or war zones; they tend to be smaller but in a generation or two the children are closer to the American norm. Poor prenatal care and nutrition correlates with low birth weight babies and smaller adults. The Dutch are the tallest people on average, partly due to genetics of body size but also due to universal health care, prenatal care, and nutrition programs. That being said, all this is variation within the overall norm. There is a difference between 6'3" mean and 7' men. And I see no evidence that unusually small people are healthier. Obviously there are accomplished short people. And tall people.
