WHAT MADE SHAWN BRADLEY SEVEN SIX INCHES TALL? Ben Cohen had an article in the Wall Street Journal (September 19, 2018) about Shawn Bradley’s genetic inheritance. Bradley was seven feet six inches tall and played significant minutes in the National Basketball Association from 1993 to 2005. (statistics from Basketball Reference here) Bradley’s height is extreme. His height is 8.6 standard deviations above the average height for US males, putting him in the 99.99999th percentile.
Geneticists have finished a study comparing Bradley’s genotype with thousands of others.
The conclusion of the study was that Bradley’s height was not due to a genetic mutation.