OK, OK. We get the point. Geez, you don't have to shout.

	Fortson is among the leaders in boards, despite his height.

Danny Fortson had serious foot injuries each of the previous two seasons, and he had something to prove this season. He is healthy, and he is very motivated. He plays for a losing team, and he is dominating.

No one so short is living so large. Exactly how short is the subject of great debate -- the Golden State Warriors list their starting power forward at 6-8, he insists he is 6-8, and everyone else counters that he is stretching the truth there as if it were on one of those Medieval racks -- but of this no one dares to argue: Fortson is a ball hog of the best kind. When a rebound comes off the rim, he's got some crazy notion that it belongs to him and doesn't have any interest in letting it land in someone else's hands.

Fortson stands 6-6 or 6-7 or, maaaaaybe even 6-8, and he stands out in a crowd of 7-foot centers and gazillionaire power forwards who annually make the All-Star game by acclamation. The guy won't be anywhere near Philadelphia in the second weekend of February, unless he goes on his own, but watch him be at the top of the rebounding list come the end of April.

Fortson isn't just playing for this season. Without even realizing it or promoting it or necessarily even buying into it, leaving his peers and bosses to write those stories while he concentrates on grabbing the headlines, he is drawing comparisons to the great undersized power forwards of all-time, despite barely having had time to make an impression.

	Fortson

That's the other thing. His career really hasn't started, thanks to having so many foot injuries since coming out of Cincinnati as the 10th pick overall in 1997 that he must have been Fred Flintstone's chauffeur in a previous life. He played six games last season, before going out with a stress fracture in the right foot. Fifty-five in 1999-2000 in Boston, after missing the first 25 with a stress fracture in the right foot. He played all 50 in the lockout campaign as a Nugget, leading the league in offensive rebounds and rebounds per minute while finishing fourth overall in boards. He even lasted his entire rookie season.

He has something to prove after the last two years. That's where the trouble started for 28 other teams. He was good at this before, and now he has extra motivation.

"That's what it is," Fortson said. "I know I'm a pretty good player. The problem is convincing everyone else that I am."

Or maybe not.

"He's a tenacious rebounder," said Clipper Elton Brand, himself on pace to challenge for a top-five finish in that category. "He knows that's his ball every time it comes off the rim. He has that will to rebound. I remember one time, it looked like a loose ball would be going out of bounds. Everyone else gave up on the play except Danny. He got it."

	“	I know I'm a pretty good player. The problem is convincing everyone else that I am. ”
		— Fortson

"Relentless," said Clifford Ray, the Warriors assistant coach who works with the big men. "He never settles for position. He automatically finds that gear and it kicks in if a guy is in front of him. That's what it takes."

All of which would be impressive enough, except that Fortson is already being compared to some of the great undersized bruisers of all-time. Charles Barkley was listed at 6-6, but was really more like 6-4 and a half, and we're talking height. Truck Robinson led the league in rebounding in 1977-78 at 6-7. Dennis Rodman was 6-8, Wes Unseld a terror at 6-7. Bill Bridges and Paul Silas consistently averaged double-digit boards at 6-6, Happy Hairston at 6-7, Larry Smith was 6-8 but didn't get the nickname Mr. Mean for nothing.

"There's been a lot of great rebounders like that," said Ray, who had a 10-year career in the NBA as a center and power forward. "But you can put him in there with any of them."

With only the specifics left to be determined. His heart can't be measured, and you'd have a hard time finding opponents who believe his height can be either, at least with accuracy.

"Maybe he's 6-6," Brand said.

"Six-six," said Cavaliers coach John Lucas, an assistant in Denver when Fortson played for the Nuggets. "At the most."

"Probably 6-7," Ray said.

Fortson sticks to the company line.

"Who says that?" he said. "Coaches?"

Coaches. Players. Opponents. In a nutshell: Who doesn't?

"Interesting. But that's good. I'm glad they think that much about me."

It's a compliment. Fortson is battling for the league lead in rebounding when he would be give up inches to a lot of small forwards or, if you buy into the 6-6 theory, some shooting guards. But, no buts about it, he also has a massive backside -- "He's got one of the great gifts for a rebounder," Lucas said -- and hands that are strong and big like catcher's mitts and a drive that makes him one of the best, although that sometimes also gets the best of him. That's when it becomes a problem.

It has always been an issue, ever since high school in Pennsylvania and college in Cincinnati, when he once got so frustrated after feeling like he got a bad deal from the referees in Rome during a Bearcats tour of Europe that back at the hotel, he and a wall played catch with a flower pot and some dishes. That was after an exhibition game.

"I've got to put a lid on it sometimes," Fortson said. "Sometimes, I admit myself, I don't always put a lid on it. But I'm working on it. I've gotten better at it through the years."

Said Warriors coach Brian Winters: "He's still a pretty emotional guy. Maybe he's a little more under control than before. There's still times when his emotions get the better of him."

Like the double-technical ejection Jan. 8 against the Bucks. But the improvements are obvious. On the other hand, he does have an extra season's worth of energy stored up after all the sitting last season.

He could win the rebounding title, hits double figures in scoring despite generating much of his own offense from offensive boards, and does it all at 6-6 or 6-7. All right, all right. Six-eight, like Fortson claims, or insists. We believe you. No need to shout.

Scott Howard-Cooper covers the NBA for the Sacramento Bee and is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.