By Mark Bechtel Hughes is a 40-something academic with zero practical experience. Who better to portray a legendary complex basketball icon? View the original article to see embedded media. Solomon Hughes plays Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in Winning Time, HBO’s excellent, raucous series about the Showtime-era Lakers. For most actors, the physical aspect of the assignment—convincingly portraying a 7’ 2”, low-post legend—would be the hard part. Hughes has that covered, though. He’s 6’ 11”, was a captain of the Cal hoops team and played professionally, including a stint with the Harlem Globetrotters. The…