A.I. chooses easy path over unfamiliar role with contender
PHILADELPHIA -- So this is how the next act begins, the final act for Allen Iverson. One of the iconic players of his generation, one of the most influential to ever play, goes out like this.
You had to cover your ears and close your eyes during the raucous, deafening introduction that Iverson received from his fans in his city Monday night. That was the only way to put emotion aside and judge this for what it was. For the Sixers, it's a stunt. For Iverson, it's the last gasp for a player who finally has realized he will never be known as a winner, and certainly, never as a champion.
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| While A.I.'s presence makes 76ers fans excited, it has never led to a championship in Philadelphia -- and likely won't. (AP) |
Let that sink in. It's a quote that beautifully and sadly defines the honorary captain of the NBA's "me" generation, one that is gone from basketball the way Iverson's once-breathtaking skills are, too.
"Championship or not -- that's a goal of mine, and it's something that I want in my life -- but it doesn't kill me," Iverson said. "Like, I don't wake up every day dying because I haven't won a championship."
This was after Iverson had enjoyed one of the truly special moments he has ever experienced in basketball. You can count on one hand the players who have been adored the way Iverson is in Philadelphia, and it all came pouring out Monday night. As he did in his return to Philly with the Denver Nuggets two years ago, Iverson ran out to midcourt before tip-off and kissed the Sixers' logo. There might as well have been a tombstone there, marking the end of an era. Because this was not the beginning of anything.
Iverson knows how to make an entrance, and on this night, he walked into the locker room at exactly 5:57 p.m. -- barely an hour before tip-off. By 9:30, Iverson was checking out of the game to a much smaller ovation, checking out of a 93-83 loss to the Nuggets. He'd played 37 mostly ineffective minutes -- 11 points on 4-for-11 shooting -- which was understandable, considering he'd played only three games all season and had practiced only once since re-signing with the Sixers last week. As late as Sunday, according to a source, Iverson was telling friend Carmelo Anthony that he didn't think he had enough in the tank to play against Denver.
"My heart said 'yeah' but my legs said 'no,'" Iverson said. "It's just gonna take some time. I didn't think I was gonna play in this game right here, but I just wanted to, because I felt the fans deserved it. I gave everything I had."
And that's the nerve he has always struck with this city, why the fans have always tolerated the disruptions and distractions that came with the effort and the show. But that's not why he's here.
He's here because, when things look bleak, you go with what you know. Instead of conducting himself in a way that might've compelled a championship contending team to sign him, he barked and complained about the minutes and coaching in Detroit and Memphis. Instead of adapting his game and his perspective on his own importance, he ran into comforting arms. He chose the easy path, the one that will allow him to play out his days in a place where people still revere him as the superstar that he was -- and where his teammates, coaches, and handlers will give him the kid-glove treatment he requires.
Before the game, coach Eddie Jordan all but abdicated his throne to Iverson, announcing that Iverson -- not the coach -- will decide how much or how little he plays. And here was a new twist: After Jordan gave him 37 minutes Monday night, Iverson said he was expecting more like "five or 10."
"I'm in a situation now where I'm totally happy, win or lose," Iverson said. "I hate to lose more than I like winning, but I'm at a point where I'm happy. And I think at this point of my career, that's what I want. I don't want to be somewhere to where I'm not looking forward to going to practice every day and not looking forward to going to games. So for me, I'm 100 percent satisfied."
Not with the result, but with the circumstances. And the circumstances with the Sixers haven't changed, except at the box office. Shortly after Sixers chairman Ed Snider strolled back to his seat in the fourth quarter -- presumably from a bathroom break -- most of the sellout crowd began streaming toward the exits. Chauncey Billups, traded from Detroit to Denver for Iverson in a move that simultaneously launched the Nuggets into contention and the Pistons out of it, had hit the parking lot shot: a 3-pointer that made it 89-77 with 3:11 left.
From Snider's perspective, at least all those people who were leaving had already paid. Not long after that, the night ended with Iverson's curtain call; with submission.
He will fight his last basketball battles here, in a place that he knows and owns. And on one hand, Denver coach George Karl is happy for that. On another, he wishes Iverson would stop fighting.
Karl and Iverson had a good relationship in Denver. It worked, because Karl was flexible with a few exceptions, and Iverson agreed to meet him halfway on those. Karl also had some excellent Cliff's Notes on how to deal with Iverson, on which buttons never to push, from fellow Carolina alum Larry Brown.
"I want A.I. back playing basketball -- that bounce and that energy that over years has been amazing to most NBA basketball people," Karl was saying hours earlier at the morning shootaround. "My worry is the friction of minutes and how he accepts that in his role. I don't know, if I'm the president of Philadelphia, that I want A.I. to play 40 minutes. They've got too many young cats and they've got some guys that they need to grow up. So can A.I. play 30 minutes and mentor? I think he has great basketball I.Q. He has great basketball knowledge. He has great basketball stories. But will he give them to the [Jrue] Holiday kid? Will he give them to the Lou Williams kid? Will he give them to the team as a captain or a leader? Or will he fight that, 'I want to be on the court more?'"
These are all very open and poignant questions from someone who knows they must be asked.
"The one thing that I would tell A.I. is, this is the period of his life when he should be celebrating the game and enjoying the game and thanking the game rather than fighting the game," Karl said. "That's kind of what my recommendation would be."
At the end, it was a Carolina point guard, Ty Lawson, who was running circles around Iverson. ("He's fast as lightning, I'll tell you that," Iverson said.) And it was Billups, the other side of the trade that precipitated Iverson's decline, who put in the dagger.
"That's frustrating, too," Iverson said. "Just being out there with guys that are super fast and me not being in a rhythm and not being in the shape that I wanted to be in, and just still trying to compete at a high level and help my teammates win when I know I was outgunned."
Down the hall in the Denver locker room, longtime Sixers advisor Sonny Hill was leaning against a doorway as the players and coaches packed up and headed for the bus. Hill is a fixture of Philadelphia basketball going back to Wilt Chamberlain, and a father figure to Iverson and Kobe Bryant, the modern basketball sons of the city. "When your physical skills wane, then your mental aspect comes into effect," Hill said. "So when you look at the great players, what they're able to do is still be a force on the floor, but more from a mental point of view than a physical point of view. And I think that's the transition that he has to learn to make, because that's where he's at."
And from all appearances, that's where he'll stay.
