AI is Talking Bout Broke

Funny the pass people are giving him for his practice habits. When it was game time I don't think anyone can question his heart or toughness but the one thing the greats usually share is their unbleievable work ethic. Whether it be in practice or staying after practice and working on their games.

 

He played 14 years and his team made the playoffs 8 times and got past the second round of the playoffs only once.
So he was never surrounded by great talent or never made his teammates better? of both?

 

I don't give AI a pass for his practice habits, but to coin an utterly original phrase, "it is what it is."

It's always been hilarious to me that one of my favorite flogging dummies, Larry Brown, is renowned far and wide as a rock-ribbed disciplinarian, even though his approach to 'disciplining' AI was to let him do whatever the fuck he wanted on and off the court, until it came back to bite him on the ass in a playoff situation, THEN all of a sudden he pulls his hang-dog passive-aggressive moaning about Iverson's casual approach to practice (by implication dumping all the blame on him).

Similarly in Detroit he picked up another problem child, Rasheed Wallace, and similarly LB's approach to "discipline" was to let the problem child do whatever the flying flaming fuck he wanted to do, and everyone was amazed because "Sheed responded well to Brown's tutelage" (well fuckin-A, imagine that, I always respond real well to being allowed to do whatever the fuck I want to do too), until all of a sudden in the final seconds of a deciding game of the NBA Finals, Mr. Fundamentals and Discipline says to Sheed, "Hey, how about you go cover Robert Horry, what do you think," and straight out of Hoosiers and straight out of Scottie Pippen and 1.8 Seconds, Rah-Weed Wallace says, "Fuck you old man, I don't let The Man tell me what to do, I'll guard Robert Horry if I feel like it and I won't guard him if I don't feel like it too, what the fuck do you care, you'll be in New York 20 minutes after this game is over anyway."

Whoosh. Rasheed was 15 feet away from Robert Horry as he watched him drill the series-winning 3-pointer. But at least he Watched Him The Right Way.

 

Well, he did move Eric Snow, who was useless anywhere on the court as anything except a non-shooting/all-defense point guard, to the point, let him do the grunt work of bringing the ball up from the backcourt, then pass off to AI as soon as he crossed half court, and then let AI do whatever the hell he wanted, plus let him quit guarding PGs which absorbed a lot of his defensive energy, so I guess in some ways that was kind of a strategic master stroke.

 

That decision wasn't quite the no-brainer you're describing. Moving a guy who's actually a shade under 6 feet tall and only 160 lbs to the two position was actually pretty brazen at that time. When he made that move, the trend all across the league was toward bigger stronger two guards, and everyone was looking for these 6'6" to 6'8" twos built in the mold of McGrady, Miller, Steve Smith, Kobe, Drexler, Vince Carter, etc. When undersized guys who played like twos came along, the practice was to try to convert them into point guards instead of allowing them to play their natural position. But Larry Brown had the good sense to say, fuck that, I'll play him where he's best. Not all coaches would've.

The 01 Sixers had to be the most overachieiving NBA team I can ever remember. The League's smallest backcourt and a motley bunch of stiffs for their frontcourt, yet somehow managed to finish with the League's 2d best regular season record and reach the NBA Finals. Iverson and Brown both deserve a ton of credit for that season.

 

Both.

 

We also can't forget how god awful the Eastern Conference was back then either

 

What was Iverson, 160 pounds? He took a fucking beating every damn night. When he was in his prime there were very few who played with more heart.