When Allen Iverson signed a contract with the Memphis Grizzlies this offseason, you just had a feeling it wouldn't end well.If most reports from Saturday night are true, you were right.
On Saturday, the Memphis Grizzlies granted the one-time league MVP his leave from the team for personal reasons. Yahoo's Marc Spears and ESPN.com's Chad Ford have both reported that Iverson's leave is indefinite and no timetable has been set for his return.
"Allen Iverson has left the Memphis Grizzlies and is not expected to return anytime soon," Spears wrote, "if at all, a source close to the situation told Yahoo! Sports on Saturday."
Mr. Ford?
"Head coach Lionel Hollins said Saturday night that Iverson's departure was "indefinite," Ford wrote on True Hoop. "Owner Michael Heisley said Iverson's absence has nothing to do with his displeasure about his role on the team. "
If it is, as Heisley notes, a personal matter that Iverson needs to take care of, then you have the hope that everything will be OK and that Iverson can get it settled in order to return to the Grizzlies as soon as possible.
But as Spears and Ford are reporting, it seems to be more of a personnel matter than a personal matter. And as anyone who knows anything about Iverson during his career is that he's a spotlight guy. Riding the pine isn't in Iverson's DNA.
Last season, he had problems coming off the bench for the Detroit Pistons, a team that had been to six consecutive Eastern Conference finals. Can you imagine the indignity he must have felt coming off the bench for the Grizzlies, a team that has never won a playoff game?
You don't even need to imagine, really. You can read for yourself. FanHouse's Matt Steinmetz caught up with A.I., who had played his first game after injuring his hamstring, on the recent Grizzlies road trip.
"I had no problems (with the hamstring)," Iverson said afterward. "I had a problem with my butt from sitting on that bench so long. That's the only thing I got a problem with."Understood. You have two NBA All-Star Game MVPs and more points (24,020) than any active players not named Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant. Please, continue.
"Yeah, I'll be disappointed (if he's a sub this season)," Iverson said. "I'm not a reserve basketball player. I've never been a reserve all my life and I'm not going to start looking at myself as a reserve. ... To answer the question, 'No, I'm not a bench player. I'm not a sixth man. Go look at my resume and that will show you I'm not a sixth man."Did you expect anything less from Iverson, who has been a, quote-unquote: warrior, for his entire career? He may not like to practice, but he liked to play. He wanted a ring -- validation for all he had given to the game: heart, soul and body -- and was going to be dragged kicking and screaming into retirement. If anything signaled desire to play, at any cost (and in this case a discount at $3M per), it was signing with the Grizzlies in the first place.
But as of Saturday night, it seems as if Iverson was not going to leave it all on the court. Instead of going down fighting, his career has started to echo those far sadder words said by Gen. Douglas MacArthur soon after Harry S Truman fired him for insubordination: "Old soldiers never die, they just fade away."
Comments (Page 1 of 3)
There's a team player for you.
hey go get a job at kmart if you dont like it
The media is unconcerned about evidence there is epidemic mentally disordered sexual harrassment in the Nba/Sports/scoiety, but gets its panties in a snit over a team excusing the abscence of an athlete. Shows what the media`s priorities are, doesn`t it?
Don Ameche is officially the only gay male in Nba history (other than Rudy Gay`s last name). But the guy who missed a dunk, allowing Ameche to be the first to score in the new millennium, Alonzo Mourning, has been kissed in public by his coach, Pat Riley. And while Michael Jordan didn`t flee after Doug Collins came up behind him and kissed him in public, Terry Mills played out his option after his coach, Collins, kissed him in public, and signed with Riley, who benched him, forced him back to Detroit, which he had left. So coach Brown coming up behind LeBron James and kissing him in public is not the first time this sort of thing has happened. It is not affection. It is not in private. It is sexual harrasment by a boss, not between consenting adults. It is illegal, on video, and they get away with it. But abuse of power, and not just by homosexuals and lesbians, is not new, but shouldn`t be tolerated just because it has been going on forever. You can guess from how many male athletes wear female jewelry in public how rampant/epidemic it is. When it is consensual, adults, affectionate, in private, it is, by law, not the public`s business. But where are the prosecutors when it is public and/or not consensual and/or against minors, and/or by abuse of power/money? Even when the prosecutors can show video of the crime they do not do their job, they do not prosecute. True homosexuals, lesbians, bisexuals, if there are any, folks who do care about their romantic partners, should be furious when these crimes are committed by straights and gays alike. So should true straights. But the crimes remain flaunted in public. Prosecutors continue to do nothing. But these prosecutors who won`t prosecute need to be jailed. Aiding and abetting mentally disordered sex offenders by deliberately refusing to enforce the law, against straight and gays alike, is a crime, being an accomplice, at least after the fact. And if folks are being falsely accused, their names need to be cleared, too. We need to be able to reasonably trust our government to obey the law and enforce or change the laws they don`t want to enforce. Criminal sexual harassment on live television is not a person`s private, personal life.
I think you have other issues to deal with. So a man kissing a man in celebration is gay??? I think you need some help, therapy maybe?? I don't think anything done is against the law. I would hope that you get the help you so much need.
Mentally disordered sex offenders publicly assaulting their employees sure love to claim straights are the ones mentally ill, don`t they?
what a shocker here! and to think the pistons traded billups for this trash! thanks joe d!
He has never been a team player, just ask the 76ers, Piston who threw his carcus to the curb.
Aaaww, poor little Allen isn't on his pedestal any more. Somebody please get out the violin so we can have a pity party. Same story, different day. He says he's tired of talking about it? Well change the tune, AI. When you're no longer the "god" of the team, it's up to YOU to make things better by adapting YOURSELF to the needs of the team, not the other way around. Get used to it or quit, primadonna.
...he just wants to come back home to philly...he knows it was his best fit he just had to find out the hard way!!!
This type of behavior just shows how selfish Iverson is. It also should solidify Larry Brown's position in the hall of fame as he took an undermanned sixers team to the NBA finals with this clown. Larry realized what it took to build a team around Iverson. Make sure he( Iverson) gets his 50 shots and have people around to collect his 33 misses.
I'm sorry folks...But if I could earn a measley $3 million just by sitting on the bench, I say pass the pillow! As The Iron Sheik would say: "You are a no good piece of ..... worse than Michael Jackson. You had your chance Iverson and could not win. Now, go away and I hope you don't come back. The Raiders might be be looking for a crybaby like you. You make me sick! You hear me?
Hey, James...take a deep breath and stop hating people whether they good or bad. Who are you to judge? My personal opinion, Iverson is not a team player. But easy up, man! Go for a walk.
"Did Tawanna tell you that? You wanna keep it real, you keep it real with me."
Worse than Michael Jackson? What?! Do you know Michael Jackson personally to make that asinine statement in your post. Or, A.I., for that matter. Damn, Bubba Hubba, I agree with the one poster: Take a walk. And please take that slow long walk off of a very short pier into the deepest part of the lake.
James, I meant, whether they do good or bad. Thanks.
Allen, you were the man in your day....BUT your time has come and gone. GET OVER IT!!!
IVERSONS AN ARROGANT ASSHOLE, AND HE DESERVES TO BE BROKE AS HE WAS A SHORT TIME AGO. THESE OVERPAID IMMATURE BABIES NEED TO GO OUT AND GET A "REAL JOB" AND SEE WHAT ITS LIKE TO "WORK" NOT "PLAY" FOR A LIVING!
no matter what you fools say he was the best small man to ever play the game.please name me a quality player on his team that he took to the finals. you never got cheated when you watched him play.stop hating because he use to wear bradies and chose not to kiss up.john stockton couldn't carry his jock.
James, there have benn a lot of small men who have played the game as well if not better than Iverson. Do your research on the history of the game before you pop off.