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Knicks Decide Allen Iverson Isn't The Answer

The New York Knicks deliberated signing Allen Iverson after he was waived by Memphis, but it appears they have decided to pass on The Answer.

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So Much For Iverson In NYC: Knicks Pass On Signing The Answer

After thinking about it for a couple days, it appears the Knicks will go in another direction and pass on signing Allen Iverson.

Alan Hahn of Newsday reports:

The Knicks put a great deal of thought into bringing Allen Iverson to New York to help rejuvenate the 2-9 team, but a source this morning suggested the team — after coming very close to going for it — has decided not to go through with making a contract offer for the future Hall of Fame guard.

I have to admit, this news makes me sad. Not because I feel like Iverson deserves another chance, but because I would have thoroughly enjoyed Iverson playing in Mike D’Antoni’s Seven Seconds Or Less offense. What can I say, mixing a guy who never met a shot he didn’t like with a coach who encourages quick shots is what passes for must-see TV for me.

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Nuggets, Magic Won't Rule Out Signing Allen Iverson Either

One day after Allen Iverson was officially released by Memphis, it appears the Knicks aren't the only team that could consider signing him.

NBA Fanhouse reports that, if George Karl is to be believed, the Denver Nuggets might think about Iverson if circumstances change for them.

"A.I. for us is an injury discussion,'' Karl said. "I don't think it's a discussion right now for us... But just say somehow (guard) Ty Lawson is out for the season, I think speed and quickness is what Ty gives us. A.I. would be on the list of speed and quickness.'

Karl also admitted that the Nuggets briefly talked about signing Iverson during the offseason.

Denver isn't the only contender considering Iverson. One day after losing all-star point guard Jameer Nelson for four to six weeks due to a knee injury, Orlando Magic GM Otis Smith indicated to the Orlando Sentinel that Iverson is a possibility.

Magic General Manager Otis Smith is more inclined to use veteran point guards Jason Williams and Anthony Johnson while waiting on Jameer Nelson to recover from arthroscopic knee surgery in four to six weeks.

At the same time, when asked by the Sentinel about the possibility of signing free agent point guard Allen Iverson, Smith didn't reject the idea out of hand. He has usually shot down scenarios involving players who come with baggage or questionable character, citing team chemistry and how it might affect superstar Dwight Howard.

"It's hard to say. You have to evaluate it. But it has to make sense for your team," he said. "I just got the news (on Nelson) a few hours ago, so I can't rule out anything yet. You have to take a step back. That's how we've done things."

Karl and Smith both believe that Iverson will be on an NBA roster at some point this season, even if it isn't theirs. So ... maybe there's still more to be written in the book of Allen Iverson's NBA career. 

However, it's also possible Donnie Walsh, Karl and Smith are just being polite because of all Iverson has accomplished in his career.  Yahoo!'s Adrian Wojnarowski and Marc Spears have been asking nearly every team in the league whether they would sign Iverson, and none has even responded with a "maybe."

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Hold The Phone: Knicks Interested In Signing Iverson

Just when it seemed like Allen Iverson’s NBA career was over, it appears he might get a reprieve from … the New York Knicks?

Frank Isola from the New York Daily News is reporting that the Knicks will considering signing Iverson for the rest of the season.

[Donnie] Walsh, the Knicks’ president, confirmed Monday night that the club will explore the possibility of signing Iverson, the former league MVP who was placed on waivers yesterday by the Memphis Grizzlies.

“We’ll look into it,” Walsh told the Daily News. “Right now, I’d say probably not but we’ll see.”

Isola reports that the Knicks’ 1-9 start has accelerated the need for a guy like Iverson to provide buzz and sell tickets while the Knicks wait around for the 2010 offseason. The Knicks’ concern, of course, is that Iverson’s presence will stunt the development of youngsters such as Danilo Gallinari and Toney Douglas. Sounds pretty similar to Memphis’ concern, doesn’t it?

But you know what? This might actually work. The Knicks may be one of the few teams in the league that can give Iverson the starting job he so desperately craves. Right now, the Knicks start Chris Duhon, a backup on any decent team, and Larry Hughes, whose shot-happy ways convinced one fan to create a site called “Hey Larry Hughes, Please Stop Taking So Many Bad Shots.” Everyone around the Knicks knows this season doesn’t really matter anyway, so why not try to generate a little buzz? Plus, let’s be honest, watching Allen Iverson play in Mike D’Antoni’s Seven Seconds Or Less offense is going to be interesting, to say the least.

However, Posting and Toasting, SB Nation’s Knicks blog, disagrees.

I don’t see the point. The idea that we need some sideshow to keep us occupied until July seems childish. Similarly, the notion of signing Iverson to win some games is shaky because 1. Iverson at this point in his career isn’t enough to make these Knicks competitive, so why bother? and 2. Paying for wins just to spite Utah (the owners of New York’s draft pick) is unnecessary. It’s Utah. The big thing, though, is that Iverson would steal minutes from Toney Douglas, which seems backwards, given that Toney’s a long-term investment and AI would be a rental.

Long story short, the interest is to be expected, but I don’t see it amounting to anything for the reasons mentioned above.

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Sources: Grizzlies, Iverson To Officially Part Ways

And thus ends the brief Allen Iverson experiment in Memphis.  According to the Memphis Commercial Appeal, the Grizzlies will waive Iverson after mutually agreeing to terminate his contract.

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This means Iverson's Memphis tenure will have ended after just three games.  If this is indeed how one of the most influential players in recent NBA history goes out, it will have been a sudden fall from grace.  As recently as 2008, Iverson was averaging over 26 points per game.  Now, he probably won't be able to find a place to play.  Memphis was the only team willing to give Iverson a chance this summer, and now they have waived him.  I suppose it's possible someone else picks him up, but that's probably as likely as Memphis making the playoffs this year. 

It's only fitting to show this clip on the day of Iverson's likely exit from the league.

 


 

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Grizzlies Owner Gives AI Deadline To Decide If He Wants To Return To Team

Are the Memphis Grizzlies ready to end the Allen Iverson experiment? According to Ronald Tillery of the Memphis Commercial Appeal, the answer (no pun intended) may finally be “yes.”

Tillery reports that owner Michael Heisley is giving Iverson until the end of the week to decide if he wants to return to the Grizzlies.

"I’ve treated this like Allen told me it was – a personal leave," Heisley said. "But either he’s retiring or coming back to play. I’m not upset with Allen. We’ll be happy to accommodate Allen. If he retires, then he retires. If he wants to come back, we’ll gladly accept him back. But I have personally made it clear that there’s going to have to be a decision made. We’re expecting an answer in a couple of days."

Tillery also reports that Heisley is upset that Iverson hasn’t spoken to him directly since he took his leave from the team. This means that Iverson has now had communication issues with his team’s owner, his team’s coach, his previous team’s coach and his previous team’s players. At a certain point, I’d think Iverson loses the benefit of the doubt here.

Tillery quotes a source saying that it’s doubtful Iverson returns to the team, which would mean that he’d retire. That news, combined with the Grizzlies’ recent signing of Jamaal Tinsley, certainly reinforces the belief that Iverson may have played his last NBA game.

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Coming To Terms With The End Of Iverson

For the past few days, while the Iverson controversy has simmered, I've tried to remain pretty apathetic, at least in writing. But with rumors surfacing that Iverson may retire, it's impossible to keep on ignoring it. The surprise isn't that a player like Iverson--with nothing left to prove and having banked $100 million at least--might consider retirement. But that someone who was once so iconic would be reduced to an ending like this.

I mentioned elsewhere that it's difficult to write about this situation because it's just so damn depressing. Like writing a profile of the city of Detroit, I joked. And while that was just me being a sarcastic dick, it's also a little bit true.

Detroit's a city that is dilapidated in practically every sense. Politics, economy, crime, the freakin Lions... Hell, even the weather is depressing. And relatively speaking, the landscape directly mirrors the Memphis Grizzlies franchise over the past few years. Let's see... Their owner doesn't want to own a pro basketball team, they have one of the more hapless GMs in the league, their attendance is among the worst in the league, they have a team full of selfish players, and... well, you get the point. They traded an All-Star Center for Kwame Brown and Javaris Crittendon. As far as the NBA landscape's concerned, Memphis=dilapidated.

But what makes it even more difficult to write about this situation is that Iverson mirrors Detroit, too. That city's trajectory over history--from prideful beacon of American evolution to a sad symbol of our decline--is disturbingly similar to Iverson's. For most of my youth, Iverson was an icon of the post-Jordan generation. An incredibly polarizing, occasionally maddening figure, but an icon nonetheless. 

And watching his decline over the past few years has been oddly personal. He played a pretty critical role in how I came to understand basketball. AI was never my favorite player, but that's because he was so overwhelmingly popular that calling him "favorite" just seemed redundant. I remember watching him work out during his freshman year at Georgetown and returning home wide-eyed. Never in my life had I seen someone that quick.

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Photo courtesy of the Hampton Roads Daily Press.

I remember watching him dominate the Big East, making other All-Americans like Ray Allen at Connecticut look downright boring in comparison. It's hard to imagine now, but Allen Iverson could DUNK back then, and you couldn't take your eyes off him when he was on the court. He defied our notions of what won basketball games--while scouts frothed over size and versatility and shooting, here was Iverson, this 5'11 kid who did nothing but score and attack people. And yet, he was such a force of nature that even the greatest cynics couldn't deny his value to a basketball team.

That continued throughout his career. But somewhere along the line, he acquired additional meaning, and became more than a basketball player. Suddenly, he was this counter-cultural figure that transcended the success of the Philadelphia 76ers--by succeeding in opposition to the stereotypes of star athletes before him, he was lionized, regardless of whether he ever actually won anything with the Sixers.

Nothing epitomizes this more than that legendary play from his rookie year, when he embarrassed Michael Jordan:

 

Nobody cared that Iverson's team lost that game. It was looked upon as a torch-passing moment between icons of different generations. The Bulls and Jordan may have reigned at that point, but everyone could point to that play and say that Iverson--and the Hip Hop generation--was coming. Except, it never did.

Iverson had his moments, particularly during the 2001 season, but the rise of some tattooed, swaggerific next generation player never happened. People forget, but these are the terms in which Iverson was viewed.

He was a departure from what we'd come to expect from athletes, clad in tattoos, white t-shirts and nappy hair, and disregarding the approval of others. And as a generation of superstars raised on hip-hop was coming to maturity, many believed that Iverson was who they'd become. He was seen as a harbinger of a new culture. For this, he was crucified by traditionalists, and deified by American youth. But we all sort of missed the point.

Iverson was, and is, unique. A generation of anti-authority, corn-rowed, tattoo-covered superstars never came--instead, hindsight leaves stars like Stephon Marbury and Iverson looking like history's accident, a brief blip on the radar between the Jordan era and contemporary times, with deferential stars like Lebron James, Dwyane Wade, Dwight Howard, and Chris Paul taking up the torch from Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan, two guys who, in every concievable way, are the antithesis of Iverson's ethos.

Iverson never got to carry that torch, after all.

And that's sort of hard to stomach. Because however misguided we were in assigning this deeper meaning to Allen Iverson, it was very real, and he represents a generation of fans that came to understand basketball through a cultural prism that was established with him at the forefront. And yet, if this is how it ends for AI, then it sort of undermines everything, doesn't it?

I guess I'd been hoping for one last renaissance for Iverson. Holding out hope that this year in Memphis, he could carry the Grizzlies like those old 76ers teams, and even though they wouldn't advance far in the playoffs, getting them there, on the strength of a broken down body and a Herculean will, would be a testament to Iverson's greatness in itself.

And then, even though he'd never won a title, we'd always be able to look back and say, "Iverson was one of the toughest players I ever watched." Instead, we see a guy unwilling to accept a backup role even for a few games, and so frustrated by the perceived lack of respect that he'd rather go home and sit on his ass in Atlanta.

Iverson, then, just looks like a heroically stubborn basketball player that was great for a long time, and then, the second he stopped being great, became too stubborn for his own good. No deeper meaning, there. Just an overly-prideful person who made enough enemies in the NBA to wedge himself out of the league a few years earlier than expected. He was a great player and his impressive career definitely happened, but The Allen Iverson Era never did.

And for someone that spent his youth as a basketball fan waiting for that era, it's hard to accept that reality. It's like the whole experience--the Reebok Commercials, the All-Star Games, the hair, Tyronn Lue, that damn press conference... It's like none of it mattered. And Iverson's reduced to just someone that was supposed to make history, but never did.

But God damn he was quick...

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