Allen Iverson

As a Sixers' fan, I lived and died with Allen Iverson. I loved his never-say-die attitude, the fact that Stephen A. Smith would always describe him as "mercurial," and his intense playing style.

Iverson's legacy, however, has been tarnished by the obvious evidence coming out of Denver that he is not what we thought he was. In Philly, we always believed that we were one guy away from becoming a championship team. But we came to realize that Iverson worked best with a bunch of nobody bruisers who played defense and deferred to him on offense. If Larry Brown recognized the existence of the three-point shot, and maybe signed someone who could shoot it, perhaps the Sixers would've won the Finals one year. Then again, it's hard to argue that the Sixers could ever have overtaken the Laker or Spur Dynasties.

I spent a large part of my life rooting for AI and defending him from those who thought he was a me-first pretender. Iverson DID lead the league in scoring and steals a few years, and he did take his team to the Finals, putting him way ahead of clowns like Stephon Marbury and even (for now) superstars like Tracy McGrady. But his career suffered from motivation problems throughout. In his early career he was iconoclastic and wouldn't go to practice or listen to coaches. In his later career he lost the motivation to win at all costs and starting putting up seasons where he averaged about 30 points but his team plain sucked and was unwatchable. Philly fans blamed this state of affairs squarely on Billy King, but Iverson also was a very tough player to build around.

The evidence from Denver is quite convincing. George Karl, though a horse's ass, is universally recognized as a good coach. Carmelo Anthony is an excellent player. So is Marcus Camby. Yet Iverson and Anthony combined to create a team that got swept by the Lakers and managed to play like a bunch of junkyard hoodlums. Iverson, an amazing individual talent, completed the capstone course in proving that he's a great one-on-one player who can't play in a team setting. He is the paradigmatic player who succeeded by doing it alone and now can't play well with others. His attitude and presence are amazing, but on the court he can never be part of a team that is greater than the sum of its parts (other than that one Finals team that was built specifically to favor Iverson's strengths while masking his weaknesses).

Iverson suffers from being a six-foot-tall two-guard who never made the transition to being a true point. To that end, he was always a matchup problem for his own team. He also always "got his" and his teams one when others fell in line. The problem is that AI doesn't fit into the team concept. Other than his successful run with Larry Brown, Iverson has been mired in mediocrity and a bevy of great statistical performances that yielded few wins (see: his rookie season; this year).

I loved Allen Iverson, but now that he's not on the Sixers it's just wonderful to watch a team that shares the ball and doesn't suffer from being weighted down with egotistical superstars. Allen Iverson was a great player, and some of his best years were squandered in Philly by Chris Webber, Billy King, and Glenn Robinson, but we can no longer say that the Sixers failed him. Iverson also failed the Sixers.