PHILADELPHIA — Jayson Tatum remembers cutting his socks into arm sleeves and pulling on a headband, trying his best when he first started playing basketball to look like Allen Iverson. Kevin Durant was one of the tallest players on his travel teams, but he still made sure to test defenders with Iverson’s signature crossover dribble. And Chris Paul wanted to braid his hair as a kid and wear No. 3 because of Iverson.
“Everyone looked up to him,” Tatum said. “Everybody loved A.I.”
So it’s easy to imagine how the current NBA stars — players like Tatum, Durant, and Paul — feel when they receive praise from Iverson. Tatum, a Boston Celtics forward who will start in Sunday’s NBA All-Star Game, felt again like a 6-year-old in St. Louis with hoop dreams when someone sent him a clip last year of Iverson gushing over his game.
“That made my day,” Tatum said. “People give you praise all the time, but someone like Allen Iverson — one of the best players of all time and someone who everybody loves — it just meant a little bit more. I’ve watched the clip 1,000 times.”
Iverson has filled part of his retirement by habitually promoting the current crop of NBA players. His social media feeds are full of homages to the stars of today and he fills up interviews with compliments for the players he now watches on TV.
It’s hard to find a bigger promoter of the current game than Iverson. In a way, Iverson is giving the love that he didn’t always get.
It’s been 25 years since Iverson was booed after being named the MVP of the NBA’s All-Star Rookie Challenge. Much of the angst that night in Cleveland, where this year’s All-Star Game will take place, was fanned by critiques of the 76ers rookie from NBA veterans and retired players.
Charles Barkley called him “the playground rookie of the year.” Scottie Pippen said Iverson shot too much for a point guard. Michael Jordan questioned Iverson before a game after he created a stir by saying Jordan was “just another basketball player.” Even Dennis Rodman thought Iverson was disrespectful, saying, “I don’t like a lot of these young guys but especially him.”
The Cleveland fans bought in, booing Iverson from the time he was introduced through the moment he lifted the MVP trophy above his head. One of the first marquee moments of a Hall of Fame career was tarnished by boos.
“He was hurt,” said Pat Croce, who took over as Sixers president before that season. “It was his rookie year and he’s having a phenomenal season for a lousy team. Here he was at the All-Star Game, representing the team and the city, and he gets booed. When’s the last time he got booed?
“For him to be booed, he doesn’t understand because he’s giving his best effort. That’s what he always did. He left himself on the court. I think he was hurt and that left a scar on him, not on players but on the city of Cleveland. He took it personal.”
The NBA was nearing a crossroads in 1997 as Jordan’s career was winding down, leaving the league to determine who would be his successor as the face of basketball. Grant Hill, who grew up in an upper-class Virginia neighborhood and played four years at Duke, seemed like a safe choice.
“Then you get a guy like Allen who emerges,” said Aaron McKie, who played eight seasons with Iverson for the Sixers. “This small dynamo who is super talented emerges.”
Iverson quickly became one of the league’s most exciting players, but he didn’t quite fit the mold of what the league was looking for. He grew up poor in Hampton, Va., spent four months in prison, had a tattoo on his left arm that proclaimed himself “The Answer,” traveled everywhere with a group called “Cru Thik,” and braided his hair into cornrows before taking the court that night in Cleveland.
The league sent Iverson memos that season for playing in baggy shorts and wearing black ankle bracelets that covered too much of his white socks. Referees whistled him for carrying and traveling violations when he did his crossover.
Iverson would eventually be celebrated for being the player who connected the NBA to hip-hop culture and helped the league to thrive after Jordan’s farewell. But 25 years ago, Iverson was a disruptor. And that all helped fuel the crowd in Cleveland.
“People resist change,” said Johnny Davis, whose one season as Sixers head coach was Iverson’s rookie year. “People resist uncertainty when they don’t know something, when they’re not familiar with something, when they’re not comfortable with something, they tend to resist it.”
“He was a stimulus of acceptance of change,” Croce said. “Whether it was the baggy clothes or the hip-hop or the dreadlocks or the tattoos, A.I. believed in himself. He wasn’t going to listen to what other people thought. One thing about ‘Bubba Chuck,’ he doesn’t care about what other people’s voices are saying. That never bothered him because he thought he was on the right path and he did feel that he was going to walk his walk, talk his talk. And, by golly, he got penalized and every once in a while he got fined, but eventually [commissioner] David Stern embraced him and the league embraced him and the following of the NBA — definitely the 76ers — enhanced.”
When an injury kept Iverson off the court that season, Davis pulled the 21-year-old aside and offered him advice.
Perhaps, Davis told Iverson, he should consider sitting on the bench in a three-piece suit. TV cameras would frequently pan to Iverson during the broadcast, giving the rookie a free chance to grab the attention of a corporation looking for a new pitchman. This minor injury, Davis thought, was a chance for Iverson to cash in. Think about all the money you could make, Davis told him.
The coach can’t remember what town the Sixers were in that night, but he’ll never forget how the rookie responded.
“He looked at me and said, ‘Coach, you may be right, but that’s not who I am and they have to accept me for who I am and doing it that way versus trying to be someone who I’m not,’ ” said Davis, who is now the chairman of the National Basketball Retired Players Association. “I looked at him and said, ‘You know what, I respect that. I respect that a lot.’ He came to the game and had his deal with the way he dressed, more like a rapper than a corporate guy. His dress never bothered me.
“I’m from a different era, but I respected the fact that here was a guy who was saying, ‘If I have to be someone other than who I am to grow a fortune and be accepted, then I don’t want to do that.’ That to me spoke of a great maturity, a great self-awareness, and a commitment and determination to remain who he was and is. I thought that was admirable.”
His refusal to conform gained the respect of Davis but it did little to help Iverson before he arrived for All-Star Weekend in Cleveland. The NBA was honoring its 50 greatest players that weekend and Iverson — who had played just 41 games — was a hot topic.
Hall of Famer Elvin Hayes said Iverson played “like a runaway train” and questioned if the rookie respected the players who came before him. Barkley said, “Grant Hill listened to us and took the criticism” instead of complaining like he said Iverson did.
After Iverson lifted the MVP trophy, broadcaster Craig Sager showed him a copy of a newspaper with the headline: “Legends take Iverson, young players to task.” Iverson smiled and said the legends paved the way for him and inspired him to play. He had nothing but respect for them.
Later that night, he told Newsweek that “not one of those guys has pulled me aside and asked me what was going on. It’s been decided that I’m the bad guy, so I take all the heat.”
“He wasn’t disrespecting Michael Jordan,” Croce said. “He was just playing his game and he wasn’t afraid of Michael Jordan. That’s all he said. He never said, I’m going to show off or show him up. Never. He wanted to score. Whether it was Michael Jordan or any other player by the name of Michael or Jordan, it didn’t matter to him during the game, he was going to do what was necessary to put that ball into the basket. I don’t think he ever disrespected anyone.”
Iverson publicly shrugged off the boos by saying maybe the crowd just wanted Kobe Bryant to be the MVP. But he never forgot the jeers, and used them as fuel every time he returned to Cleveland.
Four years later, he set a career-high with 54 points and said, “I always look forward to coming back here to play against these people.” Iverson averaged 29.5 points per game in Cleveland and has the sixth-most career points by a visiting player there.
“I don’t even let my mom come here,” Iverson said after scoring 37 points in a 1999 win in Cleveland. “They’re the toughest here by far. I hear them, ‘Jailbird this, jailbird that. Thug this, thug that.’ I just feed off that.”
He didn’t forget the boos that night, but he also didn’t allow them to change who he was. Iverson’s refusal to conform would eventually be celebrated. Just four years later, he was cheered after winning the MVP of the All-Star Game in Washington. No longer booed, Iverson was one of the league’s most popular players.
“What you see is what you get. That was him,” said McKie, now the Temple coach. “I don’t think there were any surprises with how he went about things, how he played basketball, how he was off the court. He just tried his best to be Allen Iverson. I don’t think he ever tried to shy away from who he was or pretended to be somebody. That’s why so many people gravitate toward him because they can respect that.
“So many of us, inside of us, wish we could be like that and say, ‘I’m going to go out and live this way’ instead of trying to live how society wants you to live.”
By the time Tatum started following basketball, Iverson had established himself at the top of the NBA’s hierarchy. Like his tattoo said, Iverson was “The Answer.” Booing Iverson? That sounds crazy, Tatum said. Iverson was the player Tatum and his friends wanted to be like.
“As I got to the NBA, you always remember those moments where the first time you see Allen Iverson or someone you look up to and that nervousness or excitement where you hope they know who you are,” Tatum said. “Then someone like A.I., who’s always shouting guys out and showing love. As famous or whatever as we are, that means a lot.”
Those boos in Cleveland may have hurt Iverson and he certainly carried them with him during his 14-year career. But what helped fuel those boos — critiques from the players he grew up admiring — has not stopped Iverson in retirement from showing the love that he didn’t always get. The player Tatum grew up admiring is now admiring him.
“A lot of the older guys don’t do that — not that they have to — but the fact that A.I. goes out of his way and goes to games, and shouts guys out, I think that’s like the coolest thing ever,” Tatum said. “He goes out of his way to show love and give people their respect, knowing that I was 6, 7 years old, trying to be like him and look up to him. There’s nothing like guys who you look up to showing you love. Even as an NBA player.
“That’s the responsibility that I think we all have, knowing that somewhere in the world there’s a 6-, 7-year-old looking up to me who will be in my shoes one day. Knowing the platform you have and how many people you can influence by doing what you do, it doesn’t cost anything to show somebody some love. How much people appreciate that can go a long way.”
Iverson, in that video clip Tatum kept replaying, called him a “dog.” And there might not be a tougher player ever than Iverson, Tatum said, so it meant even more that Iverson noticed his toughness. The edge that helped Iverson catch flak 25 years ago is now what he’s celebrating in the players he sees.
”He can appreciate outstanding performance as much as the performer who executed it. He’s that kind of guy,” Davis said. “He’s not what they call a hater or one of these guys that says, ‘Back when I played, they didn’t do this, and I did that.’ That’s not who he is. He’s genuinely happy for the success of the players today. He’s a guy who enjoys where the NBA is today, and I think he enjoys watching that. He was influential with his play in the NBA of today.”
