In Search of The Answer: Why Allen Iverson was the Most Important Basketball Player of the 2000’s

June 6, 2001

NBA Finals Game 1

Sixers 103, Lakers 99. 0:47 remaining in overtime.

I don’t know whether to cheer or throw my hands up in disgust. I do neither. I just shake my head.

Allen Iverson has just finished the Lakers’ night with an exclamation point. He goes from zero to 60 in less than a second, dashing towards a baseline that only contains Los Angeles defenders, all eyes trained on him. But he knew this all along; it was predetermined. He stops in an instant, puts the ball between his legs, crosses Tyronn Lue and creates enough space for himself to throw up his unorthodox stepback. Lue leaps at him, more out of desperation than strategy, but Iverson has already released the ball, not with the typical follow-through that high school and AAU coaches drill into perfection. He doesn’t wave goodbye to the ball, he merely releases it, knowing where it’s headed. As it splashes through the net, Lue falls sprawling onto the court, a defeated man. But the hunter is not finished with his prey. He doesn’t step over him, he STOMPS, as if the Lakers’ hopes were an insect on the sole of his shoe, and Iverson has no tolerance for bugs. For a brief second, he stands over his victim, seemingly laughing, as Lue’s teammates on the bench stand helplessly only inches away. It does not mathematically eliminate the Lakers, as Eric Snow’s floater in the lane would do 30 seconds later, but everybody knows the game is over. The whole city of Los Angeles could not stop A.I. tonight, and he has reminded them in a brutal fashion.

Eleven-year-old me is conflicted. Despite my affiliation with Philadelphia sports, I am a converted Kobe fan, and since my childhood idol left the game in 1998, I had grown rather attached to this afro-wielding future superstar. This Finals was a meeting of the two teams I would most want to hoist the trophy. While some may view this as a favorable position to be in, my pessimism does not afford me such comfort. Every win for the Lakers is a loss for the Sixers, and vice versa. To ease my discomfort, I have already conceded victory to Los Angeles. The Lakers have not yet lost in these playoffs, are coming off a sweep of the San Antonio Spurs that toed the line between utter domination and public execution. The Sixers, on the other hand, took seven games to beat the Milwaukee Bucks in the Conference Finals, and boasted a starting lineup that included Aaron McKie, Tyrone Hill, and Jumaine Jones. Dikembe Mutombo was their second best player, and his joints would literally creak as he lumbered down the floor.

But tonight belonged to The Answer, as he single-handedly served the Lakers their first loss of the 2001 Playoffs.  While the Lakers would go on to win the next four games, and the series, that moment has forever been carved into my mind. In my lifetime, I can only remember watching three Playoff games in which a player seemingly won a game on his own, as if he could have picked four fans out of the stands to play with him and the result would be the same: Jordan’s last game as a Bull, LeBron’s 48 Special against Detroit, and what Iverson had just done to L.A. In these instances, the outcome was not a result of poor performances by the losing team; there was simply nothing they could do.

Eleven years later, AI sits in basketball purgatory. By his own admission he is still holding out hope that he will get to play in the NBA again, that one more team will give him a chance. He bristled at the use of the word ‘retirement’ in an interview with Lisa Salters at a Sixers playoff game this year, a game where he was honored at center court before the game. But whether he is willing to say the word or not, Allen Iverson is effectively retired. While he has been relegated to stints in the Turkish Basketball League, players that were taken after him in the 1996  Draft continue to play, and in many cases thrive, in the NBA.  There is no doubt that he could provide consistent scoring off the bench for a mid-level team. Hell, even Derek Fisher (taken 23 picks after Iverson) is playing major minutes for a championship contender. The issue Iverson has run into is the expectation that teams have for veteran role players. The function of these players is to provide minutes off the bench, limit mistakes, and provide a model for younger players to emulate. The first and last responsibilities are in question when it comes to The Answer. He has had trouble coming off the bench before, and the assumption around the league is that his pride will not allow him to do so. Not helping his cause is the Iverson image, constructed by years of trouble with the law, feuds with coaches, and endlessly replayed sound bites. In a nasty twist of fate, the public persona that once made Iverson arguably the most popular player in the league has assured that he will never play in it again.

When Michael Jordan retired after the 1998 season, he predictably left a void in the culture of the NBA. For years afterward, fans and media awkwardly tried to shoehorn players into the status as Michael’s heir. Many suitors came and went. Vince Carter once seemed primed for the role. As a hyper-athletic 6 foot 6 shooting guard out of UNC, who could be better to take the torch from His Airness and lead the league into a new era? While Carter possessed all of the physical attributes of Jordan (right down to the shaved head that seemingly pleaded for comparisons), he lacked the two things that pushed MJ over the top: heart and balls. Kobe Bryant certainly fit the bill as well. Young, talented, charismatic, and obsessed with winning, Kobe was primed to be the NBA’s next megastar. But, with Shaq in the way, he wasn’t able to establish himself as the Alpha Dog on his own team, much less the league. Tim Duncan was a basketball purist's dream: a fundamentally sound big man who understood the concept of true team basketball from a young age. But his game was too slow and methodical for younger fans to truly get behind, despite his continued success. Hard as it may be to believe now, the closest thing the NBA had to an icon in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s was Mr. Iverson. And of course, he achieved this status the way he seemingly achieved everything in his life: his own damn way.

When one thinks of Iverson, there are a few things guaranteed to come up first. The killer crossover, the tattoos and cornrows, the Reeboks, the on-court tenacity, and of course, practice. These are nothing more than memorable threads of a much more complicated tapestry. We, as sports fans, often presume that we understand the character of these players, whether they are upstanding guys or arrogant jerks. The reality is that this presumption is outrageous. It is impossible to know a human being’s character by watching them play a sport and seeing the occasional interview with them. Assuming we can demeans the complexity of human beings as a whole. I do, however, believe that we have developed a relatively acute ability to spot from a distance whether another human being is genuine or not. And therein lies the beginning of what made Iverson the idol that he was. Whether he was filming a commercial, or pissing of his coach, or taking the shot because he didn’t trust anybody else to do it, it was always apparent that he was simply being him.

If you look strictly at on-court success, Allen Iverson was not the most successful player of the post-Jordan era, not by a long shot. Nor was he the most talented. But what Iverson did better than anybody else was appeal to one of the NBA’s largest and most profitable markets: young African-Americans. This is what separated Iverson’s cultural impact from Jordan’s. Michael Jordan appealed to everybody. He was the Will Smith of basketball, in that both the white and black communities respected and adored him equally. There was always a duality to Michael. He arrived at the stadium dressed impeccably, and proceeded to tear the heart out of each opponent. He always appeared family-friendly, even appearing alongside the Looney Tunes in the cultural masterpiece that was Space Jam. But at the same time he suffered from a gambling addiction that nearly ended his career prematurely. He toed the line between statesman and warrior perfectly, and everyone loved him for it. AI made no such efforts. He showed up to games dressed in a way that turned off many older purists; baggy clothes, doo rags, chains, etc. His demeanor was unapologetic, and so was his game. When Jordan was on the court, he always resembled a poet, reciting his masterpiece for the thousandth time. Each move was fundamentally impeccable, carefully orchestrated to yield the best result. His form was always perfect, but there was a flow to the way he glided through the air that was beautiful to behold. Iverson’s game was battle rap. Each move was improvisational, a swift reaction to whatever his opponent put forth. His forays to the hoop were brutal and devastating, and his crossover was his deadliest weapon that would body bag his opponent.

                                                             Think these guys had a lot in common?

In the years following Jordan’s retirement, Iverson’s approach and demeanor led to division among the basketball community. The old guard (front office and league personnel, old school journalists, and long time fans) detested Iverson’s style. But fellow players and young fans embraced Iverson’s so-called “thug” persona. As the years progressed, and Iverson’s on court exploits afforded the Sixers more national airtime, his presence grew exponentially. Simply put, Allen Iverson’s influence directly led to baggy jerseys, even baggier shorts, arm sleeves, the And 1 mixtape tour, every NBA player having at least one tattoo, and this amazing Kobe Bryant/Tyra Banks collaboration. If you grew up following the NBA during this time then you know, this WAS basketball. This was cool. (Minus the Kobe song. Nobody thought that was cool.) Iverson and Rasheed Wallace became the faces of this new generation of players, who wore championship belts to games and received record setting amounts of technical fouls. The NBA seemed stuck between trying to capitalize on this trend and trying to stop it in its tracks. And then Ron Artest ran into the stands…

The Malice at the Palace was exactly what the NBA needed to squash the “thug” culture that Iverson jump started. Soon thereafter, David Stern put a dress code in place that required players to dress in “business or conservative attire”. The league began to heavily promote its younger, “cleaner” stars, such as LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and Dwight Howard. On the court, games were called much tighter to weed out physical play and technical fouls were given out more frequently to discourage displays of strong emotion.

Now, let’s be clear, I am not blaming the Pacers/Pistons Brawl on Allen Iverson. That was the fault of a few imbalanced players, hundreds of unruly fans, and poor security. However, Iverson, for better or for worse, affected the public’s image of NBA players more so than any other player of his time. And I am confident in saying that David Stern and the rest of the NBA would not have reacted the way they did if there was not a perceived cultural problem within the league. Whether or not the changes in the game have yielded positive results or not is a question for another time. (Believe me, you don’t want to get me started on the positives / negatives of violence and refereeing in the NBA. This post is long enough as it is.) The focus should not be on the legitimacy of these changes, rather on their scope. The fact of the matter is, no single player in the past decade has had more of an effect on the game than The Answer himself.

Eight years after he brought Los Angeles to its knees, he drops to his own in Philadelphia. He kisses the floor that once staged his greatest acts; though the building has changed its name twice since those days, the man remains the same. His passion for the game is still as evident as when he dominated it. His return to Philly was short-lived, and served as his last games in the NBA. While I didn’t get to see him play much in those months, I made sure to watch the night he returned. I stood, smile on my face, and nodded the way I did years ago. When he first elicited that reaction from me, I’m not sure I understood what it meant. Now, I comprehend. It is respect, a respect I hadn’t felt since the man in the red #23 shirt walked away. No player ever meant as much to the sport as Michael Jordan. He was the face of the league for the better part of 20 years, and in many respects still is. When he retired, we all wondered who would step into his place, who would take the league where it was going, for better or for worse? The NBA of the present is different in ways we couldn’t have imagined back then, but we did eventually find out who it was that would lead us here. The Answer is, of course, exactly that.