Allen Iverson, the poster boy for how Hip Hop and basketball cultures collide, was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame yesterday (September 9).
Advertisement
The 2016 class included three of the NBA’s greats in Shaquille O’Neal, Allen Iverson and Yao Ming – who were all first-ballot entrants.
Iverson singled out Michael Jordan, who he somehow managed to successfully compare to Rick James in the famous “Chappelle’s Show” skit. “And if I know my father, he’s up there arguing with Wilt Chamberlain right now, trying to convince that his son is the most dominant big man to ever play the game”. “It’s what I wondered would happen to me if I didn’t”. And, for the first time in my life, a human being didn’t really look real to me. “I don’t know how you miss this”, O’Neal said. I still dont know. I see my picture up there. It looked like he was glowing. I’m sitting there and I’m saying, ‘Man, that’s Michael. I can’t stop looking at him. “He also helped me get pushed off the team and traded to Miami”. It was my Mike. “It was my idol, my hero”.
Iverson got a standing ovation before he could even be introduced prior to his speech.
He said Georgetown coach John Thompson saved his life.
For those sneakerheads in the audience, this clip of Iverson besting Jordan is important.
But with that small acknowledgment – of his lateness, of his reputation, and of the ridiculous nature of the questions he endured throughout his career – he turned the press conference in a completely different, very positive direction.
“[Yao’s] career was cut short, and I think he didn’t achieve everything he wanted to on the floor”, National Basketball Association commissioner Adam Silver said at last year’s All-Star Weekend.
It seems like just yesterday that the players being inducted into the 2016 NBA Hall of Fame were dominating their competition at almost every position on the court. Iverson, who also played for Denver, Detroit and Memphis, scored 24,368 points in his career and was an 11-time All-Star selection. I thank you all for the support over the years.
“The game of basketball has been so good to me, and while I have left the court, I will never leave the game”.
Advertisement
Iverson closed his speech with a nod to the “guys who are not my friends any more”. Just the best of me, I love you so much. “It means people were able to appreciate how I played”. “I want you to walk around and be proud of yourself that you are a Hall of Famer”. Yao said in a statement announcing a youth basketball partnership with NBA China in 2012. He was listed generously at 6-foot, 165 pounds, and many rappers thought, if he can do it, why can’t I? Listing former Philadelphia stars like Julius Erving, Moses Malone, Billy Cunningham and Bobby Jones, Iverson lamented “having to come in there and fill all those shoes – when I was only a size 10 – and those guys are greats”. “You want to make sure you mention the people that helped you”.
