Posts tagged ‘allen iverson’

A D.C. pic, Wizards memories, and links …

[Takoma Recreation Center - NW Washington, D.C.]

On Wednesday, TAI held another ticket giveaway (courtesy of StubHub), this time involving four suite tickets to next Tuesday’s Wizards-Lakers game. A winner was randomly chosen from all those who left comments about their favorite Wizards memory on the TAI FaceBook page. It was kind of a random means to give tickets away … I almost asked some lame question like ‘name your favorite current Wizard’, but instead went with the memory concept, which seems equally generic. Whatever, I was just trying to find a pool of people to give free tickets to, right?

Well, as it turns out, I had a lot of fun reading the favorite memories of various Wizards fans — not surprisingly, most of them involved Gilbert Arenas. But what’s not a lot of fun is only being able to award the tickets to one person. But it is what it is as Mike Miller would say … so a congrats goes to Devin Krotman, who was chosen at random amongst all those who entered. Devin’s favorite Wizards memory is below, along with some other select memories of entrants. Thanks to all for taking time to share.

Devin Krotman

“I thought long and hard about this and my favorite Wizards moment has to be Gil’s game-winner against the Bucks on January 3, 2007, This is the one where Gil dribbles slowly down the court and bangs the 3 with such swagger that he is actually walking away with his back turned to the basket and hands in the air when the balls goes in…Out of all of the Gil/Wizard moments, this is a classic. I was at this game..and actually bought tickets with my friends for Student Appreciation night; somehow though we weren’t sitting together and I had to sit by myself. To me it didn’t matter though.. I had great seats and probably saw one of the coolest finishes to a NBA game. Come to think of it I would never mind sitting by myself at another Wiz game, that’s how big a fan I am.

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Got home, watched the first half of the Wizards-Sixers game, put it on pause, and left for the gym with thoughts of Groundhog Day dancing in my head.

I came back feeling better about myself because I got exercise and later felt even better with the pleasant surprise of a Wizards win, fueled by much improved play in the second half.

Washington has swept the season series with Philadelphia, a team just as bad in general and worse defensively. I’ll take it.

Below is what I saw.

Quick Thought:

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In anticipation of tonight’s Wizards game against the 76ers in Philadelphia, I exchanged some questions with Carey Smith of Philadunkia, the ESPN TrueHoop Network Sixers blog.

I answered a question from Carey about the Wizards’ struggles in general, and attempted to encapsulate the season’s problems in a nutshell. I also answered a question about Eddie Jordan and defense, which I spoke with the coach about when the Sixers played in D.C. on December 22nd.

Head over to Philadunkia to read my answers. Carey’s answers to my questions are below.

(TAI) — How is Elton Brand coming along? Has he overcome his slow start? Is he ultimately better coming off the bench?

(Philadunkia) — Brand has been a beast lately — three double-doubles in December and one near miss (25 & 9); 18 & 6 per over his last 4 games –, so I would say yes he has overcome what many perceive to be a slow start. If Eddie Jordan would just play him more and maybe call the occasional set play for #42, I’d bet that Brand would really fill up the stat sheet.

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Caron Butler had his eye on the ball

“Shoot it boy!!”

At around the 8:11 mark in the first quarter, Arenas could have taken his first shot. He didn’t. Left wide open at the top of the key, the ball was kicked out to Gil, and he turned it down. C’mon dude, is that what the team is paying you to do now?

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Tonight’s match against Memphis at the Siegel Center on the campus of Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA might provide the most packed crowd I’ve ever seen for an NBA preseason game.

Sure, the excitement of Gilbert Arenas’ comeback tour and the new-look Wizards are probably enough to fill the 7,500 seat arena … I mean, pictures of the Wizards are literally on the side of the building (see below).

But the main draw might be Allen Iverson, the prodigal son returning to his home state of Virginia (as a Memphis Grizzly of all things). Iverson grew up in Hampton, VA, about 80 miles away from Richmond.

I kind of heard a secondhand joke about Iverson this weekend, stating that he hasn’t been in Richmond since … [insert item from troubled past]

• … since he must have been thanking then VA Governor Doug Wilder profusely for giving him clemency and detention instead of jail time due to charges related to a 1993 bowling alley brawl (which was in Hampton, but Richmond is the state capital).

  or
  

• … since 1997 when Iverson was arrested and spent the night in a Richmond jail. Police found weed and a gun in his car after pulling it over for going 90 mph in a 65; Iverson was a passenger, not a driver.
  
  or
  
• … since 2006 when Iverson bought his mom an ABA franchise that was supposed to be called the Richmond Warriors. The team became the Ballerz before playing briefly in 06-07. They then moved to the Hampton Roads/Norfolk area, but haven’t really been heard from since.

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{via Sports Illustrated Vault}

An unfortunate part about being a Wizards/Bullets blogger and only 29 years old (and only having moved to DC in 1990), is that timing has deprived my memory and knowledgeable grasp of franchise history. But we all depend on people before us to tell the stories we don’t know. The more accounts there are, the better depiction we get of what actually transpired. This is what’s so great about team blogs, or “sites” maintained by sources which not apart of main stream media. They provide a more in depth view from wider angles, making the lore that much better for the future.

For my last birthday, a friend gave me ‘The Great Book of Washington, D.C. Sports Lists‘, written by Andy Pollin and Leonard Shapiro and published in 2008. These two guys have an insanely close relationship with sports in the city I love, and they turned to even more brilliant minds for assistance when composing their lists. While the book doesn’t exactly satisfy my desire for Bullets history tid-bits (to be expected in a Redskins town), it comes highly recommended for its Washington sporting facts, which are considered mostly minutia by ‘official’ historical accounts, but extremely savory to serious fans.

In reading, which I still continue to do, some lists twice, I came across some eyebrow raising commentary regarding the relationship between Wes Unseld and Elvin Hayes. I’m almost ashamed to admit that I previously had little knowledge of Hayes outside of him being a great player, and a member of the ’78-79 championship team. I simply haven’t taken the time to dive into research about him as I’ve done for more contemporary figures during my fandom period (such as Kevin Duckworth, Robert Pack, Larry Stewart, Scott Skiles, and Haywoode Workman).

Hayes and Unseld appear on three lists together: Read more »

{ The 1978 Larry O'Brien Trophy - flickr/Scott Ableman }

In late August, Caron Butler said, “people shouldn’t be scared to mention championship.” On Tuesday, Antawn Jamison followed up with his own championship talk. You can read it covered by Michael Lee in the WaPost and Mike Jones in the WaTimes.

Good sound-bites, but should the Wizards really be talking about a championship? Of course they should, and here are the top four reasons why:

#4) If you’re setting goals, why not set them high? …and we’re not talking about setting goals while you’re getting high, a la Allen Iverson, and some sort of god propelled (probably Jobu), dream of marching the Larry O’Brien down Beale Street.

#3) Talking title sets a tone. The Wizards aren’t here to hope, they’re taking the court to want and desire. As soon as players start talking about maybes, shouldas, couldas, and wouldas … those big ‘IFs’ (looking at you health bug), they’re already psychologically putting themselves behind the eight-ball. The seriousness of backing up expressed championship aspirations brings an air of focus to the table.

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Ya’ll heard Gilbert Arenas came back?
Naw really….no April Fools.

Well, in case you missed it last Saturday, I outsourced some screen shots and they just arrived from Bangalore. Enjoy.

He hugged out all the troubles of the world today with ‘Sheed.

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