May 7, 2002: Following the Philadelphia 76ers' defeat to the Boston Celtics in the 1st round of the NBA Playoffs, Sixers coach Larry Brown criticizes his star player, Allen Iverson, for missing practice.
At that point, Larry Brown was 62 years old. Born in Brooklyn, and raised in nearby Long Beach, Long Island, New York, he had starred as a player at North Carolina. He was considered too small to play in the NBA, but he played in the ABA, winning the Championship with the 1969 Oakland Oaks, and started coaching there. He coached the Denver Nuggets to the 1976 ABA Finals. He coached UCLA to the Final of the 1980 NCAA Tournament.
He took both of the NBA's "little brother" franchises to the Playoffs -- twice: The New Jersey Nets in 1982 and '83, and the Los Angeles Clippers in 1992 and '93. As Tony Kornheiser of The Washington Post and ESPN, a fellow Long Islander who once had Brown as a camp counselor, put it, "He took the Clippers to the Playoffs! Nobody takes the Clippers to the Playoffs!" Indeed, from the time they moved from San Diego to Los Angeles in 1984, Brown was the only man to coach them to the Playoffs until Bill Fitch in 1997, and then they didn't make it again until 2006 under Mike Dunleavy.
The big mark against Brown is that he was always moving around. He left the Nets to take on one of the top college jobs, the University of Kansas. He led them to the Final Four in 1986 and the National Championship in 1988. He then left for the San Antonio Spurs, and took them to the Playoffs. He left them for the Clippers. He left them for the Indiana Pacers, and took them to the Eastern Conference Finals. In 1997, he left them for the 76ers.
A native of Hampton, Virginia, outside Norfolk, Iverson got into legal trouble in high school, leading many colleges to shy away from offering him a scholarship. John Thompson of Georgetown thought he could handle him, and, for 2 years, he did. Then Iverson declared for the NBA Draft. The 76ers took him. In 2001, with Brown as his head coach, he led the NBA in scoring average and won its Most Valuable Player award, and the Sixers won the Eastern Conference Championship. But they lost the Finals to the Los Angeles Lakers.
Still, Iverson was just 26, and was being coached by Larry Brown, playing in a great basketball city for a historic team. People all over the Delaware Valley were wearing his Number 3 jersey. The sky appeared to be the limit. His nickname was already "The Answer."
But the 2001-02 season did not go well. The Sixers had injury issues, and, despite Iverson winning his 2nd straight scoring title, only went 43-39, losing in the 1st Round to their arch-rivals, the Boston Celtics.
After that defeat, Brown criticized Iverson, the biggest star in Philadelphia basketball since the retirement of Julius Erving, 25 years earlier, for missing team practices.
Let's be clear about something: If you defy your coach, even if he's wrong, you're still more wrong. Brown can be difficult, but he was the coach, no player is bigger than the coach, and Iverson had to obey the rules.
But he didn't. And, on May 7, they had a shouting match outside the team's practice facility. A few hours later, there was a press conference. Iverson sat there, wearing a Boston Red Sox cap. (When asked about that years later, Iverson admitted that he didn't really follow baseball, but, despite growing up in the market of the NFL's Washington Redskins, now Commanders, said he rooted for the Dallas Cowboys.)
He spoke about something that had happened a few months earlier, and was now coming to a head: Rahsaan Langeford had been Iverson's best friend in Hampton, and had been shot and killed a few months earlier. It had weighed on his mind all season long, although that doesn't explain why he again led the NBA in scoring. At any rate, the trial for his killer had begun, and was still in progress at the time of the bustup with Brown.
Iverson mentioned that at the press conference, and then said:
We sitting in here. I'm supposed to be the franchise player, and we in here talking about practice. I mean, listen: We talking about practice. Not a game. Not a game. Not a game. We talking about practice. Not a game. Not the game that I go out there and die for and play every game like it's my last. Not the game. We talking about practice, man.
John Smallwood, who covered the 76ers for the Philadelphia Daily News, was at the conference, and reported that Iverson was drunk: "If he had been sober, he would have been able to get himself out of that. He never would've gone down that path. Maybe you had to have been around him all the time to know the difference, but we all knew."
Brown did not punish Iverson any further. Team management further broke up the roster that had reached the 2001 Finals, and while the Sixers won their 1st Round matchup in 2003, they lost the next round. Brown resigned, and Iverson was free of him.
Brown was hired by the Detroit Pistons. He took them to the 2004 NBA Championship, and to Game 7 of the 2005 Finals. He remains the only coach ever to win titles in both the NCAA and the NBA.
Iverson stayed 3 more seasons with the 76ers, played 2 seasons in Denver, 1 in Detroit (Brown had already left), a few games in Memphis, returned to Philadelphia for the 2009-10 season, and played a season in Turkey's league, before retiring in 2011. He was named to the NBA's 75th Anniversary 75 Greatest Players in 2021. The 76ers retired his Number 3.
Both he and Brown were elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame. They have reconciled. Brown has said that Iverson could have been the greatest player of all time if things had been handled perfectly -- possibly an admission of some responsibility on his own part. Iverson has called Brown the "best coach ever."
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May 7, 2002was a Tuesday. Football was out of season. There were 2 games in the NBA Playoffs. The New Jersey Nets beat the Charlotte Hornets, 102-89 at the Continental Airlines Arena at the Meadowlands. And the San Antonio Spurs beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 88-85 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los
Angeles.
There were 2 games in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The Montreal Canadiens beat the Carolina Hurricanes, 2-1 at the Bell Centre in Montreal. Donald Audette scored the winning goal, 2:26 into overtime. And the St. Louis Blues beat the Detroit Red wings, 6-1 at the Savvis Center (now the Enterprise Center) in St. Louis.
And these Major League Baseball games were played:
* The New York Yankees beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 5-2 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida. Mike Mussina outpitched Paul Wilson. Derek Jeter went 2-for-5 with an RBI.
* The New York Mets lost to the San Francisco Giants, 5-1 at Shea Stadium. Russ Ortiz outpitched Steve Trachsel. Barry Bonds went 0-for-3 with 2 walks. Former Met Jeff Kent went 2-for-5. Jay Payton went 3-for-4 with the Mets' only RBI.
* The Colorado Rockies beat the Montreal Expos, 5-3 at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal.
* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Houston Astros, 7-4 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia.
* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Cleveland Indians, 4-3 at Camden Yards in Baltimore. Jeff Conine grounded out in the bottom of the 10th, but that was enough to get Jerry Hairston Jr. home with the winning run.
* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Atlanta Braves, 6-5 at Turner Field (now Center Parc Stadium) in Atlanta. The game went 16 innings, before Paul Lo Duca grounded into a force play that allowed Marquis Grissom to score the winning run. Brian Jordan went 4-for-7, including 2 solo home runs.
* The Florida Marlins beat the San Diego Padres, 12-4 at Pro Player Stadium (now Hard Rock Stadium) in Miami Gardens, Florida.
* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 8-2 at Cinergy Field (formerly Riverfront Stadium) in Cincinnati. Adam Dunn and Sean Casey hit home runs, but Ken Griffey Jr. was injured and did not play.
* The Chicago Cubs beat their arch-rivals, the St. Louis Cardinals, 8-0 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Kerry Wood pitched a 4-hit shutout, striking out 9. Alex Gonzalez went 1-for-4, but had 4 RBIs, on a bases-loaded double and a groundout.
* The Kansas City Royals beat the Minnesota Twins, 4-1 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis.
* The Chicago White Sox beat the Texas Rangers, 11-6 at The Ballpark (now Choctaw Stadium) in the Dallas suburb of Arlington, Texas.
* The Arizona Diamondbacks beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 7-6 at Bank One Ballpark (now Chase Field) in Phoenix.
* The Detroit Tigers beat the Anaheim Angels, 3-0 at Edison International Field of Anaheim (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Seth Greisinger pitched 7 innings of 4-hit shutout ball, and José Paniagua and Juan Acevedo completed the 5-hit shutout.
* The Boston Red Sox beat the Oakland Athletics, 9-7 at the Network Associates Coliseum (as the Oakland Coliseum was then known). Pedro Martínez outpitched Cory Lidle. A's legend Rickey Henderson was with the Red Sox that season, but did not play in this game.
* And the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Seattle Mariners, 4-1 at Safeco Field (now T-Mobile Park) in Seattle. Roy Halladay outpitched James Baldwin. (Not the author.) Ichiro Suzuki went 1-for-4.
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