Hall of Famer Iverson: 'I'm growing'

HOUSTON - On the morning it was announced that he would be inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame on Sept. 9, Allen Iverson, decked out in a King of Hearts shirt with chains hanging from his neck, was seated at a round table in a hotel ballroom explaining that 20 years after he was drafted by the Sixers, five years retired and finally out of the chaos that was his life from the bowling-alley incident, to prison, to Georgetown, to No. 1 draft pick, to MVP, to NBA Finals, to 24,368 NBA points, to the show on the court, and the controversies away from the gym, he is catching up to life.

Speaking for 25 minutes, he was honest, introspective and illuminating. Finally with some perspective on an athletic and societal life lived beyond large, he is now able to look back on it all with wisdom you can only gain through time.

"I'm growing, I'm still trying to become the best man that I can be for my family, definitely for my (wife), definitely for my kids," Iverson said. "I'm learning on the fly just like everybody else."

Only everybody else wasn't a superstar high school football and basketball player in Hampton, Va., who was, it has become obvious over the years, sent to prison on charges that never should have been brought and from a conviction that never should have resulted in prison time.

John Thompson took a big chance on Iverson 22 years ago. The Hall of Fame Georgetown coach has never regretted it.

"You can only help somebody if they're willing to help themselves and he was receptive to me helping him and that meant a lot to me," Thompson said. "The whole time that he was with me he never one time said, 'Somebody done me wrong,' he never brought it up."

Iverson called Thompson the man who "gave me a chance at life."

"If you ever gave me a chance to get on that floor, I thought anything was possible," Iverson said.

Even, it turned out, the Hall of Fame.

"I didn't want the Hall of Fame to ever come because I wanted to play forever," Iverson said.

It turned out he could not beat time.

"This is not just my accomplishment," Iverson said. "The people that supported me my whole way through, my ups, my downs, my trials and tribulations, everybody that stood by me regardless of what people said, my actions, right or wrong . . . it's a tribute to them."

And especially those closest to him.

"Your girl to rub you when you're hurting," Iverson said. "You waking up and you walking like Fred Sanford in the morning. And she's saying, 'I know you're not playing today.'

'Yes, I am.' "

The fans loved him for that more than anything, forgiving all the rest of it because the show was so original.

The 2001 run to the NBA Finals was one of the great unifiers in city history. That team was impossible not to appreciate.

"It was memorable and it was a great experience," Iverson said. "I'm so proud of the guys that played with me because we knew we gave it all every night . . . So we were cool with the fact that we couldn't get it done because we knew we gave everything we had. We got beat by a better team . . . We went into that series broke, beat up, tired."

Larry Brown and Iverson got them farther than realistically they should have gone.

"I don't regret nothing in my life," Iverson said. "I love being who I am, the person that I am. I feel comfortable in my skin, but if I could have a wish as an athlete, I wish I would have bought into what (Brown) was trying to give me all along, just being defiant, being a certified asshole for nothing when all he wanted was the best for me. I didn't take constructive criticism the way I should have."

No he did not.

Now, he can laugh at himself, once an athletic marvel, and say, "I can't even touch the backboard, it is over."

Back in the day, Iverson said, "I wanted to be everybody. I wanted to be Michael. I wanted to jump like him. I wanted to pass like Magic. I wanted to be fast like Isaiah, I wanted to rebound like Barkley, I wanted to shoot like Bird."

Instead, he was uniquely himself at "6-feet, 165."

And he will always have the practice press conference. After trying to explain it, Iverson smiled and got to the bottom line: "I'm a Hall of Famer. I can go outside today or go to a restaurant or wherever and somebody will come up to me and say, 'Practice, we're talking about practice.' "

As the session was wrapping up, I asked him where he was in life right now. He thought about it a moment and said: "I think I'm so much more settled. I've been with the same woman for 25 years now. I've been through a divorce three years ago, back together not even a month after the divorce.

"I had to realize basically that she was trying to get my attention in any way she could, you know what I mean? She was at the end of the road, there's nothing else I can do, but show him how serious I am. I'm so much more dedicated to my girl. I'm there for my kids more than I was ever there."

What happens next will determine the rest of the story.

"I'm just so much more of a family man," Allen Iverson said. "That's how I want to be defined at this point in my life."

@DickJerardi