Veteran guard Allen Iverson made his season
debut Monday night for his new team, but in a loss as the Memphis Grizzlies
fell to the Sacramento Kings, 127-116, in overtime.
Iverson came off the bench and scored 11 points on 5-of-9 shooting. He sat out
the opening three games with a slightly torn left hamstring.
But after the contest, Iverson seemed upset at the questioning of the media
that he's a possible reserve player in the league.
"I am not a reserve basketball player. I've never been a reserve all my life
and I'm not going to start looking at myself as a reserve," he said. "That's
something for the media to talk about. It's only a big issue when the media
talks about it. The subject never came up in my career until everything
happened in Detroit last year. No one talked about me being a sub or anything
like that until last year. In all of the other years of my career it never
came up. I've been a starter on All-Star teams, Olympic teams and NBA Finals
teams. It's just a big deal now."
Iverson signed with Memphis in September. He started last season with Denver,
but was traded to Detroit on November 3 after just three contests and played
54 games with the Pistons. His season was curtailed by a back problem and he
averaged 17.5 points, 5.0 assists and 3.0 rebounds in a combined 57 games,
including 53 starts.
The former Georgetown star spent his first 10 full seasons with Philadelphia,
leading the 76ers to the NBA Finals in the spring of 2001. A 10-time All-
Star, he was the league MVP for the 2000-01 season.
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