Growing up in inner city Philadelphia basketball in the 80's and 90's basketball was huge for us inner city kids. During the 80's we could not play basketball or even get on the sliding board at the playground, because the drug dealers crackheads, and prostitutes took over almost every playground in the city or at least in my neighborhood.
We spent our times playing sports on our streets dodging traffic. Hit people cars with all kinds of balls. Basketball was something we had to play. We had not courts so we had to make our own courts. We made basketball courts out of milk crates. We will then put the courts on street lights poles or abandoned houses. If you can't relate just want you to know that was normal also the best times in my life. The Sixers just won a title in 1983 and drafted Charles Barkley in 1984. The Sixers remained a playoff team but never got back to championship form. Fast forward to the 90's 1992 Sixers traded Charles Barkley for no one worth mentioning.
Philadelphia basketball was pretty much dead we enjoyed our own summer league basketball games more then our professional basketball team. We was no longer a playoff team and no longer had NBA all-star on our team.
One day when I was a freshman in high school. I was reading the Philadelphia daily news about a kid in Virginia that just scored 60 points in a summer league game. This kid just got out of jail and currently have no scholarships offer but he considered one of the best in the country. The article was really detailed. I wanted to learn more about this kid that unstoppable and under 6 ft tall. We didn't have YouTube or Google during this time, so i just had to wait for another article to come out.
A few weeks later another article came out in the Philadelphia daily news about Allen Iverson but this story was about him getting a second chance and Georgetown University coach John Thompson giving him a scholarship. I got very excited because the 1st story i read about this little guard scoring ability was amazing. If the stories are true i could witness it myself.
When I finally got the opportunity to watch Iverson play I couldn't believe how good he was I became a instant fan. He stayed in college for 2 years. The Philadelphia 76ers had one of the worst record's in the league. Iverson just declared for the NBA. I remember just like yesterday praying that Sixers take Iverson. He was projected to be the top pick of the draft in order for the Sixers to draft Iverson we had to get the #1 pick. I watch the lottery drawing and was very nervous anytging less then #1 will be considered a disappointment. Now just to remind you tge 1996 NBA draft class is considered one of the best classes if not the best class ever with players Kobe Bryant, Steve Nash, Ray Allen to name a few.
Me and my cousins watched the lottery drawings. We prepared for this lottery like it was the Superbowl. We made it to the top 3 and now I'm panicking now we top 2 I'm ready to throw up. "And the number 1 pick goes to Philadelphia 76ers". It was no secret who we was picking. The basketball gods came through and saved Philadelphia basketball.
Come draft night the Sixers made it official. Iverson is now a Sixers I went from reading a article a few years back to having this guy on my team. Iverson lived up to the hype he took over the city of Philadelphia and the rest of the basketball world. Anywhere I went during this time I see people wearing Iverson basketball jerseys snd sneakers.
Iverson made us a playoff team and took us to the finals. Unfortunately we came up short to a Lakers team that had Shaq & Kobe. Eventually Iverson was getting a of negative attention and was traded. He never beed the same but remained a fan favorite. It seems as if he just vanished from the spotlight and basketball community.
I recently saw a press conference with Ice-Cube talking about a 3 on 3 tournament as i was turning it off i heard Iverson voice saying I'm coming back to basketball. June 25 Iverson played his 1st game in 7 years at tge Barclays center in NY.
He may not be the old Iverson but just seeing him play bring back so many child hood memories.
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