Author Of Iverson Book: 'Larry Brown Believes He Went To Bar' Before Practice Rant
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Allen Iverson certainly has his flaws.
In Kent Babb's new book titled, Not a Game: The Incredible Rise and Unthinkable Fall of Allen Iverson, Babb tells the drunken, violent, and negligent stories of Iverson, contradicting the Showtime documentary which portrayed AI in a completely positive light.
Babb says he tried to make his book as "balanced and as full a portrait of Iverson as possible," and admits the documentary did not.
"I thought that it was a glamour shot," Babb said Thursday on the 94WIP Innes And Bruno Show. "I thought it really kind of praises what he did on the court and that's awesome, but that's been a long time ago and things have really gone downhill for him since. I was really upset it didn't tackle, what I thought was one of the hard issues is---he's blown so much money. I mean so much money! His marriage had fallen apart, some really bad things had happened, and it didn't really get into that."
Listen: Kent Babb on the 94WIP Innes And Bruno Show
During one of the most infamous moments of Iverson's career, and arguably the most memorable sports press conference ever, Iverson was apparently drunk. It was just days after the 2002 season, shortly after being eliminated from the playoffs by the Boston Celtics, when Iverson gave his "practice" rant.
Babb says many people around the situation, including then Sixers coach Larry Brown, think Iverson was drunk.
"Brown was upset with him, because Iverson---as he's also known to do---just didn't show up that morning. It was kinda exit interview day for the season.
"Iverson had been kind of an emotional wreck because that was the year that his best friend had been murdered a few months earlier. So, the Larry Brown-Allen Iverson dynamic was in a really tough spot," Babb said. "They got in a shouting match in the parking lot. 'Are you gonna trade me?' No. You promise? Yes.'
"Then hug it out.
"Larry Brown told me that he disappeared and came back, was slurring, red eyes, all this stuff," Babb continued. "If you look at the video now, especially knowing it, you could tell. And I never knew, I wouldn't have suspected that thought I guess it makes some sense. All these people who were in the room and in the facility that day, to them it was a foregone conclusion that he'd gone and thrown back a few pops in the last three or four hours before that press conference. Because there was kind of this opening of time and Larry Brown believes he went to the bar. A lot of other people within the organization and the media believe he would have gotten himself out of that kind of a train wreck of a press conference, had he not had a little bit of a buzz going."
Babb's intrigue to write this book was spurred by Iverson's dynamic and polarizing personality.
"It's impossible to capture a character like Allen Iverson there, but I wanted to try," Babb said. "The more I learned about him he's cool parts fascinating and disappointing. He's amazing, but he also really sad. Those things, on both side of the extreme, make up Allen Iverson and from a journalism stand point he's an amazing, fascinating character that I just wanted to learn more about."
You can purchase Not a Game: The Incredible Rise and Unthinkable Fall of Allen Iverson here.
