Iverson Blames Curry, Not Pistons

Iverson blames Curry, not Pistons
By VINCE ELLIS

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Grizzlies guard Allen Iverson was sitting down at the FedEx Forum today, talking to reporters, when he stopped for a moment to wave down at the other end of the court.

He greeted members of the Pistons’ traveling party, and it was apparent the player who many fans blame for torpedoing the Pistons' era of dominance last season has no ill will toward anyone currently associated with the team.

He saves his bitterness for former Pistons coach Michael Curry.

“I was put in a bad situation that I, obviously, wasn’t mentally ready for because I was promised it would be another way, and it was totally different,” said Iverson, who will sit out tonight’s season opener with a left hamstring injury. “Obviously, it didn’t work out. The head coach isn’t even there any more after one season.

“It didn’t turn out the way Michael Curry said it was gonna be.”

He added that if current Pistons coach John Kuester were around last season, things would have turned out differently than a losing record and first-round playoff exit.

“It would have been a 100% different or 100% better, a thousand percent better, because I would have known what I was getting myself in,” Iverson said with a laugh. “I’m pretty sure Q would have been straightforward with me about how things would have been, and things would have ended up that way.”

Iverson said Curry lied to him by saying Iverson would never have to come off the bench. Curry hasn’t commented since being fired by Pistons president of basketball operations Joe Dumars in late June.

When Iverson briefly returned to the lineup after a back injury last winter, Curry had Iverson come off the bench. Iverson played a few games, openly complaining about the role, before he and the Pistons agreed to shut him down for the season.

Pistons guard Rip Hamilton, who was at the center of the controversy by starting ahead of Iverson, backs Iverson’s account and thinks the pairing could have worked if a better coach were around.

“I just thought that the coach we had at the time (didn’t allow us to be) at our best, and when you don’t have that, it makes it difficult because all guys are just trying to figure each other out on the floor on the fly other than putting us in situations where we can make each other better,” Hamilton said today.

As far as any rift between the two, Iverson and Hamilton, who share agent Leon Rose, scoffed.

“I think the media tried to make it something that it really wasn’t, that we weren’t friends,” Hamilton said. “We talk off the court all the time, to this day.

“It was just something that was magnified to a spot where it was me versus him, and it never was. We were always very supportive of each other. We just didn’t win.”

Allen Iverson speaks out -- again; Pistons announce starting five
By A. Sherrod Blakely
October 28, 2009, 12:35PM

MEMPHIS, Tenn. - Former Detroit Piston Allen Iverson (hamstring) won't play in tonight's game against his former team.

Not to worry, people.

A.I. had plenty to say about his former club and his new one (Memphis Grizzlies), which he says will include a starting five with him in it once he's healthy.

On the perceived rift between Iverson and Richard Hamilton:

"I didn't hear that one, out of all the rumors I heard," Iverson said. "That's something new to me. I have a great relationship with him, and nothing changed in my time in Detroit. It wasn't Rip's fault. He didn't have anything to do with any of the decisions made around there."

On the issues he had with Joe Dumars and Michael Curry:

"I didn't have any issues with Joe. My problem was with being told something and it wasn't that way. It didn't turn out the way Michael Curry told me it was going to be. It didn't have anything to do with Joe."

On whether things might have been different if John Kuester, a former Philly assistant when Iverson played for the Sixers, would have been coach:

"It would have been 100 percent different, a 100 percent better. I would have known, basically what I was getting myself into. I wouldn't have been shocked about anything. I'm pretty sure Kue would have been straight forward with me about how things would have been. It would have ended up that way."

On whether he's willing to accept coming off the bench in Memphis:

"Nah, I won't accept it. Bench came into the play when I came to Detroit. You never heard about Allen Iverson coming off the bench ever in my whole career. It was never something people even thought in their head until I came to Detroit. Now, it's the big topic. I'd be crazy to just out of my mouth say, 'I'd be comfortable with being a guy coming off the bench.' That's never a role I ever had."

On whether he sees coming off the bench as a negative:

"I don't look at it as a negative. On a basketball team, you need guys to come off the bench. That's what makes up a whole team. You don't play with five starters. But my whole thing is, if that makes us a better team, with me coming off the bench, than that's something I would obviously do -- if it results in wins. But I don't know anybody in the world that would feel like me coming off the bench is the right thing to do if that's not making the team better. It's just an issue because it's me.

"Everybody in the world knows I don't want to come off the bench. So that's why it's an issue. It's a conversation because people know that's not what I want to do. It's a media thing. I don't think it has anything to do with basketball. Anybody in their right mind, to me, honestly knows that on this team or the teams I've been on, that I deserve to start."