Stephen A. Smith: Iverson needs more than a prayer

March 07, 2010|By Stephen A. Smith, Inquirer Columnist
  • With his career and marriage in tatters, and no dependable person to turn to, Allen Iverson appears headed for disaster.

His closest confidant asked the basketball world to pray for Allen Iverson, as if no one has all these years while seeing this train wreck coming.

He acted as if the former 76ers star hadn't needed a significant dose of prayer, luck, and divine intervention until now.

And as the rest of us are forced to bear witness to a disintegration, the rapid decline of a career clearly lacking nurturing, the time has arrived for Iverson's inner circle to stand up and be counted, to provide some semblance of tough love - by any means necessary.

Unless those people are willing to write his epitaph instead.

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Just listening to Gary Moore, Iverson's business manager and the person he trusts most, they may be doing so very soon.

Allen Iverson is in trouble, folks, deep trouble. The combination of alcohol and gambling - and a once-promising career in tatters because of the first two - won't culminate in anything short of disaster if help does not arrive in short order.

If numerous NBA sources are telling the truth - and there's no reason to believe they'd do otherwise in a situation of this magnitude - Iverson will either drink himself into oblivion or gamble his life away.

Moore, ever the protector, would never admit as much, of course. But that's part of the problem, isn't it?

Iverson's wife, Tawanna, having hired some high-powered Atlanta attorney and filed for a divorce last week, does not help matters. Nor does it help that she's already separated from her husband, with custody of their five kids and seeking both alimony and child support.

When you consider Iverson's well-known penchant for alcohol and his banishment from casinos in Detroit and Atlantic City, if disgust and sadness don't come to mind, at least one question does:

Where is Pat Croce when you need him? Or Iverson's coach at Georgetown, John Thompson?

Where is the person with the ideal combination of compassion and toughness who would shelter Iverson at the same time he's holding his feet to the flames? Someone whose vested interest is in Iverson's well-being, someone who doesn't need his money or cachet?

In other words, someone he does not have in his camp right now. Or someone who has an impact, and needs to utilize it.

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