PHILADELPHIA - Has it been a decade already?
Has he been around town that long?
Yes and yes.
Allen Iverson is entering his 10th season in the 76ers' home white, ready again to careen around the Wachovia Center, ready to hold a hand to his ear for more noise, ready to drop 25 or so on the visitors, ready to shoot 8 for 31 sometimes, ready to play every game like it's his last, ready to annoy some and inspire others.
Ready to warm up winter nights and give kids who look like him and talk like him - and many others who do not - someone to emulate.
Warts and all.
True story: A local limo driver had Iverson in his car recently. Iverson was friendly. He didn't treat the guy as if he were nothing, as some other celebrities have. But ... "Allen Iverson, he just say (bleep), (bleep), (bleep) all the time," the driver recalled. "Nothing but (bleep), (bleep), (bleep)."
OK, Iverson isn't Emily Post or Langston Hughes. But he never said he was. He is what he is - a kid from the worst hovel you could imagine who made a career and a life for himself and his family and so many people you've never heard of.
But he's different now than when he got to Philadelphia. He's now a husband and a father, an old head on the Sixers squad. He no longer thinks of media members as "devils" (his word) looking to get him. His love-hate thing with Philly is mostly love these days.
"I took my bumps, but I had my great times here," he said. "Just to still be here - like Kevin Garnett and Kobe Bryant, they're great basketball players and they're still where they were at when they first came in. And it makes me feel good about the type of player I am, the coaches I've had, the teammates I've had, the fans in Philadelphia, and just the organization putting up with all the headaches I've caused them over the years."
Mistakes, he's made a few. Some of them have been quite worth mentioning. Over the years, he has probably done more than a couple of folks wrong who are reading this.
"A lot of times, I just reacted instead of thinking," he said. "And that's what's gotten me in a lot of situations that I've been in ever since I've been in the league and even before - just not knowing, but thinking you know everything. I think that's what comes with maturity."
Iverson knows what he will not do. He will not wear a suit to work this season, whether or not the NBA follows through on its intentions to put in a dress code.
"When I think I'm right, I stick with it," he said. "I really want people to know that I do have a problem with it. It's not fair. Just because you put a guy in a tuxedo doesn't mean he's a good guy."
And then.
"It sends a bad message to kids," he continued. "If you don't have a suit when you go to school, is your teacher going to think you're a bad kid because you don't have a suit on?
"I just came from Japan (where he was on a promotional tour for Reebok), and I saw thousands of kids, and all of them were dressed like me, from the biggest kid to the smallest."
You know what the NBA is concerned about with this dress-code business: Madison Avenue and the corporate world that the league needs to survive. And that's the NBA's job, and it has a right.
But Iverson, while obviously standing up for himself - no doubt wearing a suit reminds him of the worst time in his life, his being on trial as a teenager - is also standing up for others. He's a hero to kids who live in a world like the one he grew up in. Kids in West Philly - or Tokyo - who might not own a suit or have the means to buy one.
Is Iverson just "keeping it real?" Who knows? He has business partners, too, people who pay him millions to wear their gear. (And who also inhabit Madison Avenue, by the way.) But at least he gives you something to think about.
You don't have to agree with Iverson or even like him. You have no choice, though, but to keep watching.
