Bleacher Report - Articles by Jamie Ellis

NBA: Only the Strong Survive

Jamie Ellis — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 04:07:04 -0400

When Michael Jordan retired following the 1998 season, an era ended not just for the Bulls and the city of Chicago.

The NBA as a whole went through a complete change.

The glory days of the ‘80s and ‘90s unofficially ended as Jordan walked away and the rest of the league was locked out.

Between Michael’s exit and the emergence of LeBron, Wade, and Anthony, the league went through some depressing times.

Legends like Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Patrick Ewing, Hakeem Olajuwan, and even Jordan himself retired unceremoniously from teams they never should have joined. New personalities attempted to take over the game, yet fell incredibly short.

Between the 1999 and 2007 seasons, we’ve seen two teams gobble up seven championships—teams with Hall of Fame players and coaches.

But the Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs couldn’t bring back what the NBA had lost. The league went through a period where international players flooded team rosters, and the United States couldn’t field a team capable of finishing better than third in international competition.

Now, the NBA is in a great period of rebirth.

Two all-time greats in LeBron James and Kobe Bryant are battling nightly for the right to be the best in the world.

A new crop of point guards in Chris Paul and Deron Williams have brought speed, excitement, and unselfishness back to a game that sorely needed it.

And the old guards—Steve Nash and Jason Kidd—seem reluctant to relinquish their crown.

Amidst a wild championship chase where many around the world are ready to signal a new era of NBA greatness, one great player has been lost in the shuffle.

Through all the down times the NBA has gone through recently, Allen Iverson has remained one of the most consistent and tenacious players the league has ever seen.

Iverson’s greatness does not need to be discussed. It’s his place in history that needs to be affirmed.

Iverson’s game has few weaknesses, but the memory of him may not be as strong as it should be. If anything, Iverson’s timing was all wrong.

At the beginning of the 1980s, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird came in and made the NBA popular again.

Four years later, they were joined by Michael, Charles, Hakeem, and Stockton and the good times kept going. Players that will forever be linked to one another because of their arrival together.

Other superstars have also had this luxury. LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony will always be linked. Dwayne Wade came in with them and a new era was born.

Deron Williams and Chris Paul went three and four in the same draft and will play mirroring careers.

Kobe Bryant came into the league in one of the best draft classes of all time and we watched him grow in front of our eyes. He played with a legend, won three championships, and is now the heir to Jordan’s throne.

Iverson had no such luxuries. He came into the league as an attitude problem waiting to happen.

He didn’t have a transcendent Larry Bird to compliment his Magic Johnson. He had more of a Ryan Leaf to his Peyton Manning.

Iverson came into the league being compared to Stephon Marbury. While Marbury is hardly a flameout—he is a two-time all star—he is hardly comparable to Iverson. It was players like Marbury who defined the Iverson generation. Brash, thuggish, selfish players who would never succeed on a team level, or appeal to a wide audience.

Their styles were so similar, yet the result was completely different. Iverson has never taken a night off for his team and has always begged to play on a championship squad. Marbury couldn’t stand being paid less than Kevin Garnett and orchestrated his own NBA exile that has led him to the bench at Madison Square Garden.

Iverson’s look and attitude may have reminded folks of the brooding Marbury, but his talents were far superior.

The problem is, the league found itself with more Marbury's and fewer Iverson's. Me-first players like Steve Francis, Darius Miles, and Vince Carter littered the league and stood more for wasted talent than anything else.

Ten years after he came into the league, Iverson has outlasted his contemporaries.

The unlikely rose that grew from the urban cement the NBA represented between 2000 and 2006, Allen Iverson has grown up.

No longer a petulant kid with more basketball ability than good sense, he has become one of the NBA’s all-time greats and has been an All-Star in two memorable generations.

It’s a shame that Iverson did his best work in a time when no one was paying attention, but his consistency and longevity has let him shine alongside the greats and the not so greats.

One of the best to ever pick up a basketball, Allen Iverson will not be defined by any generation. He has transcended a single time period and has earned the highest level of success. He’s timeless.

Kobe Bryant's Killer Instinct

Jamie Ellis — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 03:01:50 -0500

There may be no better finisher in the NBA than Lakers guard Kobe Bryant. Outside of Cleveland’s LeBron James, Bryant is the best fourth quarter player in the league. As a game comes to a close, there’s no question you want the ball in his hands—unless of course you’re playing against him.

Yet, Bryant made possibly his best case for an MVP in a game in which he did not attempt a single fourth quarter shot. No rebounds, no assists, no steals.

In fact Bryant didn’t play a single minute in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s win against Seattle. But this was an example of the leadership he shows on a nightly basis.

With just over four minutes to go in the third quarter the Lakers led by 31, with Bryant and Sonics guard Mickael Gelabale fighting for a rebound. Gelabale won the struggle and secured the ball, but Bryant believed he had been fouled.

After not getting a call, Bryant let referee Brian Forte—son of veteran NBA ref Joe Forte—hear about it. With the Sonics setting up their offense at the other end, Forte popped Bryant with a technical foul.

As Sonics forward Kevin Durant took his place at the line, Bryant chased Forte down the court. Head tilted, body language making obvious his anger and frustration, Bryant told the young referee exactly how he felt.

Forte acted correctly and walked away from the irate superstar. He looked away from Kobe and let him talk. And then he let him walk.

Forte issued Bryant his second technical and ejected him from the game—Bryant’s first ejection of the season. To a chorus of boos and laughter from the Key Arena fans, Bryant continued to jaw at Forte as he exited the floor.

The Lakers were comfortably ahead in a game they would easily win—for their 11th straight victory —and Bryant was unusually upset about this simple no-call.

The fact that a player of Bryant’s level would get ejected from a game says a lot about the league. The world perceives these players as prima donnas and the referees are not going to let themselves be shown up.

On the other hand, Bryant allowed himself to be taken over by emotion in a blowout game against a weak opponent in February. So much for the NBA regular season being meaningless.

What happened on Sunday night was much more than a simple loss of temper. He sent a message to his team that every play, in every game, from here on out, is important.

The Lakers, as well as eight other Western Conference teams, are at once fighting for the No. 1 seed in the standings, and their playoff lives. With nine teams bunched within six games of each other, a single loss of concentration could take the top team to the bottom in a matter of days.

Bryant has made it clear that he has no intention of letting his concentration lapse. The Lakers are ahead in the West right now, but not comfortably. They currently hold a half-game lead over the San Antonio Spurs with 26 games remaining.

If Bryant didn’t think Sunday’s game was ensured, with a 31-point lead against the Sonics with 16 minutes to go, he must have a hard time sleeping with the Lakers merely clinging to the top spot in the conference.

Bryant may not have reacted the way he did had the game been close, or at home, or against one of the league’s premier teams. But he certainly wasn’t going to let his voice go unheard.

With a sprint to the finish sure to make the next six weeks the most exciting regular season basketball we’ve seen in years, Kobe Bryant and the L.A. Lakers are not going to rest on their laurels.

Kobe Bryant wants to win, and he’s going to let you hear about it.

Should the Philadelphia Eagles Keep Donovan McNabb?

Jamie Ellis — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 08:41:12 -0500

Philadelphia sports fans know the pain of losing all too well.

While the Cubs and Red Sox got all the attention for their long championship droughts, teams from Philadelphia have always been on the back burner.

And that should be expected.

We can’t even be the best at losing.

Over the past two championship-less decades, we have certainly seen our fair share of great stars. But we haven’t seen those stars reach their full potential and finally claim the ultimate prize. One of the biggest reasons for the city’s sports malaise has been its inability to build a winning team around a star athlete.

The fact that Philadelphia could not make champions out of Charles Barkley, Allen Iverson, and Eric Lindros is criminal. Some of the best and most talented players to play their games could not find the success they deserved in Philadelphia. We groomed them, we loved them, and we lost them. They got us close, oh so close, but never all the way to the top.

We could soon see history repeat itself in the form of our beloved Eagles very soon. Over the past seven years, Eagles fans have actually become spoiled. Hard to believe that a team that has never won a Super Bowl and hasn’t hoisted an NFL Championship trophy since the Eisenhower administration could have spoiled its fans, but it’s true. We expect the Eagles to make the big game every year, and when they don’t we want them to blow it up.

For much of the frustrating 2007 season, Donovan McNabb received the lion’s share of the criticism from fans and talk radio. And much of that criticism was deserved.

After starting the ’06 season looking as good as ever, McNabb abruptly got hurt once again and has yet to fully recover. The fans expected his recovery to be immediate, as if starting over a season is like hitting the reset button on a video game. Injuries take time to heal and the length of a single off-season sometimes isn’t enough.

So Donovan and the team were booed as the Eagles stumbled through a mediocre season. The fans called for his head. The media called for a trade. And the Ravens called to see if he wanted to play for them.

CBS announcers Kevin Harlan and Rich Gannon mused about the possibility of McNabb playing his last game for the Eagles prior to the beginning of the Eagles’ week 17 game against the Bills. Eulogizing the man before his demise, the announcers felt sure we were seeing the uninspired dénouement of a once great career.

Over Super Bowl weekend, the Baltimore Ravens came calling for what they thought was an available Donovan McNabb. With former Eagles defensive backs coach John Harbaugh now handling the head coaching duties, the Ravens felt poised to add stability to their foundering team by adding the once dynamic talent. They even gave a generous offer. The Ravens offer of the eighth overall pick in April’s draft was surprising given a recent NFL precedent. Daunte Culpepper was sent packing for a second round pick, and All-pro Randy Moss was exchanged for a fourth rounder. The Eagles should have jumped at the chance for a top-ten pick, right?

If the Eagles had cut ties with McNabb that week, or if they choose to make a deal before or after the draft, they will be making a crucial mistake. While the eight overall pick would certainly help any team, the Eagles would be committing themselves to a rebuilding program centered around former University of Houston star Kevin Kolb.

Kolb is an untested, and undeveloped rookie who would be in the spotlight of one of the most vicious media and fan networks in the country. Not only would Kolb’s metal be tested by the impatient sycophants who yearn for their team’s success, he would be playing in the same huddle as another ticking clock.

If McNabb were to leave we could easily look back on the past nine seasons of memories and division titles and place his name next to the Barkley and Iverson in the city’s recent sports history. A fantastic talent who was neither given the team, nor the time, to really flourish.

But another casualty from a divorce from McNabb would surely be the awe-inspiring talent of running back Brian Westbrook. A local project from Villanova University, Westbrook has not only emerged as an unlikely star in the NFL, but he may just be the best player in the league.

With running and cutting abilities reminiscent of some of the greats in history, Westbrook has the catching abilities of Ladanian Tomlinson, and the blocking abilities of Walter Payton. He has shown the skill to be one of the best returners in the game, and his team attitude has never been in question. Brian Westbrook has fulfilled every promise that Reggie Bush has failed to deliver. He is what Bush was supposed to be right now, and if the Eagles aren’t patient, they will be wasting one the best players the team has ever had.

At 31 years old, Donovan McNabb is certainly not the long-term answer for the Eagles. He will never deliver a string of championships the way Tom Brady or Joe Montana could, but he could certainly give us one. A dynasty would be great, but I’d certainly settle for one Super Bowl.

The window for the Eagles is closing, but it is not yet shut. When a team has a talent like Westbrook on offense, and an underrated defense keeping games close, the time to win is now. McNabb gives the Eagles their best shot at a Super Bowl and the fans deserve to give him at least one more shot at getting us there.