Memphis' Allen Iverson to Start Season Off Bench Until He Proves He Can Finish

He got injured in training camp, did not play a single preseason game, and just played NBA-paced basketball for the first time in five months. He already does not care about stretching or warming up; he is 34 years old and has taken more hits than any NBA player maybe ever.

It was bound to happen. He was bound to suffer an injury that would affect his performance. Could the hamstring tear Iverson suffered during training camp change his career? You have to start wondering if even Iverson himself has lost confidence in himself. Let's hope he has not.

Well the Grizzlies, the team which Iverson signed with to prove everyone wrong by showing he can lead a team as an elite player, is going to start the season by bringing him off the bench.

As the Memphis Grizzlies revealed their new alternate uniforms Monday, coach Lionel Hollins was asked about the Iverson situation. Hollins said there is no choice but to bring Iverson off the bench at the start of the season. Hollins said there is no choice but to gradually work Iverson in.

"He hasn't had a chance to perform," Hollins said. "And when he does come back he'll be way behind with how we're doing things. So when he gets into a game, it'll be limited. That's probably where we'll wind up at the start of the season."

So there goes Iverson's revenge game against the Pistons. AI will probably come off the bench for the first four or five games. The Pistons are going to be running and playing basketball more freely with the addition of Ben Gordon.

Iverson is going to be coming off the bench. Weird, eh?

Both are things each side did not agree to do last season. If Detroit had played Iverson basketball the Piston's would be so successful and may have even appeared in the Eastern Conference Finals again.

Iverson would still be a Piston and none of this would happened. But no; Michael Curry was too stubborn to even try the experiment out and now it has ruined Iverson's reputation and changed the way people view him.

He will be coming off the bench and I am positive that AI would never have to come off the bench if Detroit had not put it in everybody's mind that Iverson is a guy who needs to come off the bench.

Iverson coming off the bench for the Grizzlies is understandable, because he has not played basketball for five months and was injured in the preseason and did not play a single preseason game.

At least it is not like the Pistons, who made him come off the bench despite sacrificing so many individual statistics for the Pistons. I do not think Hollin's will bring Iverson off the bench for more than five games.

Iverson has more points scored in his career than every Grizzlies player on the roster combined. He is one of the greatest players to ever play in the NBA and is arguably the best scorer in the game since MJ left.

AI is a first ballot Hall-of-Famer that has done so many things in this league which are being ignored because of his bad-boy image. A wise man once said: "Men lie, women lie, but numbers don't." Hollins is not going to bring Iverson off the bench for too long; he is much smarter than that and Iverson is too talented for that.