Was Allen Iverson the Most Overrated Player of All Time?

 Allen Iverson is undoubtedly one of the greatest scorers of all-time. A player averaging 26.7 for his career is extraordinary. Iverson was also considered to be the face of the NBA a decade ago. However, Iverson had many flaws in his game which media and fans did not want to recognize.

Although Iverson was a great scorer looking at his points per game average, he was not a very efficient player. The Answer shot a poor 0.425 field goal percentage in his career. It implies that his shot selection was poor, and he was a selfish player. Do not consider his assists averages, since it is normal for a player that loves to dominate the ball to get decent assist averages, which was Iverson’s case.

A lot of Iverson fans love to bring up his success in 2001 when debating about how overrated he was. Iverson’s 2001 was very successful, no doubt. He carried his team to the Finals and won the MVP. However, after his successful 2001 campaign, he only led his team past the first-round once.

Iverson had the chance to play with a young superstar in Carmelo Anthony, and that experiment failed. Despite having a great supporting cast in Denver, the Nuggets failed to make it past the first round the two years Iverson has played for Denver. Also, in the 2007 playoffs, Iverson shot an atrocious 37 percent from the field.

To make matters worse, the Denver Nuggets have made it to the Western Conference Finals the very year they had traded Iverson.

Once Iverson arrived to the Detroit Pistons—the mighty Pistons—who made the Eastern Conference Finals from 2002 to 2008, they were quickly transformed to a first-round team.

Iverson’s me-first attitude also cost the US team in the 2004 Athens Olympics. Iverson was the one who took the most shots and shot a terrible percentage. Iverson failed his team in an era when the US team had a dominating team on paper compared to other nations.

The Answer also clashed with many of his coaches and has had numerous controversial off-the- court incidents.

Iverson might be one of the most skilled individual players of all-time. When it came to showmanship, the Answer was a master. His trademark killer crossover was imitated by many kids at local courts. Although Iverson was a great showman and a great individual player, he had to be one of the worst team players of all-time.