\jeff{krimmel}

Allen Iverson on Practice

I recently joined an intramural softball team, and we have our first practice this evening. I haven’t been to a true practice for a semi-organized sports team in many, many years. The first thing I thought about when I realized I would be going to practice is the news conference with Allen Iverson from the spring of 2002 when he repeatedly mentions that “we talkin’ about practice, man”.

I remember either watching the news conference live or getting a same-day repeat of it on ESPN. It might be the single most memorable news conference in the history of sports. Well, if it’s not the most memorable, it has to be the funniest. Allen Iverson is incredulous that members of the sports media want to ask him about practices he supposedly has or hasn’t missed. For those who don’t know, Allen Iverson butted heads quite often with his head coach at the time, Larry Brown. Coach Brown would often criticize Iverson for his lack of hustle, or lack of attendance, at team practices.

Here’s the video clip from YouTube, with my own transcript below. My absolute favorite part is Iverson’s very last statement. Well, it’s actually a question. Enjoy, this whole thing is a classic.

Anybody tell you that I miss practice, if, if, if, if a coach say I miss practice then y’all hear it, then that’s that. I mean, I might have missed one practice this year. But if, if somebody say, “He doesn’t come to practice”, it can be one practice, out of all the practices this year. That’s enough.

(cut in news conference footage)

If I can’t practice, I can’t practice, man. If I’m hurt, I’m hurt. I mean, simple as that. It ain’t about that. I mean it’s, it’s not about that at all, you know what I’m sayin’? I mean, but it’s, it’s, it’s easy to, to talk about, it’s easy to sum it up when you just talk about practice. We sittin’ here, I supposed to be the franchise player, and we in here talkin’ about practice. I mean, listen, we talkin’ about practice. Not a game, not a game, not a game…we talkin’ about practice. Not a game. Not a, not a, not the game that I go out there and, and die for and play every game like it’s my last. Not the game. We talkin’ about practice, man. I mean how silly is that? Man, we talkin’ about practice. I know I supposed to be there. I know I supposed to lead by example. I know that. And I’m not, I’m not shoving it aside, you know, like it don’t mean anything. I know it’s important. I do. I honestly do. But we talkin’ about practice man. What are we talkin’ about? Practice? We talkin’ about practice man. (laughter from members of the press) We tal…we talkin’ about practice. We talkin’ about practice. We ain’t talkin’ about the game. We talkin’ about practice man.

(now addressing one particular member of the press)

When you come in the arena, and you see me play, you see me play don’t you? You see me give everything I got, right? Well, we talkin’ about practice right now. We talkin’ about pra…Man, look, I hear you. I, it’s funny to me too. And I mean it’s strange, it’s strange to me too. But we talkin’ about practice, man. We not even talkin’ about the game, the actual game, when it matters. We talkin’ about practice.

(inaudible question from member of the press)

How the hell can I make my teammates better by practisin’?