Sixers, Like 1980 Pistons, In A Quandry

Superstar basketball player declares he no longer wants to play for his team. He forces the hand of management, for the team of which he's been a part for nearly 10 years. So the entire league is aware that Superstar wants to be traded, and the list of suitors varies, sometimes daily. Where will he go? Where WON'T he go?

This was the scenario in January 1980, when Bob Lanier made it very known that he no longer wanted to play for the Pistons. The team had a new GM, Jack McCloskey, and he was hit between the eyes, almost as soon as he took the job in December 1979, with the Lanier trade demand.

The drama droned on, into February.

Finally, McCloskey had his taker for the giant Bob Lanier: he sent the center to the Milwaukee Bucks for
Kent Benson, and what McCloskey really wanted -- a #1 pick in the 1980 draft. It wasn't all that good of a deal, truthfully, but the Pistons were in dire need of draft picks, their cupboard being left bare after the horrific Dickie Vitale Era.

The Philadelphia 76'ers find themselves in a similar quandry today, engaging in a very public divorce with potential Hall of Fame guard Allen Iverson. Every day, every hour almost, there is a new destination for
Iverson. Golden State. Charlotte. Sacramento. Dallas. And others.

The allure of imagining Allen Iverson in a Pistons uniform is fun, and as long as he remains untraded, there'll always be scenarios tossed out for consumption. Hardly any of them will make sense, but it's great fun over a frothy drink and some pretzels.

It can't possibly be a good bargaining position for the Sixers, when it is known with 100% certainty that Iverson won't play one more minute for them. Philly management will say that they can wait for the best offer, but it still can't be a position of strength, when other GMs know that a deal has to be made sooner or later.

Iverson's locker, it is said, has been cleaned out, and his image has been removed from the team's pregame highlight reel. All that's left is for the papers to be signed. Too bad there wasn't a pre-nup.

The Sixers are 5-15, after a 3-0 start. It can be argued that they are the worst team in the NBA -- worse even than the Charlotte Bobcats, to whom Iverson supposedly nixed a trade, and worse even than the Atlanta Hawks or Toronto Raptors, the league's yearly bottom feeders. The Pistons in early 1980 were flat bottom -- eventually finishing with an unsightly 16-66 record. After Lanier was dealt to the Bucks, his new team got hot and won its division. For the next few seasons, the Milwaukee Bucks were legitimate title contenders. The Pistons? They struggled for one more season, then they drafted Isiah Thomas and Kelly Tripucka. They struggled no longer -- even long after Lanier retired.

So all is not lost for the 76'ers. It just seems that way.