In the wake of the drama surrounding the validity of claims made in the Allen Iverson book “Not a Game: The Incredible Rise and Unthinkable Fall of Allen Iverson” about Iverson being drunk at the time of the infamous practice rant, AI’s fatherlike former coach Larry Brown is denying all claims that he told author Kent Babb that AI was clearly intoxicated.
Babb went on a radio show to reinforce the claims made in the book after Iverson and Stephen A Smith came out to blatantly deny such reports. Babb stated that it was Larry Brown who informed him that Iverson was drinking in the moments before ‘Practice-gate’. Here’s Babb’s statements made on-air last week:
“Larry Brown told me that [Iverson] disappeared and came back, was slurring, red eyes, all this stuff,” Babb told the Innes and Bruno Show on 94WIP yesterday. “If you look at the video now, especially knowing it, you could tell.”
After the radio comments went viral Larry Brown got wind of this and told The Big Lead what actually went down that day when he confronted Iverson.
“That’s a total lie!” Brown told The Big Lead. “I’ve told this story to over 100 people and said it in many interviews. Allen was supposed to meet me in my office for exit interviews at 3 pm. The clock hit 3, he didn’t show up, so I go down to my car to leave. And Allen pulls up. And he’s mad at me that I’m leaving. We didn’t have a shouting match, but we had a discussion. My tone wasn’t off the charts.”
“But all he wanted me to do was tell him he wasn’t being traded. I did that. And then I never saw him again that day. So I don’t know where the ‘red eyes’ and ‘slurring’ comes from. I never said he was drunk when we spoke in the parking lot.”
Babb never mentioned the ‘red eyes’ and ‘slurring’ parts in the book, but in his radio interview to back up his drunken AI claims he mentioned it verbally. Babb would later also contact The Big Lead to admit he embellished in the radio interview owning up to the mistake saying he “misspoke”.
Babb and Brown have met since the back-and-forth claims and in their latest sit-down they butted heads on Babb’s report that Brown made a drinking motion as if to symbol that AI was drunk when Babb first interviewed him for the book, which he tape recorded at the time.
“I would say 1,000 percent that I didn’t give that motion. I’ve done interviews about the events leading up to the press conference for at least 10 years now. I don’t think I’ve ever told anybody he was drunk.”
Currently it’s Babb’s word against Brown’s on if a drinking motion was made or not. But it’s worth noting that even though Brown wasn’t present and because the only time they met in the moments leading to the rant was in a parking lot and briefly, it’s not enough to conclusively refute or back up the story–which feels like an urban legend of sorts.
What do you think?