You Tube Gold: Alan Iverson Still Stuns

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It’s been awhile for many of us but if you never saw Allen Iverson in his prime get some popcorn. He was spectacular.

People forget what a phenomenal athlete Allen Iverson was. He could have been a Hall of Fame player in football if he hadn’t chosen basketball.

In high school, his reputation was damaged by a brawl in a bowling alley. He was convicted as part of it, a conviction that later proved to be unjust and was later overturned.

He served time over it though and it made it difficult for him to get offers from college coaches. John Thompson eventually signed him for Georgetown and Iverson proved he was special there. After two years he moved on to the NBA, where he was an electrifying figure from Day One, scoring 30 points in his debut.

He was misunderstood there too. The most famous quote from Iverson is about missing practice with the 76ers. What a lot of people didn’t realize at the time was that a close friend had been murdered. What was practice compared to that?

As an NBA player, Iverson was unstoppable. He played with immense energy and heart, doing things that a 6-0 guard should never be able to do.

This video features 10 of his best plays ever and a couple literally make you just stop and go what did I just see?

But the last one is pretty great because he just embarrassed the great Michael Jordan before hitting a jumper on him.

Iverson was and we’re sure still is a complex figure, but whatever else you can say about him you have to say this: no one ever played harder, or gave more of himself to the game, than he did.