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 Inside the NBA
Posted: Tuesday March 23, 1999 06:49 PM Rose Almost Gets the Point | Allen Iverson, Sixers Around The Rim The oft-fouled Shaquille O'Neal says he's ready to hurt somebody By Jackie MacMullan
That is no longer necessary. O'Neal, frustrated by what he says is a lack of respect from the NBA's front office, told SI last Thursday that he will not play in the 2000 Sydney Games. "I probably shouldn't say this, but I'm not going," said O'Neal. "They can find someone else. The NBA doesn't give me any respect. They say all the right things, but I won't believe them until they show me the same respect they show Karl Malone and Charles Barkley. Those guys can say whatever they want, and nothing happens to them. I say anything, and the league hits me with a fine. "If they think they're going to stop me from voicing my opinion by fining me, they're mistaken. I'm not a materialistic person. You can't shut me up with the threat of taking my money." The opinion O'Neal voices most vociferously is that he's getting hacked to death while refs look the other way. O'Neal, who is listed at 7'1" and 315 pounds, knows that all big men get abused on the blocks; he just wants a level playing field. "If they gave me every call I'm supposed to get, I'd average 60 points a night," O'Neal said. "I guess the NBA doesn't want me to average 60. I'm the only so-called superstar who gets absolutely no calls at home. One day someone is going to foul me, and I'm going to go crazy. It's going to happen -- soon -- because my [chronically injured] stomach muscles can't take much more." O'Neal said several doctors have told him the strained abdominal and groin muscles are injuries he'll have to battle for the rest of his career, largely because of the stress he puts on those areas of his body when he goes up strong with two or three defenders along for the ride. Last season, after missing 21 games with an abdominal strain, he sought the opinion of three specialists. Two recommended surgery, and the third recommended physical therapist Alex McKechnie, who now works with O'Neal periodically throughout the season. Granik has heard O'Neal's no-respect lament many times, yet he says it is disconcerting to hear the big fella is so upset that he's balking at making the trip to Australia next summer. "The last time I talked to Shaq about the Olympics was a year ago, and he indicated he was anxious to play," says Granik. "If he has changed his mind about playing, I can only hope he'll change his mind again before next summer." O'Neal would be a huge asset to the U.S. team. Amid this chaotic Lakers season, he has been the one constant. He was averaging 27.2 points and 11.3 rebounds a game through Sunday and had exhibited the kind of leadership many of his doubters said he could never provide. Among the issues O'Neal discussed in a wide-ranging interview was the Lakers' relationship with Dennis Rodman, who returned to the team on Sunday for a nationally televised game against Orlando. "I said from the beginning I wasn't going to be a babysitter," O'Neal said. "The first day Dennis didn't show up for practice, we were told he had personal problems. I left it at that. Then we hear he's here, he's there, he's in Las Vegas. So my job becomes keeping my guys focused on dealing with what we've got. "I will say this about Dennis: He's a hard worker. I might not agree with what he does off the court, but our front office says give him space because he's got personal problems -- whatever that means." On coach Kurt Rambis: "I used to hate him when I watched the Lakers. I thought he was dirty. But that was his role. He told me, 'Pat Riley said if I ever shot the ball, I'd never play again.' When Kurt took over, he let everybody know there'd be no nonsense and that we were going to run our asses off for two hours in practice. Before, it was practice 20 minutes, talk 30 minutes. [Former coach] Del Harris should have known better. In this era you can't give guys that kind of time to mess around. You gotta keep them busy." On executive vice president Jerry West: "I'm worried about him. I wish he could relax, take it easy. I know he's not happy. Jerry is like me. He likes people to act professionally. If Jerry West says he's tired, that he can't take it anymore and he's leaving, I'll accept that and stay. But if I feel he was forced out, or made to feel unwanted in any way, I am going to be very, very upset." On the Spurs' David Robinson: "I don't dislike him. David and I have gotten into it, but if I ever saw him off the court, in front of his family, I wouldn't have a bad thing to say. I'd show him respect. On the court, though, I've got to do what I have to do. Hey, this is the NBA. We're all actors. It's the World Wrestling Federation." On the Knicks' Patrick Ewing: "He's somebody I really don't like, especially since the lockout. Let me tell you this: Patrick and his Georgetown boys messed up the lockout. Georgetown is supposed to be a five-star university? Yeah, right. That's why he and 'Zo [Alonzo Mourning] were trying to play lawyer, trying to intimidate billionaires like [Portland owner] Paul Allen. Please." On his image: "So I like rap, and I do some movies. What does that mean? I'm not trying to be anything I'm not. I don't have a huge vocabulary. I barely passed the SATs. I'm not from a rich neighborhood. But I set my own kind of good example, because I have siblings, and I have a two-year-old daughter, and I'm not going to let them down." On his team: "We don't have any excuses now. We have the deadly shooter, the big man, the rebounder. I'm tired of hearing, 'They're so young.' I'm tired of hearing, 'Kobe is only 20 years old.' Let's show some heart. Let's just shut up and win."
Nowitzki Watch: Mavericks rookie Dirk Nowitzki is tired. His German pro team, Wurzburg, started its season last September, and he played for it until the NBA lockout was settled. After hastily packing his bags and flying to Dallas in January, he found one more piece of heavy baggage waiting for him: G.M. and coach Don Nelson had loudly and proudly predicted that Nowitzki would be Rookie of the Year. That's pretty hard to do when you don't get off the bench. After starting and playing generous minutes in the first month, the 7-foot Nowitzki fell out of the regular rotation in mid-February. He only started getting significant minutes again after forward Cedric Ceballos fractured both wrists on Feb. 25 and was lost for the season. This season has been a humbling one for the 20-year-old, whose performance against American players in a high school all-star game last year had the entire league buzzing about his mobility, range and soft touch. "We expected him to struggle some defensively," Nelson says. "What we didn't expect was for him not to be able to shoot the ball. It's hard to keep him on the floor when both of those things are going on." Teammates say Nowitzki's talent is evident in practice, but he still hasn't grasped the nuances of the game and looks as though he has tired legs. Nowitzki, who can't blame his rocky transition on a language barrier -- he speaks nearly flawless English -- says his original plan was to remain with Wurzburg for at least one more season before jumping to the NBA. That's what he told Celtics president and coach Rick Pitino, who was drooling over the young German after putting him through a private workout at a gym in Rome last summer. Nelson swung a draft-day deal for Nowitzki anyway, then persuaded him to visit Dallas, where he roped him in with the prospect of NBA grandeur. Did Nowitzki make the right decision? Would he have been better off playing a second year in Germany's pro league? Nelson insists that another year in Europe would only have fostered bad habits, but this baptism by fire has not done much for Nowitzki's confidence. "It has been tough," says Nowitzki, who played center once in Nelson's small lineup but is better suited to one of the forward slots. "I'm a bit too slow for the outside guys, and I'm a bit too weak for the inside guys. But I am young. I will get bigger and faster." NBA experts agree. In spite of his struggles, few -- if any -- are proclaiming Nowitzki a bust. "He should be judged no differently than any of the high school kids who made the jump," Nets general manager John Nash says. "Dirk is a terrific talent. He has size. He's going to be a factor. He'll get the attention of a lot of teams if Dallas ever wants to trade him." Nelson thinks Nowitzki most needs a minor attitude adjustment. "Dirk needs more of a sense of urgency," says Nelson. "It's not O.K. for him not to play well. It's not O.K. for him to wait a year or two." The reason the Mavericks cannot wait: They're coming off eight straight miserable seasons and already dealt away their 1999 first-round pick to acquire point guard Steve Nash from Phoenix. Nelson gambled that his team would be good enough this season to render the '99 pick only marginally useful, but Nash has been a disappointment, having shot only 35.9% from the floor while averaging 5.1 assists and just two turnovers through Sunday. "I never thought Steve would tighten up or press, but he has," Nelson says. "He wanted so much to run his own team, but now that he is, he's trying too hard." Nowitzki has tried to guard against making the same mistake. "I am learning every day," Nowitzki says, "and Coach Nelson comes up with something new for me all the time. We played Golden State, and he had me guard Muggsy Bogues. Muggsy only blew by me once. He's not so good a shooter, so I backed off him." So far the NBA has done the same to Nowitzki. And Nelson isn't saying who will get his vote for Rookie of the Year.
Breakthrough Pacer?: In a recent game against Washington, Indiana's versatile, 6'8" Jalen Rose bird-dogged point guard Rod Strickland from end to end on one possession, stuck a hand in the face of shooting guard Calbert Cheaney on another, and spent a good portion of the fourth quarter guarding 6'9" forward Juwan Howard on the blocks. "He's a can-do-everything athlete," Pacers president Donnie Walsh says, "Jalen is on the verge of being a topflight player." But what Rose would really like to be is a topflight point guard. That has been his goal since he entered the league with Denver in 1994. After struggling at the point and resisting a change of position, Rose was a study in untapped potential before breaking out last season for the Pacers ... at small forward. After an encouraging talk with coach Larry Bird at the end of last season about making the transition to full-time team quarterback, Rose spent much of his summer (and the entire lockout) prepping himself. The plan was to use Rose at the point when veteran Mark Jackson needed a breather and move last year's backup point, Travis Best, to the shooting guard spot alongside Rose. Bird implemented that strategy in the first week of the season, but both Rose and Best struggled in their new roles, and Bird, realizing that practice time was limited in this shortened season, scrapped the experiment and went back to his old rotation. "I think he just figured we didn't really need any big changes right now," says Rose. "As a competitor, I'm disappointed. I know I can do it. But I can't really worry too much about it." Rose is not hard up for minutes. He plays small forward, gets significant time at shooting guard and does spot duty at the point, where he has played well over the last month. "I'm not afraid to put him out there," Bird says. "We'll make sure he gets his minutes running the team. Jalen is a better player when he's interested. It's always better when Jalen has to guard a guy he thinks is a great player. When he thinks he's better than the player he's on, it sometimes makes for a long night." Therein lies Rose's biggest flaw: lack of focus. "That's the only thing holding him back," says Walsh. The Nuggets also felt that Rose lacked maturity. "When Jalen came into the league, he thought he was the second coming of Magic Johnson," says Dan Issel, president and general manager of the Nuggets, the team that drafted Rose with the 13th pick. "So there was no way he was going to consider playing any position but point guard." Last season, with Bird allowing him more freedom on the floor than any of his previous coaches had, Rose provided the kind of energy and moxie that has made him indispensable to the Indiana rotation this season. Now all the Pacers have to do is keep him under contract. Citing a change in the collective bargaining agreement that negates a restricted free agency clause in his contract, Rose believes he should be a free agent next summer; the Pacers think otherwise but have petitioned the league to allow them to redo Rose's contract. The matter is headed for arbitration, but Rose says he doesn't want to leave, and the Pacers want to keep him, so Walsh is optimistic about the outcome. "We want Jalen settled and happy," says Walsh. Allen Iverson, Sixers In a matchup of the NBA's two top scorers last Friday, league leader Allen Iverson outscored Shaquille O'Neal 41 to 23, had 10 assists to O'Neal's two and had three turnovers to O'Neal's five. Although 13 inches shorter and 150 pounds lighter than O'Neal, Iverson also outrebounded the Lakers center five to four. The Sixers won 105-90. Phoenix coach Danny Ainge finally did what almost any other coach would have done a month ago: benched struggling Rex Chapman (who was shooting 34.1% at week's end) and replaced him with athletic rookie Toby Bailey . Bailey, however, did nothing as a starter, so Chapman, who has battled hamstring and calf injuries all season, was back in the starting lineup after four games ... Here's one reason Minnesota signed Dennis Scott to a 10-day contract when Anthony Peeler went down: The team is last in the league in three-point shooting (24.4% through Sunday) ... The Lakers' trade for Glen Rice may work out for them eventually, but with Rice starting at small forward, Kobe Bryant moves to shooting guard, where he has been lit up by some of the league's top twos. (That's why recently fired L.A. coach Del Harris resisted playing him there.) There's another drawback to the move. Bryant, who had several double doubles in the first month of the season, doesn't rebound nearly as well from the backcourt, which means the Lakers have significantly downgraded their defense and rebounding at two spots ... Whispers out of Boston are that point guard Kenny Anderson , who was initially rejuvenated by his move to the Celtics, is the latest veteran to grow disenchanted with president and coach Rick Pitino 's my-way-or-the-highway control over the team. Issue date: March 29, 1999
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