By Jeff Moss
June 17, 2012
DetroitSportsRag@gmail.com
I really didn’t want to write a column regarding the recent tempest in a teapot surrounding the 20-year anniversary of the “Dream Team” that was manufactured out of thin air by an NBA TV documentary commemorating their obnoxious gold medal performance.
But after reading Vincent Goodwill’s overly emotional and completely one-sided recollection of the events that led to Isiah Thomas being unceremoniously left off the 1992 US Men’s Olympic basketball team and Drew Sharp’s column idiotically suggesting Team USA give Zeke a gold medal 20 years after the fact, I figured I would reluctantly throw in my two cents.
Look, I want to preface what I am about to write by stating that I LOVED Isiah Thomas when he was a member of the Pistons. The 1989 NBA championship was the second Detroit title I was able to witness personally and after “There’s a steal by Bird underneath to DJ who lays it in” and the phantom foul on Bill Laimbeer in 1988, that initial Pistons crown was about as gratifying as it gets.
Hell, after years of trials and tribulations leading up to the Game 4 sweep of the Los Angeles Lakers, for Pistons fans the evening of June 13, 1989 can only be compared to Tim Tebow’s eventual wedding night and Isiah was the main reason it all went down.
Isiah Thomas is still my favorite Detroit Piston player of all-time and probably will remain that way in perpetuity.
With that said, I totally understand why he wasn’t invited to participate on the 1992 “Dream Team” and not only does it not bother me 20 years later as a Pistons fan, I sort of revel in the fact that Thomas was so hated that he was shunned.
I mean, if you want to play the role of the ASSHOLE sometimes there are ramifications to that behavior. Being this town’s Public Enemy #1 in relation to the Detroit sports media crowd, I can somewhat relate to Isiah’s plight.
Would I like these jackholes to CREDIT me when they steal my ideas from this space and use it for their own programs or columns? Would I enjoy the opportunity to debate morons like Pat Caputo and Terry Foster on “Sportsworks” and provide the site a larger audience?
Of course I would, but it isn’t going to change my behavior on the DSR because I view these shitheads as my ENEMIES and I am not about to play nice with them so I can get invited to their little parties.
Sean Baligian told me just the other day that most of the mainstream media in Detroit consider me to be a pariah. And the guy thought he was telling me this as a COMPLIMENT.
The following is the dictionary definition of the word, “pariah”:
1. an outcast.
2. any person or animal that is generally despised or avoided.
Seriously, Baligian thought I would take that as a compliment.
And he was right, I did.
I learned a long time ago that when you choose to be a dick, don’t be surprised when people treat you as such.
And while Isiah’s media loyalists don’t seem to understand that when you wear the black hat sometimes you will be ostracized, Zeke himself seems to get it. Because of all the complaining about a slight that occurred TWENTY YEARS AGO, none of it has come from #11’s mouth.
When you agree with Dennis Rodman that if Larry Bird was black, he’d be just another ordinary player, don’t be shocked when Bird has an opportunity to exact revenge for that comment, he does so.
When you “allegedly” orchestrate the Michael Jordan/South Capitol Avenue Freeze-Out at the Hoosier Dome during the 1985 All-Star Game, don’t be stunned when MJ uses his power years later to deprive you of an Olympic roster slot.
Are we going to sit here and pretend that Thomas’s career (before 1992 and after) hasn’t been littered with fractured relationships that might cause his enemies to think he wouldn’t have been the best teammate in Barcelona?
Let’s ask Virg Jacques’ throat, Imad Denha’s cash register, the employees of Speedy Printing, the CBA and Anucha Browne Sanders about “Isiah the Angel’s” past relationships.
Or how about the man who treated Isiah like a son? Yep, Pistons owner, Bill Davidson, was ready to turn the keys to his franchise over to Thomas after the point guard’s retirement, but even Isiah couldn’t resist fucking up that association.
Instead of taking over the reins to HIS team, Isiah had to watch Mr. D pull a Miss Ellie and hire the “nice and moral brother”, Bobby Ewing, errr, I mean Joe Dumars to run the Pistons organization instead of Zeke.
Like, Isiah was so toxic that just TWO years after being left off the “Dream Team”, Bill Davidson stopped talking to him completely.
And Davidson wasn’t a fierce competitor of Isiah’s on the Bulls, Celtics or Lakers. No, he was a man who treated Isiah like a son, that won two NBA titles because of Zeke and whose presence helped him build a new, state of the art arena.
Terry Foster, Sharp and Goodwill can’t fathom why Bird, Jordan and Magic Johnson didn’t want Isiah to potentially fracture the 1992 Men’s Basketball team’s chemistry when the same dude burned every bridge including one with his own “adopted” father soon after he retired?
And why are we even celebrating the “Dream Team” in the first place? The entire exercise was ridiculous from the start and only occurred because the 1988 amateur team couldn’t win the gold.
So in response to the ’88 failure, the American Olympic contingent decided to field a team featuring Jordan, Magic, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, John Stockton, etc.
It was the equivalent of the Prime Minister of Luxembourg sending George Herbert Walker Bush a nasty letter and the President responding by dropping a hydrogen bomb on Pétange.
I didn’t even watch most of the “Dream Team’s” games back in ’92 because they weren’t compelling at all. Hey, we beat Lithuania by 51 points, YEAH!!!!! And you are talking to someone who would watch flies fuck if you labeled it an athletic event.
Sega Genesis actually made a “Dream Team” video game, which if not for “Space Shuttle” for the Atari2600, would have been considered the worst video game ever produced.
Even a kid with Cerebral Palsy and the worst eye-hand coordination in the world couldn’t select Team USA and lose to Brazil.
I mean, even that black kid who trashed Turtle in the gamer challenge on “Entourage” couldn’t have defeated the “Dream Team” with Angola on “Preseason Level.”
It sucks that Isiah never won a gold medal representing his country at the Olympics. First, because of Jimmy Carter’s boycott of the Moscow games in 1980 and then because he pissed off a majority of the 1992 participants who didn’t want to hang out with him in Spain.
But I am guessing that Isiah didn’t attempt suicide in 2009 [ALLEGEDLY] because of either event.
So can we stop with all of the hand wringing about the hypocrisy of David Stern, His Royal Airness, Ervin Johnson and that piece of shit Scottie Pippen?
Who the hell cares?
I love it that the Bad Boys were considered the Black Sheep of the NBA. I rejoice in the fact that Michael Jordan hated those teams so much that he labeled them bad for basketball.
And I think it is hilarious that Isiah was viewed as such a PARIAH™ (Jeff Moss) that not only was he left off the “Dream Team”, but that 20 years later his absence was the biggest story to come out of this documentary.
When you play the role of the villain, you can’t just turn it off like a spigot when it benefits you.
Isiah wanted to pummel you at all costs and if winning meant not telling his beloved mother to look up at a downed Detroit Edison power line, he probably would have napalmed that bridge also.
We loved the Bad Boy era of Pistons basketball because we were viewed as outcasts, dirty and deplorable. Instead of crying about Thomas’s snub, I would advise you CELEBRATE it like I am doing.
Did you ever see Kevin Nash or Scott Hall whine about being left off the 1996 US Olympic Wrestling Team in Atlanta? (The home of Turner Broadcasting, mind you?)
Exactly.
Bad Boys 4 Life.