Brown just may wander out of game

[Jimcs50]

Nov. 30, 2004, 1:29AM

Brown just may wander out of game
By JOHN P. LOPEZ
Copyright 2004 Houston Chronicle

Pistons coach Larry Brown has been called nomadic. He's been called mercenary.

The truth is, Brown has been more the wondering man than the wandering man.

He never has stopped searching for the past. He has chased this thing to New Orleans, North Carolina, Denver, Los Angeles, New Jersey, Kansas, San Antonio, Los Angeles again, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, Detroit, virtually any place that offered hope.

He has searched for some kind of indicator that the game of basketball — and more significantly, its players — would return to a time when CDs were where you kept your money, pub was where you rehashed the night's game and bounce was a pass, not a showboating strut upcourt after a dunk.

I once asked Brown why he never wrote a basketball book like so many other coaches, the majority of whose stories would pale in comparison to the thousands Brown knows.

"No one would buy it," Brown said. "It wouldn't be a tell-all. It would be a how-to."


From summit to letdown
His life's work has been more instruction manual than tabloid. Brown endlessly scribbles on the backs of restaurant napkins in search of the inbounds pass or post-up play that will unlock all the secrets.

He calls coaching friends almost every day to vent, complain and wonder what happened to the players he knew.

He can walk into a gym — any gym — and help players cut better, set screens better and move without the ball better. If only they'll listen.

Last spring, the Pistons did, and it was a beautiful thing to watch as they danced around Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant on the way to the NBA championship. But that may well have been as close to basketball bliss as Brown will ever get.

Just weeks after winning the NBA le, Brown took on the so-called U.S. Olympic Dream Team, and it became a nightmare. Everyone was on his own, with personalities and egos trumping everything Brown tried to teach. Beautiful basketball usually was played only by the opposition. Throughout the Athens Games, stories of Brown's frustration and player bickering abounded.


Palace episode repulsive
Then came the staggering scene at the Palace of Auburn Hills 11 days ago, when the Pistons' Ben Wallace and Indiana's Ron Artest, Stephen Jackson and Jermaine O'Neal were at the epicenter of possibly the lowest moment in NBA history.

That it all unfolded in front of Brown should not be lost on anyone who cares about the game and knows what it has meant to Brown for more than four decades.

The chase finally may have ended that night in Michigan.

Brown may well call it a career soon, walking away shaking his head, aghast as he is wont to be, successful in so many ways but falling short in his mission to reconnect players to the past.

Sure, Brown spends the majority of his time talking about cups that are half-empty. Calling Brown despondent is somewhat redundant. It's his way to whine for fear of coming across boastful, so it might be easy to figure his moaning over the Pistons-Pacers debacle will pass.

But the Palace fight was not so much the beginning of the end of Brown's coaching career as much as it was perhaps the last straw.

In the wake of the Athens Games, Brown, 64, hoped to return to a Pistons squad that would re-energize his faith in team-first basketball. Instead, the Pistons were crumbling long before Artest leaped into the stands.

Coming into tonight's game at Toyota Center against the Rockets — Brown's first road game since he underwent his second hip-replacement operation, which could be another factor in his contemplating retirement — the Pistons are 6-7.

Worse, even before they were hit with the suspensions resulting from the Palace melee, the Pistons were a s of the team that won the le. The selfless, defensive-minded machine that once was Detroit began disintegrating from the start. The suspensions only made it worse.

Cleveland's LeBron James torched the Pistons for 43 points, which is bad enough. Denver's Earl Boykins hit for a career-high 32 before that. Carmelo Anthony scored 34.

Brown recently has spoken about the game's no longer being fun for him and his discouragement over the sense of en lement players have. Coming from Brown, who says "I can't coach these guys" the way most say "good morning," the words might not seem so significant.

But he has just about had it.

Who knows if Brown will ever write that book? But I know the le if he does: The Extra Pass.

He has chased this ultimate sign of giving it up for the team until, perhaps, he has no chase left in him. He has preached of walking away from scrapes and avoiding trouble because players must behave for the sake of the game.

He's been ridiculed in arenas from coast to coast. He's had beer spilled on him and guacamole dumped on his head. He's been shoved and punched on the court. He's gone nose to nose with opposing coaches and his own players. And now, after the incident at the Palace, he's seen everything.

A nomad? No. Brown just never found the pure and selfless players he once knew. He could finally be realizing that he never will.

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[Jimcs50]

Some reasons why Larry is sick of today's game:


First we have Latrell Sprewell, earning about 15 million this season and seeking a contract extension from the Minnesota Timberwolves, said he has a family to feed. Public relations-wise, this compares favorably to when Marie Antoinette, after being told people had no bread during the French Revolution, was said to have remarked, "Let them eat cake."
Sprewell's annual expenses break down as follows: gasoline for his 3 Hummers ($4.4 million),cell phone bill, ($3.2 million) hair styling, ($1.9 million)dry cleaning, ($1.7 million) jewelery, ($1.35 million) petty cash for posse, ($1.1 million) tattoo maintenance, ($500,000) groceries for family, ($15,550) NBA League Pass, four payments of ($47.25).

Then we have Labron James' longtime girlfriend gave birth last month to a boy, aptly named LeBron Jr. James, 19, was excused from the Cavaliers briefly to visit mother and child and reportedly dropped off a pair of Nike Air Generation Low basketball shoes for the tyke.
The All-Star team you could put together amongst NBA players who have fathered children out of wedlock would be, well, stunning. I mean, we could end America's Olympic basketball woes by just trucking out these daddies in 2008. Geez, they can run the floor, fill the lane and take it to the rack!
At the recent American Music Awards in Los Angeles, the Lakers' Kobe Bryant, who lives and works in L.A., was booed. How does an NBA All-Star get booed at an entertainment show? That would be like Bill Gates getting heckled at a dental convention.
Heck, I know Kobe is selfish, takes too many shots, ran Shaq out of town and hangs with Jim Gray and but it's not like he got us into a war halfway around the world or rushed into the stands and rabbit-punched the Olsen twins. My goodness, on any given day in L.A., most married men wake up, get dressed and drive home — and these people are passing judgment on Kobe????

The Raptors' Vince Carter told the Toronto Sun, "I don't want to dunk anymore." Vince Carter doesn't want to dunk anymore? That's like Bill Clinton swearing off self-infatuation. That's like TPark turning down dessert at The Golden Corral. That's like Papa John giving up pizza.
I'd call this a midlife crisis, except Carter's not in midlife and NBA players only consider it a crisis if they leave their PlayStation 2 on the plane.

[ducks]

spree is not even on the pistons

larry is a quitter

wanted to run from the sixers to

[ducks]

holt also says he quit on spurs
larry says he was fired

[exstatic]

Holt wasn't even here when Larry was, ducks.

[timvp]

LB is a nomad.

He did a good job winning a championship on a team put together by Joe Dumars and taught how to play by Rick Carlisle.

[adidas11]

Bingo

[Spurminator]

Larry is a very good coach, but he has a niche... He'll never be the kind to build a team to greatness from the ground up (same with Phil Jackson) but he has been excellent throughout his career at getting the best from the players he has.

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

It would be a how-to

Like how to win a gold medal with some of your best players on the bench because "they're young"?

[ShoogarBear]

My goodness, on any given day in L.A., most married men wake up, get dressed and drive home ? and these people are passing judgment on Kobe????