![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/11\/iversonpic27_t210.jpg\")
He has been welcomed by millions, embraced by a star-starved Istanbul as the star-crossed superstar that he once was \u2013 and hopes to one day become\u00a0again.<\/p>\nISTANBUL, Turkey \u2013 In Turkey, Allen Iverson has brought basketball to the\u00a0masses.<\/p>\n
He has been welcomed by millions, embraced by a star-starved Istanbul as the star-crossed superstar that he once was \u2013 and hopes to one day become\u00a0again.<\/p>\n
Visions of AI billboards (sipping a Turkish soda, perhaps?) dance in one\u2019s\u00a0imagination.<\/p>\n
He is the fresh prince of this ancient\u00a0city.<\/p>\n
This is reality \u2026 is it\u00a0not?<\/p>\n
Not\u00a0really.<\/p>\n
That depiction is distorted. On game night inside BJK Akatlar Arena \u2013 home court of Iverson\u2019s new team, the Besiktas Cola Turka Black Eagles \u2013 the image of Iverson hysteria is pure and true, but the arena seats 3,200 in a city of about 13\u00a0million.<\/p>\n
Iverson is not a sensation here, but rather an exciting curiosity for small pockets of basketball fans, playing for a club that doesn\u2019t even compete in Euroleague, Europe\u2019s most\u00a0prestigious.<\/p>\n
The 76ers\u2019 former all-everything guard is broke \u2013 by all accounts except his own \u2013 and playing in Istanbul for a number of reasons, none of which is to become an ambassador for Turkey\u2019s solid, but often overlooked, pro\u00a0league.<\/p>\n
In early November, Iverson signed a two-year, $4 million contract with Besiktas, then missed his original flight to Istanbul, got on a plane two days later, and scored 15 points in his Besiktas debut on\u00a0Tuesday.<\/p>\n
On Sunday, Besiktas lost 74-67 to crosstown rival Fenerbahce Ulker, whose point guard is former Temple star Lynn\u00a0Greer.<\/p>\n
The Blue Mosque, Spice Market, and Grand Bazaar are all about a half-court heave in any direction. The streets are cobblestone, the newspapers filled with soccer, the restaurants\u00a0packed.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s Istanbul\u2019s tourist district, where the waiters know English and the cabbies know every switchback in every\u00a0road.<\/p>\n
No one knows Iverson. Not\u00a0one.<\/p>\n
A waiter, flipping through pictures on his touchscreen phone and singing Usher, tilts his head when asked about\u00a0Iverson.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere\u2019s that?\u201d he finally asks, more curious than confused, as if \u201cAllen Iverson\u201d is a new nightclub he\u2019d like to check\u00a0out.<\/p>\n
Never\u00a0mind.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn that area, they may not know,\u201d said Ismail Senol, an announcer for NTV Spor, which broadcasts Turkish Basketball League games. \u201cIt\u2019s a financial thing. In rich areas, they know Allen Iverson because NBA TV, they have to pay for it and then are interested in it. In some places they\u2019ll know him, in some places they don\u2019t know\u00a0him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maybe Greer can\u00a0explain.<\/p>\n
On Saturday, his Fenerbahce team practiced just ahead of Besiktas inside BJK Akatlar Arena. Greer, pausing to say hello to Iverson as he walked onto the court, did just\u00a0that.<\/p>\n
\u201cSoccer is way up here.\u201d Greer raised his hand as if talking about someone quite tall. \u201cAnd basketball \u2013 some people like\u00a0basketball.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s unbelievable,\u201d Greer said. \u201cLast season, our soccer team used to have 55,000 at their games and then at the basketball games, we\u2019d get like\u00a02,000.\u201d<\/p>\n
So using Greer\u2019s example, thousands care that Iverson is here \u2013 maybe one in every few\u00a0thousand.<\/p>\n
Iverson has been selective in granting interviews. At first, he talked only to\u00a0HBO.<\/p>\n
After Friday evening\u2019s practice, Iverson neither declined nor confirmed an interview request and merely walked toward the locker room after saying, \u201cI need to shower.\u201d A few minutes later, he left a handful or reporters interview-less, which was not\u00a0unexpected.<\/p>\n
A similar source explained that Iverson is broke, plain and\u00a0simple.<\/p>\n
Over his NBA career, including his lucrative deal with Reebok, Iverson made over $100\u00a0million.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s very surprising,\u201d Besiktas teammate Mire Chatman said of Iverson\u2019s signing. \u201cI was a big fan of his. He paved the way for a lot of scoring point guards. Now that he\u2019s here, I just want to help him adjust to the European\u00a0basketball.\u201d<\/p>\n
Whether he\u2019s here for money or for a second chance \u2013 and the likelihood is it\u2019s a combination of the two \u2013 Iverson appears genuinely happy during\u00a0practices.<\/p>\n
Greer has seen Iverson\u2019s influence on Turkish\u00a0basketball.<\/p>\n
\u201c<\/p>\n
Now, Greer said, instead of the 10-page Turkish sports section filled with 10 pages of soccer, there is often one page reserved for Iverson, which is one more than\u00a0usual.<\/p>\n
via Iverson: Turkish curiosity – Spokesman.com – Nov. 27, 2010.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ISTANBUL, Turkey \u2013 In Turkey, Allen Iverson has brought basketball to the\u00a0masses. He has been welcomed by millions, embraced by a star-starved Istanbul as the star-crossed superstar that he once was \u2013 and hopes to one day become\u00a0again. Visions of AI billboards (sipping a Turkish soda, perhaps?) dance in one\u2019s\u00a0imagination. He is the fresh prince […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":27063,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3996],"tags":[3997],"class_list":["post-27061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport","tag-iverson"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}