Allen Iverson isn’t an early riser, but he went to full alert fast Sunday when Gary Moore, his manager, awakened him with a phone call.
“I got the call at like 8 or 9 o’clock in the morning,” he said after a two-day whirlwind was winding down to conclude his introduction as a Detroit Piston at a Palace press conference Tuesday afternoon. “I don’t usually get up that early, but it woke me right up. It was just good news. I was happy to hear it.”

Happy because the destination was wholly unexpected. Iverson figured a trade was coming. Denver barely made the playoffs last season, then had to give Marcus Camby away over the summer to lessen its luxury tax burden, and a rebuilding around young Carmelo Anthony seemed afoot. But he never dared to dream it would be to Detroit.

“I knew it was possible I could get traded, but when you think about that, you’re always thinking the worst. When he told me what team it was, I had to ask him to repeat himself. And I was just very happy.”

The marriage of Allen Iverson and the Pistons – his debut should come against Toronto on Wednesday night if the ex-Pistons sent to Denver pass their physicals – won’t be without the typical awkward transitional surprises, but there are any number of reasons to expect it to be mutually rewarding for however long it lasts.

It’s the best team Iverson has ever enjoyed.
“When I was in Philadelphia, I was double-teamed, triple-teamed a lot,” he said. “With this squad, it will be hard for teams to get away with that, trying to take me out of the basketball game. It’s all about just being a basketball player and being willing to sacrifice whatever I have to sacrifice for the betterment of the team.

“When you look at how many offensive weapons we have on this squad, a lot of people might doubt, but it will show what type of basketball player I am and what type of team that we’re going to have. … It might not be peaches and cream in the beginning, but I’m pretty sure we can get it together and be a force to be reckoned with.

“I know the sky’s the limit for us.”

His mind-set fits perfectly with his new team’s collective psyche.
Michael Curry said last week the Pistons have earned the doubt that’s been cast upon them by national media analysts. Iverson, for all the individual accolades he’s accumulated over a brilliant 13-year career, knows the glaring hole on his resume is the lack of a championship.

“We think he’s going to fit in with exactly what we stand for here,” Joe Dumars said. “It’s all about winning, it’s all about being in the big dance at the end of the year and those are his goals along with ours. … Everybody knows what our goals are and Allen will explain to you what his goals are and you’ll see that those goals go hand in hand together.”

Iverson: “I want to be the piece that can get us over the hump. That would mean a lot to me in my career. I’ve done so many things in this league as far as being an All-Star, scoring champion, first-team All-NBA and things like that. But I haven’t accomplished my No. 1 goal and that’s to win a championship. Like I was telling Joe earlier today, I’m willing to sacrifice whatever I’m willing to sacrifice to get it done. I’ve tried it my way plenty of times. I’ve tried it different ways and it hasn’t been done.”

Iverson will find a kindred spirit in Michael Curry for his take-no-prisoners approach.
One of Curry’s constant themes since taking over for Flip Saunders last June has been to be the aggressor at both ends. Is there a more aggressive player at both ends than Iverson?

“That’s what I want to hear,” Iverson said when I relayed Curry’s be-the-aggressor theme. “That’s the best song I’ve heard all day.”

Yeah, Iverson is a gambler defensively, and maybe Curry will gently demand a little more accountability within the framework of team defense, but Curry also knows that gambling and creating havoc is one of Iverson’s great strengths, and he knows he’ll have a strong team defense behind him when his gambles miss, so don’t expect Curry to be in the least inflexible on that front.

Iverson, Rip Hamilton and Rodney Stuckey will put enormous pressure on opposition defenses.
At first blush, it makes perfect sense to wonder how Iverson and Hamilton will mesh. Hamilton’s game, after all, is heavily predicated on movement with the ball, which requires Hamilton to get the ball in the right place at the right time to be effective. Billups and Hamilton had developed extraordinary chemistry in six seasons as teammates. Iverson’s game is markedly different than Billups’. So how’s it going to work?

“They both have great basketball instincts,” Dumars said. “That’s the key. It’s not so much how you run plays or what the set is, it’s do you have basketball instincts. He has incredible instincts. He’s averaged seven, seven and a half assists.”

“I think it will be easy for me to mesh with Rip because of the style,” Iverson said. “I played against him so much and they run a lot of the things coach (Larry) Brown ran with us. I know about Rip coming off screens and where to get him the ball on the curls and flares. I don’t think it will be a problem.

“Those questions will always be there because it’s a new situation, it’s so different. It was the same thing in Denver when I went there. Could me and (Carmelo Anthony) mesh? And we proved we could. I think it’s just about being a basketball player and a lot about thinking the game, knowing how to play the game and knowing how to adjust.”

The Pistons have prided themselves in this era on their toughness. Who exudes toughness better than Iverson?
Iverson was asked during the press conference what he would have to do to earn the trust of teammates who, understandably, are feeling a little traumatized by losing two fraternity members in good standing in Billups and Antonio McDyess.

“The first thing is when we’re in the foxhole together and they look to the left and to the right and they see my face,” he said. “That’s the most important thing – just for those guys to know. They know what I’m about. I’ve played against those guys for years. They know what I bring to the table and vice versa.”

Chauncey Billups earned his nickname, Mr. Big Shot, with some incredible late-game heroics over his six-plus seasons as a Piston. His teammates knew they could count on him to be unflappable with the ball in his hands in the loneliest moments of the biggest games.

But if you were to poll NBA players on the five players they’d most like on their side down the stretch of a tight game, does anyone doubt that Iverson would show up on the majority of lists?

As Joe D put it, “He brings a certain stature with him that only a handful of guys can bring.”