"THE TRADE" REVISITED

On November 9, 2008, I posted an article on this blogsite about the trade that sent Chauncey Billups to the Denver Nuggets and Allen Iverson to the Detroit Pistons. It was a transaction which will haunt the Motor City outfit forever. The Pistons’ failure to advance beyond the first round of the playoffs can be attributed to the lack of direction coming from the backcourt. AI was a no-show and they terribly miss the leadership which Billups consistently provided for the 2004 NBA champs.

The 33 year old Denver native led the Mile High City squad to second place over-all in the Western Conference while finishing with a strong 54-28 win-loss card while on the other hand, Iverson’s antics contributed to the anticipated downfall of the Motown five as they ended up with eight and final seed in the Eastern Conference with a woeful 39-43 slate.

The Nuggets’ surprising run in the current playoffs is really remarkable. Nobody gave them a second look when they trounced the New Orleans Hornets in the opening round, much more when they crushed the Dallas Mavericks in the West semis and of course, the ongoing nip-and-tuck series with the Los Angeles Lakers in the Conference finals. Billups is clearly the “heart and soul” of the team. His leadership on-and-off the court is clearly very evident on the way the Nuggets are playing in the post-season.

For Denver, “the trade” will forever be cherished and if they go on and gatecrash into the NBA finals, they only had to look back to November 2008 and really be thankful that Billups had become a Nugget once again.

*****

For all those hoping for a LeBron-Kobe face-off in the NBA finals, it may not come into reality. Instead, a Howard-Anthony clash in the Larry O’Brien series is looming in the horizon. Orlando had just taken a commanding 3-1 advantage over the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Finals and are a win away from making the championship series for the first time since 1995 during the Shaq-Penny days.

Meanwhile, the Nuggets are coming off from a 120-101 trashing of the Lakers that evened up the Western finals series at two games apiece. If Denver steals game five in LA then they have the chance to close out the series in game six at their home turf in Pepsi Arena. I am very sure commish David Stern is praying hard that both the Cavaliers and Lakers bounce back and win their respective series or else he had to be contented with the less-marketable Magic-Nuggets finale.