Was noticing during that fantasy draft thing on TNT Saturday night that there was a lot of laughter and overall dismissal of Kenny Smith's 'selection' of Clyde Drexler. Then when they were showing the judges for the dunk contest, when they zeroed in on Clyde, there was total silence, and when it moved to the next guy, the panel immediately started commenting. WTH is that all about? To me, Drexler is one of the most underrated players in NBA history. Did he do something to piss people off?
^ That's great, but Charles wasn't the one laughing, I believe it was Webber. And Barkley wasn't the only one on the panel who was silent at the dunk contest.
Was it!? Thanks! It was just a possible explanation of why one of the people there might not like him.
freak - my impression is that clyde is known as an anomaly- aloof, spaced out, and more "mysteriously effective" than traditionally hardworking and inspirational. He allegedly showed up to games and practices when-the-frick ever, made team functions - meetings, planes, etc - very late (Rudy never came down on him) - sorta irritated most everyone by not being an easy teammate- Dream included. He was apparently nice but very entitled. not personally rude, but a weird ballplayer to have on your team. on the curious contrary, apparently vernon maxwell was actually a great guy to have around when he was not flipping out - very loyal and committed, strange as it may sound. As a bonus, clyde's fundamentals were terrible - dribbling with his head down watching the ball, taking off with the wrong foot, out-of-nowhere passes, weird basketball rhythm, etc. Nothing traditional to let other guys know what he was up to. Some players could deal (mario / chucky / hakeem) but others thought he was just insane (Cassell) and did not like playing with him. thats my understanding, anyway.
I think players around the league have respect for him and what he did in his career, I mean he is a hall of famer after all. But once you hear him talk he really throws you off with the things he says... maybe that's why players avoid him.. :grin:
I thought Clyde was highly respected in Portland. I may be wrong though. I think it was when he went to Houston then that he was characterized as a difficult teammate. I do remember even Hakeem had problem with you. That's kind of weird. You would think that coming back to his hometown and with his old college teammate would be easy. In fact, I had always thought that Clyde sort of took care of Olajuwon at UH.
Lol, this is funny. I frequently think Clyde is insane when listening to his commentary. Houston fans of course appreciate his talents and what he did for us...but I don't blame others for not liking him.
But the guy who made the thread said they were laughing at Kenny for picking Drexler in a fantasy draft. That would seem to have nothing to do with how Drexler talks. I guess maybe they could be letting their off-the-court perception of him cloud their judgment of how he played. I don't know...
Nice info. I just think he should be respected more. There haven't been many guys since he played to lead a team to such great records and multiple Finals appearances (when that was hard to do, not like JKidd in NJ). Certainly Barkley, Miller, or Webber didn't do that. McHale lived off of Bird, Kerr off of Jordan. These were the guys on the panel. Even Stockton and Malone had each other. Clyde had Terry Porter. It's becoming clear from this thread that a lot of people on this site only know him from his broadcasts.
I doubt there were any real problems between Olajuwon and Drexler. Drexler introduced/presented Olajuwon at the Hall of Fame. Hakeem didn't have to pick him. I can buy that he was/is aloof, however.
