Allen Iverson Says It's "Bittersweet" to See How Freely NBA Players Express Themselves Today

Allen Iverson talks to Stephen Colbert about how it’s "bittersweet" to see today’s NBA players expressing themselves freely.

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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During an interview with Complex Sports back in March, Allen Iverson talked about the impact that he made on the NBA’s style during his career and pointed out that, while he wouldn’t wear most of the things that NBA players like Russell Westbrook wear, he likes the fact that they’re given the right to wear them.

"I have no problem with none of the things that players wear today," he said. "I wouldn’t wear it. I don’t have any problems with what these guys wear because they got their own style and their own originality. That’s the way it’s supposed to be, man. Everybody is their own person."

However, Iverson—who is widely credited as the player who caused the NBA to develop a dress code—appeared on The Late Show on Wednesday and talked about how it’s "bittersweet" for him to see NBA players express themselves as freely as they do today. Westbrook, LeBron James, Kevin Durant, and the rest of the league’s stars are allowed to wear just about anything they want, which is a freedom AI wishes he had when he was in the league.

"That’s a bittersweet thing for me," he told Colbert. "I took an ass-whoopin’ for these guys today to be able to be themselves. I wasn’t afraid to be who I am, and I didn’t think anything was wrong with it. I dressed like the guys I grew up with, I looked like the guys who I grew up with. And my cornrows, it was just because I was tired of going from city to city having different barbers cut my hair, and they were messing my hair up, and I was saying, 'If I get cornrows, I don’t have to have that problem.' And the tattoos, I’ve always had a fetish for it, but obviously you see in Georgetown, I only had one, and once I came into some money, that’s when it got addictive and I was able to afford it, so that’s how I got more and more."

Iverson went on to talk about how he believes many people judged him prematurely based on his style when he was in the NBA. It’s something he thinks continues even today.

"You can’t judge a book by its cover," he said. "I think a lot of times, when people who get a chance to meet me and be around me, they understand that I’m not the person that the media make me out to be. A negative Allen Iverson story is the greatest Allen Iverson story, for some reason. They don’t talk about what I do for the AIDS awareness, what I do for the Boys and Girls Club, what I do on Thanksgiving, giving out turkeys and giving out gifts on Christmas. They don’t talk about that stuff."

You can watch Iverson’s full interview with Colbert in the video above.

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