http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/3516783.html PORTLAND, ORE. - For a moment, Derek Anderson has moved on. The Trail Blazers are in his past, no more than the next team on the Rockets' schedule. Then he thinks of what could have been, what should have been to his way of thinking. He remembers all the hopes and expectations he brought with him when he left the Spurs to sign with the Blazers in 2001, then just one year removed from the Western Conference finals. Before long, the anger and insult he felt last season is back. The excitement he had when he arrived in Portland had been wholly replaced with disappointment, unfulfilled optimism and a bitterness focused on general manager John Nash, whom he openly blames for the Trail Blazers' collapse and his own unsatisfying four seasons in Portland. "It could have been right," Anderson said before returning to Portland for the Rockets' game tonight against the Trail Blazers. "We had so much talent. We had every piece. Everything was good. We made the playoffs my first two years, and then John Nash got there and everything went south. His first two years, we didn't make the playoffs. Everything went wrong. We had chaos. We had legal, off-the-court problems. On the court, we didn't have any. He started trading guys, not playing guys, telling the coach what to do. It just went bad." Sole target of tirade A Trail Blazers representative said Nash was traveling and unavailable for comment Friday and Saturday. Anderson, however, said his dissatisfaction was solely with the Trail Blazers general manager. He praised former coach Maurice Cheeks, chairman Paul Allen and president Steve Patterson, a former Rockets general manager who had been the vice president of the Texans and Aeros before moving to the Blazers. His enmity for Nash, however, was so clear that when he was asked about former teammate Ruben Patterson's suspension this season, Anderson spoke of Nash. "It doesn't change," Anderson said. "Ever since the general manager, John Nash, got there, they stopped making the playoffs, having all these problems. "I'm out. I know what I want to say, but I'm out. I'm done with it. I just think the general manager, John Nash, has made the biggest moves, the biggest decisions. It falls to him. The owner (Paul Allen) is a great guy. Steve Patterson is a great guy. Everybody knows he's not the problem. It's John Nash." A season gone bad Anderson's resentment seems focused on last season when he says he was asked to go on the injured list though he was not hurt, then returned to the active roster only to be told that the Trail Blazers had chosen instead to play their younger players. But while Portland fell from 49-33 in Anderson's first season to 27-55 in his last, Anderson also seemed to feel that he and other players were unfairly blamed for arrests that earned the team the nickname Jail Blazers and polluted its relationship with the community. "You've got to make changes but don't do them to the people who were not doing anything," Anderson said. "They were doing stuff to people who weren't doing anything wrong: me, Nick (Van Exel). It just wasn't right. "I was never in trouble. I was never in trouble with the law. I was never late to anything. I didn't miss anything. If I didn't play well, fine, trade me for that. But don't tell me I'm the bad guy. He put it out there I was giving up. Now you can see, everybody sees, it was him. "I wasn't going to go back and forth with that guy. That's not who I am. But after a while, you have to stop disrespecting somebody. He was totally disrespecting everybody. He lied to them to their face. He's not a fair man, not a fair man at all." Anderson said that because he refuted Nash's public claim that Anderson had back spasms, Nash vindictively scuttled a proposed trade-deadline deal to the Rockets for Maurice Taylor and then kept Anderson from playing when he came off the injured list. "They said they would do it, then didn't," Anderson said of the proposed trade. "He did that on purpose. "He told me to go on the injured list because of my back then he told me to come back and they would play me. I came back, practiced, did everything, and they didn't play me. If they wanted to go young, fine, do that. But then he told me there was something wrong with my back. There was nothing wrong with my back. He put me through the ringer, there." Being paid by Blazers Anderson averaged a career-low 9.2 points on 38.9 percent shooting last season, playing in just 47 games. When the NBA offered teams a one-time option to cut a player to avoid paying a luxury tax on their salary, Anderson was released and the Trail Blazers agreed to pay the full $18.8 million owed on the two remaining seasons on Anderson's contract, voluntarily waiving their right to be rebated a portion of Anderson's Rockets salary. "Derek is the most loyal person I ever met," agent Tony Dutt said. "There was hurt there. It was just time to cut the ties and move on. Steve Patterson and Paul Allen have been nothing but professionals in the way they handled their business." With the Rockets, Anderson has started slowly, averaging 11.1 points on 38 percent shooting. But recently, he has seemed more confident and active. "I'm just trying to fit in," he said. "You just have to play hard to help this team get wins. Last year, I didn't play much. I didn't play much this summer. I'm just now getting in tune to basketball. But I think it is coming around. "They wanted to go a different way. Very few people get a chance to play for one team. The only things I miss are the fans and the people that treated me good. I'm just glad to get another chance to play." Glad, and still more than a little embittered. (I kinda feel sorry for DA now. Seems like he had a bad past like McGrady with his teams GM also.)
That guy has far more bitterness than anybody making 18.5 million dollars should ever have. I'll never understand that. How can you make that kind of money and still find things to complain about? I'd wake up every morning to see blue birds on my shoulder.
I'm sure you find things to complain about and others less privledged probably wouldnt understand it either. Thats just how it is and anyways, this is the NBA and guys want to win. But ya, he should move on because he's a Houston Rocket now!
So you make enough money .. . you shouldn't complain about anything? I mean . . we complain that athletes don't care then we complain when they obvious care alot .. . they cannot win the guy cared about winning . . . . If he had said. . . :honestly. . I got my 18.5 . . so I could care less if we won or lost" then you'd be b*tching about him not caring Rocket River
Well, it wouldn't bother me nearly so much if he was still in the situation, but he isn't. He's in Houston now. He no longer has to deal with John Nash. He's making a cool 20 million dollars and the Rockets are starting to play better. If he needs to vent about Nash, I'd expect he'd do it to his therapist, not a reporter.
Why not? The reporter asks. . . he answered Why is it classy to LIE, be EVASIVE aand deceptive when asked a questions rather than simply tell the truth When someone tells the truth about how they feel . . it is seen as . .wrong? Why is that? Rocket River
We all have to vent.......just b/c they make more money doesn't mean they can't vent. At least he didn't complain about not being able to feed his family.....cut the guy some slack.
If you're saying money should be the reason for him not talking, you're basically saying money can buy you out or shut you up. And that is just wrong. Apparently Nash was bad-mouthing DA by saying he was "giving up" when DA says he wasn't and instead was being forced to sit on the bench or have a mystery injury. I'd still be pissed, too. (assuming what DA says is all true, of course... )
[sarcasm]Anderson should just shut up since he makes all of that money. So what if his feelings are hurt, he got enough money to buy new ones. If Nash did bad mouth him, he can just rub some money where it hurts.[/end sarcasm]
Regardless of money, nobody likes to be projected to be something he is not, or in a condition that he is not. I wouldn't want the league and all the fans to believe that I was punished for being a "jail blazer", sitting out due to injuries that aren't true, despite the management insisting that it is-it has an influence on your future team, salary, etc. Generally, being projected as a loser, or being washed up, without proof. Whether that stuff is true, who knows?
He doesn't have to lie. He can simply say "That situation is behind me now. Now I'm just looking to help the Rockets win some games, and if I do that, anything bad that happened in Portland will be forgotten." There is no lie there. There is nothing evasive or deceptive involved. It is the truth. Come on, guys. He's a mediocre basketball player making 20 million dollars this season. Nobody else finds it ridiculous that he's still whining about how his old boss was mean to him and hurt his feelings? As to blasting players for not caring then blasting them when they obviously care - I blast players if they're not doing their job. If his boss tells him to sit on the bench for 18.5 million dollars, that's a job he ought to be able to handle. I'm sure most people would be jumping up for joy to do that job for 1/100th of that. And yes, Rocket River, I do think it's classier to abide by the rule our mothers taught us. If you don't have something nice to say.....
DA isn't the only player to blast Nash. As a matter of fact, wasn't the a blurb in the recent Quitten article where Scottie critisizes him. The situation up during that 4 year period (1999-2003) left an usually bitter taste in everyone's mouth and DA isn't the only one complaining.
I see lots of posters making the point that he's making 20 millions. I am wondering what has that to do with his shot at his previous GM? He got 20 million, or even 200 million, as long as someone agreed to pay him. Deserving or not, it's not our business. Money aside, he felt he wasn't treated faily by the GM, NOT the coach or owner or president. Just the GM. What's the outrage here? He gets 20 million from the good work of his agent, his past playing, and negotiation with the owner. Why would he have to accept whatever other people did to him? He can express his feelings whenever he wants to. Even he's never a great player, over the hill, a lucky b*stard, but he's still a person, who has feeling and pride, who doesn't want to be protrayed as something he isn't. What's to put up? Why does he have to shut up? Just because of 20 million? So what's the rule to shut up? What money is considered the boundary to tell your feelings when asked? Money itself doesn't make a happy employee. Nobody gets money for free, whether his work worth that much money is between him and his owner, but not a penny from that contract is paid to absorb any mistreatment from another employee - the GM.
