Never Had a Chance

As the NBA season creeps closer, the odds of seeing Allen Iverson either hang ‘em up for good or lace ‘em up in some distant land are becoming shorter and shorter.

If, indeed, this is the end of the road, it will be sad finish to an inspired, albeit tumultuous career.

But while Iverson  may  leave the league on terms other than his own, he can, at the very least, rest safe in the knowledge that he had a long run, having  played more than 40,000 minutes over a 14 year stretch.

Most careers, in comparison, are a blip on the radar. Case in point: Dajuan Wagner, a player who was so often likened to AI.

Wagner arrived in the league as the sixth pick in 2002 and was gone just three years later. In 102 games for the Cavs (and one for Golden State), he played a grand total of 2,202 minutes.

It’s not that Wagner wasn’t good enough to hang around, however, it’s just that his body just wasn’t up to it.

Even before his college days at Memphis, Wagner had been plagued by stomach pains which, by the time he reached the league, had grown increasingly frequent.

His health, along with his game, declined steadily, forcing him to miss large chunks of his second and third seasons.

Eventually Wagner was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, a form of inflammatory bowel disease and, in 2005, was forced to go under the knife to remove his colon.

Following the procedure, his NBA career was effectively over.

He never had a chance.

At the time, Wagner’s wretched story was scarcely an afterthought.This was partly due to a guy named  LeBron landing in Cleveland in 2003, which was more than enough to overshadow the problems of a struggling sophomore.

But it’s also because he soldiered on. Wagner’s exit would have been deemed far more tragic had it come soon after his promising rookie year, as opposed to the tuneless note of spluttering mediocrity he left on two years later.

As it was, he was labelled a bust; too small and too one-dimensional to succeed in the league, even without the health problems.

While the Iverson comparisons had some merit - both he and Wagner were 6-foot combo guards, both had goofy nicknames (The Messiah!) and both were stencilled in ink – it was no mirror image.

Wagner never had the sheer speed or fluidity of Iverson. He didn’t possess Iverson’s laser-like ability to knife through traffic or his knack for finishing over big men at full stretch. In short, he wasn’t a virtuoso, but then few are.

Perhaps Wagner would never have become an All-Star and maybe he'd never have been among the league leaders in scoring, but he certainly possessed the abilities to achieve these things.

As I re-watched a handful of games from his rookie year, what struck me most (aside from Zydrunas Ilgauskas’ full head of hair) was Wagner’s poise; although never hesitant with the trigger, he rarely forced shots and was happy to make the extra pass.

At just 19-years-old, Wagner seemed like a veteran - something his physique didn’t belie. He came into the league a rugged 200lbs and he used it well; forever attacking, always  aggressive, able to absorb and adapt to contact.

Sure, he made just 36 per cent of his shots as a rookie but at times he was unstoppable. During a 33 point night against the Raptors (his career high) he made the defence look amateur, scoring on assortment of push shots and floaters, triples and midrange jumpers.

While break-out games such as these were the exception, Wagner did average a respectable 13.4 points on the year. If he hadn’t been struck by ill-health, there’s nothing to say he wouldn’t have improved, nothing to say he couldn’t have evolved into a consistently effective scorer along the lines of a Ben, or Eric Gordon.

Unfortunately, we’ll never truly know.

It will be a sad day when Iverson eventually disappears from the NBA landscape but, when the time does come, spare a thought for Dajuan Wagner, the guy who never had a chance.