Stephon Marbury had to spend $22,000 while with Team USA but LeBron James and Allen Iverson rendered this expense of his moot.
Advertisement
When talking about Team USA, the 1992, 2008, and 2012 squads get talked about the most. Rightfully so as each of those 3 teams won Gold at the Summer Olympics and bolstered incredibly iconic players in their primes such as Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant, Charles Barkley, amongst others.
One rendition of Team USA that doesn’t get all too much attention is 2004. Of course, there’s a good reason for this as the ’04 team managed to muster up a mere Bronze medal while losing the most amount of games by any USA squad up until that point by US men’s basketball roster in the Olympics.
The team featured a plethora of players who would blossom into a superstars but weren’t there yet like LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, and Dwyane Wade. It also had guys like Allen Iverson and Stephon Marbury, two guys who weren’t exactly considered to be leaders on the court.
When talking about his near 40 day experience with Team USA in 2004, Marbury ‘proudly’ claimed that it was the ‘worst 38 days of my life’. This had a lot to do with HoF coach, Larry Brown.
Also read: LeBron James was petrified of the infamous Celtics “Big Three” as per $100 million teammate
Stephon Marbury on not wanting to arrive late for practice.
When talking with Scoop B, the Knicks point guard revealed how he had missed a flight that would take him to Florida to begin his training alongside the team. Not wanting to start his experience off by being tardy, he chartered a private jet.
“I had to spend $22,000 to get a private plane to make sure that I made it there on time,” said Stephon. “I didn’t want to call in and make a bad impression on USA Basketball because all of the people that represented USA Basketball, I knew them from when I played with the Junior Olympic Team.”
“I got on that plane and it was the worst flight ever! It was bumpy the whole time. I didn’t sleep one second on the flight,” continued the 2x All-Star. After talking about the flight for bit more, he went through how he actually made it on time and was even 30 seconds early.
Unfortunately for LeBron James and Allen Iverson, this wasn’t the case. Because they came in late, Larry Brown suspended them both, along with Amar’e Stoudemire for their game against Puerto Rico in Jacksonville, Florida.
Essentially, this trio coming in late resulted in Marbury’s $22,000 private jet not exactly being worth it because he could’ve saved that money instead and been suspended one game. However, he did mention that he didn’t want to leave a bad impression on the higher ups from the get-go so that makes sense.
Also read: ESPN reporter’s innocuous and asinine take puts Patrick Beverley ahead of LeBron James
