You all know who my team is.  But as you see above, my favorite player from my generation never played for the Lakers.

An undersized guy among Giants.  Wears his flaws on his sleeve.  A natural born underdog, rebel, and non-conformist.

‘Iverson’ gives you all the highlights of what made ‘the Answer’ so appealing to myself and millions of others.  Even when you know the broad strokes (as I did), the filmmakers do a good job of making the ride entertaining.

You get the clips of his high school football and basketball career (State Champion in both sports, and even at this stage, just another level of speed and athleticism over everyone else on the field.)  The circumstances around the bowling alley brawl that sent him to prison (and how that unsurprisingly shaped his attitude for the rest of his life.)  Being drafted by the 76ers and becoming a culture shock to the Association in the post Michael Jordan era (after that famous crossover of His Airness of course).

And the moment I remember most vividly: that Game 1 of the NBA Finals against my Lakers.  I was here, so trust me on this: the trash talking and arrogance leading up to that series was one of those ‘I see why people hate L.A./the Lakers.’ I kid you not, they were promoting the Championship party after Game 4 before Game 1 was played.  There was no question who the better team was, but to this day I can’t remember cheering as loudly after an upset victory over my own team as I was that night (sorry Coach Lue).  You could hear a pin drop in this city after that game was over.  I was ready to put him in the Hall of Fame that night.

So check out ‘Iverson’.  Now streaming on Netflix.