Ferry’s Fighting Past Dooms Deals
Since the arrival of Danny Ferry as Cavaliers’ GM, each February the Wine and Gold have spent as much time on the phone as the owner of the mauling chimp. As last year’s personnel-altering deal demonstrated, Ferry has never shied away from making overtures around the trade deadline (anyone remember Wilkes for Flip Murray? Of course you don’t).
On a side note, funny that the NBA operates under a “soft” deadline. Imagine if this carried over to other negotiations. Like if the Israelis got their paperwork rolling before the peace talk deadline, and argued that the cease fire negotiations should continue, then Hamas woud have to hold fire, because of the “soft” deadline. I mean the lawyers and agents would be on their side, for the obvious reasons right? I digress.
Anyway, it seems Clevelanders have forgotten one key biographical item about their GM: He was one of the dirtiest players in the league. He was the Todd Bertuzzi of the early to mid-90′s NBA. And he did not mess around. Take for instance his dustup with Horace Grant back in 1996. Grant went after Ferry with a punch and earned a suspension, which led to this assessment from Shaq:
“There’s two kinds of dirty: dirty and sewer dirty. Danny Ferry is sewer dirty and has been ever since he was at Duke.”
Considering Shaq’s problems with Kobe (who he called a “clown”), there’s simply no way he could coexist with Ferry running the organization
Flash forward to 2001; in the twilight of Ferry’s career, he was still in his prime when it came to instigating. Then a Spur, Ferry slahed the eye of none other than Marcus Camby (on MLK day no less!). In Camby’s retaliation, his misfired punch nailed and bloodied coach Jeff Van Gundy – leading to JVG getting 12 stitches.
You think the coveted Marcus Camby could have set aside the horrors of his Danny Ferry confrontation? Me neither.
So two of the guys Cavalier fans wanted the most, Shaq and Camby, both in one way or another all too familiar with Ferry’s dark side.
But it doesn’t end there. Undoubtedly Ferry’s biggest claim to faim: going after the G.O.A.T. I guess this rules out any chance Ferry had of getting him out of retirement before the playoffs start.
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How come nobody ever talks about him getting cut from the Duke Lacrosse team? Can anyone imagine him as a Duke Lacrosse player player during the parties?
Does it rhyme with “crepe”?
Those uniforms are awesome, love to see LeBron in those.
Look at that little puss, turning away after throwing the punch. Couple that with Laettner’s stomping of Gimelo Martinez, and you get a good sense of the Duke tradition of “Did I do that? No, I’m a lovable white guy you can’t blame me!”
Somehow I don’t think the Bobcats and Cavs will be dealing a whole lot.
I don’t think his past conflicts really had anything to do with the trade not getting done.