Philadelphia 76ers coach Larry Brown didn’t want to waste the opportunity to win the NBA title in 2001 while Allen Iverson was on a roll. With that in mind, he traded All-Star center Theo Ratliff, who would be out for a long time due to a wrist injury, to the Atlanta Hawks in a multi-player deal that sent Dikembe Mutombo to Philly.
Miami Heat coach Pat Riley read exactly what the Brown tried to do. He realized the Sixers opted for instant help for Iverson, which Ratliff wouldn’t be able to give, but Mutombo could.
In the deal, the Sixers also included multi-time champion Toni Kukoc.
For Riley, it was a desperate move. While he totally understood the Sixers, Riley insisted that he would never do the same thing with his players, especially the stars.
“I will firmly and without a doubt take the shoe out of my mouth,” Riley said at the time. “It takes a lot of guts to make a trade like that.”
“I think they sent a message about loyalty,” he added. “Even though they are probably a very loyal franchise, a guy breaks his wrist and he’s traded,” added Riley. “But I can understand the temptation of the present moment. It would be the equivalent of me trading (Alonzo Mourning) for Dikembe, or something like that.”
As expected, Riley’s unsolicited remarks did not sit well with Brown. In his response, Brown took a jab at Riley for also trading away four key Heat players to the Charlotte Hornets – Jamal Mashburn, PJ Brown, Otis Thorpe and Tim James.
“I mean, that kind of blew me away,” Brown responded. “It’s kind of remarkable to me a guy would make a comment (while the 76ers were) in Charlotte. I’m looking at four guys, that tells you a little bit about Pat Riley.”
Riley “stooped so low”
Riley’s comments made headlines at the time as the media has been closely following any movement from the Sixers. Then-Sixers executive Pat Croce also learned about it and admitted that he was dismayed by what someone as respectable as Riley said.
“I believe Pat Riley is ‘royalty’ in the league and I’m not going to say anything derogatory about him, except that I’m disappointed he would stoop so low to try and taint this franchise,” Croce commented. “That’s awful.”
Despite the drama, Mutombo proved to Brown that the Sixers didn’t make a mistake in trading for him. He anchored the Sixers’ defense and controlled the boards. In his first 26 games with the team, Dikembe averaged 11.7 points, 12.4 rebounds and 2.5 blocks.
Mutombo wasn’t enough
Just as what many had anticipated, the Sixers made it to the Finals that season and faced the Los Angeles Lakers. Coach Brown gave Mutombo the toughest task of his career – match up against Shaquille O’Neal.
Unsurprisingly, Mutombo was not enough to contain Shaq. The Sixers won Game 1, but the Lakers won the next four consecutive games to close the series out.
In hindsight, Brown chose to be smart than to be loyal when they traded away Ratliff for Mutombo. Judging by how things played out, it’s kind of hard not to think about what would’ve happened if the Sixers kept Ratliff and Kukoc instead.