Still a Warrior

By Adonal Foyle, with Chris Navalta

March, 2004

The All-Star break was relaxing for me. I'm well-rested and ready to finish the season strong. During All-Star Weekend, I went up to High Park, N.Y. to see my sister graduate from the culinary institute of America. Then, I went over to Albany and spent three days with some of the most gifted students from all over this great country, talking politics and finding ways to change and deepen our democracy. If these young people are truly the future of this great country of ours, then I feel really assured that we will be in good hands in the future. However, until the time they take their rightful places as leaders of this land, I think it's imperative that we continue to fight for our democracy and our legacy that they will be honored to carry forth.

The trade deadline has come and gone and I am still a Warrior. Not much went on at the time of the trade deadline, except for a couple of teams. Detroit became a lot stronger when they picked up Rasheed Wallace, and Atlanta dumped a lot of high-salary players so they can basically start over next year.

But even before the trade deadline, trades were going on. It was the first time I can remember trades going on all the way from the beginning of the season up until the deadline. I think we got a little spoiled in terms of how many deals went down. We were once used to people saying Nothing is going to happen'. And there have been times when nothing did happen. But this year, we had a lot of trades.

I thought the trades were pretty successful for most of the teams, because, now, many of them look different, and some got stronger. I think Detroit did a good job in getting Rasheed, and if Atlanta's goal was to get rid of a lot of money, they certainly did that.

There were several proposals that involved Erick Dampier and me. Obviously, nothing happened. Nothing surprises me when it comes to our team. But I did think that this year, one of us would be gone before the end of the season. In years past, I didn't think much about being traded just because some of us had long-term contracts. But this year, with me being a free agent – and most likely, Damp opting out – I thought the Warriors would try and do something with at least one of us. They told us the night before the trade deadline, that something was going to happen. But nothing did. So this year, I'm actually very surprised, only because they were “straight up” in telling us one of us would be out after the trade deadline.

I came out and said the team shouldn't trade Damp because I felt that the team as we stood was a very good and competitive team. And now, looking at it, with Nick Van Exel being hurt and Troy Murphy being hurt, and Speedy Claxton being hurt, the whole dynamic of the team has changed. So at the time, I thought it was a right decision to keep him. The team was doing well, Damp was having his best year. So why get rid of him? Why not entice him to stay?

But it could have made sense either way. I just thought that given the idea of how well this team has gelled together, it would be a shame to get rid of anyone.

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