San Francisco Chronicle

July 7, 2004
by David Steele

Warriors do right by Foyle

On the final night of the Warriors' season in April, Adonal Foyle stood in the middle of the locker room at the Arena in Oakland and expressed the strongest doubts of his career about his future with the only NBA home he has had.

They weren't very strong doubts, nor were they loud, but they still were rare clouds in an outlook that had been almost uniformly sunny for seven years. He'd undergone two knee operations in the past year, played far less than he'd wanted, was no pompon-waver for Eric Musselman and wasn't saying he was sold on the then-incoming regime.

So Foyle told reporters that he had a lot to consider when he officially became a free agent in July, adding that this was a very weighty decision, "because it may be the last five years of your career."

Foyle must have heard, seen and thought about all good things in the ensuing 2 1/2 months. Those last five years -- the next five years -- will be spent back in a Warriors uniform. It's a uniform in which he always has felt comfortable, and that has made him rare with this franchise. The Warriors might have lost at an ungodly rate during his tenure, and he might not have quite reached the level of the player chosen directly after him in the 1997 draft, a kid named Tracy McGrady.

Yet Foyle has done the uniform proud, and he never has hinted -- not even when he wavered in the locker room that April night -- that he wasn't proud to wear it. That, clearly is worth something. And clearly, it's worth something to the Warriors to have him back in that uniform well into the future, through a 12th NBA season and his 34th birthday.

Of course, according to an ESPN.com report Tuesday night, it's worth $41. 6 million over those five years, and that sort of loot can blow away a lot of gloom pretty fast.

Still, it's logical to view this deal as a double vote of confidence - the Warriors' confidence in him, and his confidence in the Warriors.

After all, Foyle is nothing if not uncommonly smart and perceptive, and he likely recognizes better than most that as a player's career progresses, winning gains on money on the priority list. This will be the most money Foyle has made, by far, but it's asking a lot for him to take it in return for five more years of the lottery, of wasted draft picks and bungled trades and a coaching revolving door.

He's seen enough of that. He's seen more of it than any other Warrior now; he and Erick Dam- pier were the longest-tenured players on the roster, and Dampier is gone for sure now, if he wasn't already out the door as soon as he decided to opt out. Foyle inherits from Dampier the center job; all that time, not only was Foyle not winning, he wasn't even starting. Ugly scenes have been produced from less.

Foyle should know; there isn't much in the 10-year drought he hasn't seen, and he's seen virtually all of the worst, because he had the distinction of being P.J. Carlesimo's first draft pick. (Foyle even pre-dates Garry St. Jean, who was hired after Carlesimo was, and after that draft.)

One of Foyle's running jokes is about how he was introduced to the NBA by watching people try to pry Latrell Sprewell's fingers off Carlesimo's neck, and how it indicated that making it in this league might not be as easy as it looked.

His own career numbers have been modest, except when it comes to the blocked-shots-per-48-minutes stat (about 4.7, a ridiculous number). But no one ever has said, "That Foyle guy is the problem." Nor should anyone. He has been a positive influence in the locker room, around the organization, in the community, everywhere he has been.

He has put a good face on the franchise when none other was available or appropriate. He has been accessible and quotable, yet never divisive or selfish. His background is unique, his off-court activities are unique, his whole persona isn't merely a breath of fresh air, it's a gust that blows away the overcast.

And during that span, the Warriors got him at pretty good rates. Tradeable rates, in fact, but they didn't move him, and he didn't complain when the deadline passed each February, even when his name was mentioned in deals with contenders while he watched another season in Oakland circle the drain.

Foyle deserves to inject that persona into a winning franchise, to glean for himself more than money -- meaningful games and playoffs and a wider audience and the other things you miss when you play for a perennial loser.

This signing indicates that this is the place where that might happen. Finally. The money wasn't insignificant -- that amount can't be, unless you run Halliburton or something -- but just as the Warriors are trusting him to make it worth their while, he's trusting them to make it worth his staying.

Foyle has done right by the Warriors for seven harsh years. They're doing very well by him now, in return. The signs are a little better now that they might be doing even better by him in the next five years.

Copyright © 2004, San Francisco Chronicle

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