Bradley's Anthony Parker promoted to General Manager of Orlando Magic

[yoda]

https://www.nba.com/news/anthony-parker-new-gm-orlando-magic

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/...gm-sources-say

Link to NBA story

"Parker, an assistant GM, moves into the GM role under president of basketball operations Jeff Weltman and completes a formidable climb from being an NBA and EuroLeague player to Magic scout, G League executive and now GM. Parker has been a sought-after executive by other teams for much of his 11-year franchise tenure, but has remained with the Magic organization and methodically prepared to become a senior basketball executive there"


But they are way wrong with their statement about AP finishing his career in Europe.

[Da Coach]

Article from NBA.com-
Anthony Parker named new GM of Magic
https://www.nba.com/news/anthony-par...-orlando-magic

Congratulations to Bradley HOF'er (and MVC HOF'er) Anthony Parker!

[Da Coach]

By the way, I hope someone from Bradley reads this and corrects an enormous error/oversight regarding Anthony Parker.

The list of Bradley Athletics Hall of Fame members on the Bradley website-
Main page- https://bradleybraves.com/sports/2016/2/6/123050.aspx
Page including members whose names start with N, O, and P- https://bradleybraves.com/sports/201...-fame-n-p.aspx

Anthony Parker is mysteriously omitted.

Many of us remember the halftime ceremony at the November 12, 2012 Bradley-Texas Pan-American game at the Renaissance Coliseum when Anthony Parker returned to Bradley after he retired from playing to be inducted into the Bradley Athletics Hall of Fame.

https://bradleybraves.com/news/2012/9/23/205691083.aspx

In 2016, AP was inducted into the Missouri Valley Conference Hall of Fame-

https://mvc-sports.com/hof.aspx?hof=20

And in 2017, the 1995-1996 team was inducted into the Bradley HOF as a team honor.

So why is Anthony's name missing from the Bradley Hall of Fame members?

[molar50]

Yes. I remember the “award ceremony”. He was not allowed to speak. I called Michel Cross to complain the next day and he stated that there were “time constraints” and he didn’t want to have anything stated by Anthony that could be controversial. I am sure Joann pulled that string into Cross’s mouth.

Lets invite him back to honor his accomplishments and have him speak.

[Da Coach]

Yes. I remember the “award ceremony”. He was not allowed to speak. I called Michel Cross to complain the next day and he stated that there were “time constraints” and he didn’t want to have anything stated by Anthony that could be controversial. I am sure Joann pulled that string into Cross’s mouth.

Lets invite him back to honor his accomplishments and have him speak.

I agree. That whole thing was terribly botched by Glasser & Cross. The game (Nov. 12, 2012) was not part of the season ticket package, and it required fans who had season tickets to buy the extra tickets for that game. They held back most of tickets, including all the side court seats, because they anticipated they would need them for the higher-priority season ticket people, and thus lost out on a lot of ticket sales by non-season ticket people who were only given the choice of high-up end zone seats. In the end, only a fraction of the season ticket holders bought tickets, and it ended up being far from a sellout!
Box score- https://bradleybraves.com/documents/.../13/979959.pdf
Attendance 3,151

That 3,151 was more than 1,000 short of a sellout, and was the lowest attended regular season game since at least some time prior to the Fieldhouse.

And now we find that Anthony is not even listed among the Hall of Fame members. Ouch.

[yoda]

the PJS story on AP's promotion was just published and it's really disappointing, considering he's a Bradley guy.
Basically cut and paste from the NBA release but fails to even mention the outstanding job
he's done running their G-League franchise, and sums up Anthony's historic career in Europe, where he was
the best player on the continent for the better part of half a decade, he was the 2-time MVP of the Euroleague,
led his team to 3 European Championships, won numerous other awards, etc.... and all he says is "plus stints overseas
in Israel and Italy". Surely AP would be available for an interview, isn't that what sports journalists oughta do?


Here's an interesting tidbit...

Back when Mitchell Anderson was playing in Europe, he was given the nickname
"The Michael Jordan of Europe" - https://bradleybraves.com/sports/men...-anderson/6146

ALSO- when Anthony Parker was playing in Europe, he was given the nickname
"The Michael Jordan of Europe" - https://basketnews.com/news-171171-m...ting-five.html

Pretty cool, we have two Michael Jordans!!...

[Da Coach]

Dave Eminian (about the only reason to ever read the PJ Star) has a great column about Anthony Parker with an interview-

https://www.pjstar.com/story/sports/college/basketball/bradley-hoops/2023/07/10/anthony-parker-interview-peoria-bradley-to-nba-gm-orlando-magic/70393136007