HOOPSWORLD | Basketball News & NBA Rumors

While last week’s trade deadline was more than a little interesting simply for the sheer bulk of trades that actually got consummated, it was also interesting for another, more obscure reason.  As more and more trades were announced a trend started to appear; players were being traded back to their old teams.

The Grizzlies re-acquiring Shane Battier was the obvious one, but Renaldo Balkman ended back up in New York, the Warriors made the move for Troy Murphy (before cutting him), and Jeff Green was sent to the Boston Celtics—the team that drafted him.

It got me wondering what other notable players had spent two completely separate and unrelated stints with one team, and the answer was a resounding yes.  It’s never happened with the frequency of last Thursday, but it’s happened a lot over the history of the league.  Guys get traded away from a team or decide to sign a free agency contract somewhere else, but fate pulls them back to where they started.  In some cases, it happens two or three times in a player’s career.

It’s not hard to understand why—a player gets familiar with a franchise and vice versa.  If a relationship was there once and it wasn’t totally ruined (and even in some cases where it was), that player is welcomed back, almost always as a fan favorite.  People like homecomings.  They really do.

So here’s a list of some of the more notable players to spend two tours with one team.  I wasn’t sure whether to rank them by how great the player was over the course of the career, or how unbelievable the circumstances were that brought this player back home. 

I decided to kind of go with a combination of the two, giving extra credit for situations in which the player still had some to give and it worked out well for the re-acquiring team.  Here they are:

#5 – Hedo Turkoglu, Orlando Magic (2004-2009, 2010-present) – Turkoglu undoubtedly played his best pro ball as a key member of the 2009 Magic team that made the NBA Finals.  But that was a contract year for Turkoglu, and he turned his great performance into a monster contract with the Toronto Raptors.  It wouldn’t work out well for Turkoglu in Canada, and he’d be traded to the Phoenix just a year later.  Less than a year after that, the Magic reacquired him and, somehow, Turkoglu found a way to revitalize himself.  Apparently, all he needed to do was play his home games in Central Florida.

#4 – Chauncey Billups, Denver Nuggets (1998-2000, 2008-2011) – While Billups will certainly enjoy an opportunity to win another championship now that he’s a member of the New York Knicks, he would’ve been perfectly content retiring in his hometown of Denver.  He went to college there (Boulder), played some pretty un-miraculous pro ball there for two years in the late ’90s, and made his triumphant return in the Allen Iverson trade back in 2008.  He didn’t get to go back home for long, but it was certainly fun for him while it lasted.

#3 – Mark Jackson, Indiana Pacers (1994-1996, 1997-2000) – Grabbing Mark Jackson from the Clippers in 1994 proved to be a fantastic move for the Pacers, but when they got the opportunity to move him for Jalen Rose a couple years later, they just couldn’t say no.  Turns out maybe they should have, because the team immediately dropped out of the playoff picture and stunk so badly that the team re-traded for him less than a year later.  In just a couple of seasons, they’d be in the Finals—the only Finals appearance of Jackson’s career.

#2 – Steve Nash, Phoenix Suns (1996-1998, 2004-present) – Nash was okay in his first two seasons in the league with Phoenix, but he wasn’t necessarily a show-stopper yet.  Still, he was good enough for Dallas to give up three players and a first-round pick for him, and it was in Dallas Nash really made a name for himself.  After the 2004 season, Mark Cuban’s Mavs felt that at age 30, a high-priced, long-term extension simply wasn’t the smartest business decision, but they couldn’t have known how very wrong they’d be.  So he locked back in with the Suns, won two MVP awards, and at 37 years old is still going stronger than anyone ever thought he could, especially the Dallas Mavericks.

#1 – Derek Fisher, L.A. Lakers (1996-2004, 2007-present) – Fisher entered free agency in 2004 with quite a lot to consider.  Yes, he had been a key part of three championship teams in L.A. and was a fan favorite, but with waning playing time, Shaquille O’Neal being traded to the HEAT, and Kobe Bryant seriously considering test free agency himself, Fisher felt it was time to move on.  Considering the Golden State Warriors offered him three extra years, $22 million extra bucks, and a guaranteed starting role, he had no choice but to leave.  Less than three seasons later, now a member of the Utah Jazz, Fisher’s daughter would be diagnosed with a disease that simply couldn’t be properly treated in Salt Lake City.  Fisher requested his release so he could move to a city in which medical specialists were nearby.  Benevolently, the Jazz acquiesced, and guess what city had the best combination of doctors and basketball prowess?  Before the 2007-2008, Fisher re-signed with the Lakers and hasn’t missed an NBA Finals since.

Honorable Mention:

Scottie Pippen, Chicago Bulls (1987-1998, 2003-2004) – After leaving the Bulls in 1998 when Michael Jordan retired, Pippen saw some success with the Houston Rockets and especially the Portland Trail Blazers.  In his last season as a pro, however, Chicago brought him back so he could retire in Chicago.  This was in 2003 when there wasn’t a lot of good things happening with the Bulls, and at 38 years old Pip didn’t have a whole lot of gas left in the tank, but it was nice to see a legend finish his career in the city that made him a star.

{AUTHOR_BOX}Allen Iverson, Philadelphia 76ers (1996-2006, 2010) – Starting in 2004, Iverson began having some problems with the Sixers, for whom he had previously won an MVP trophy and a trip to the NBA Finals, and over the next 24 months those issues would continue to escalate, with Iverson skipping practices, showing up late to games, and missing corporate sponsorships off the court.  It eventually led to a trade with the Denver Nuggets, where Iverson still managed to score a ton of points in his first season outside of Philly.  In the next few seasons, though, he’d end up in Detroit and (very briefly) in Memphis—none of which worked out well for him.  In the latter portion of last season, his former team gave him a chance to redeem himself and brought The Answer back to Philadelphia.  It would be the last 25 games he’d play in the league.

Jason Kidd, Dallas Mavericks (1994-1996, 2008-present) – Despite the fact Kidd led the league in triple-doubles his rookie season and split the Rookie of the Year award with Grant Hill in 1995, Dallas’s vision of building a team around Kidd, Jamal Mashburn, and Jim Jackson never really came to fruition, so they traded him to Phoenix very early in his career for several players, including Michael Finley and Sam Cassell.  Twelve years later, after spending his best professional years in Phoenix and New Jersey, the Mavericks traded for a 34-year-old Kidd in the hopes adding him to a good veteran team would help push the team to a championship.  It didn’t work out that way, but Kidd still is showing he’s got gas in the tank as a Maverick and is under contract through the end of the 2011-2012 season.

Antoine Walker, Boston Celtics (1996-2003, 2005) – Despite the fact Walker and Boston teammate Paul Pierce had seen huge success in their years together on the Celtics, by 2003 it was starting to become clear that particular duo wasn’t going to win a championship.  Walker was traded to Dallas, where he didn’t play anywhere near the minutes he was accustomed to, and then moved again that offseason to Atlanta.  After only a half a season with the Hawks, the Celtics re-acquired him, played him for 24 games, then shipped off yet again the next summer as part of the largest trade (13 players) in league history.

Ben Wallace, Detroit Pistons (2001-2006, 2009-present) – Wallace won a championship, made four All-Star teams, and won NBA Defensive Player of the Year four times while a member of the Detroit Pistons the first time around, but the minute he signed a four-year, $60 million deal with the Chicago Bulls, he seemed to have lost much of his former athleticism.  The Pistons brought him back in 2009 out of sheer desperation for size, and Big Ben has done well in his second go-round with Detroit—even if this time he’s doing it without that fantastic afro.

Wilt Chamberlain, Philadelphia Warriors (1959-1962) and Philadelphia 76ers (1965-1968) – Wilt never played for the same franchise twice, but he did play for the same city twice.  But that doesn’t really count, does it?

Here are some other notable players who did two separate stints with the same team:

Brad Miller, Chicago Bulls (2000-2002, 2009-2010)
Manute Bol, Washington Bullets (1985-1988, 1993), Golden State Warriors (1988-1990, 1994-1995), Philadelphia 76ers (1990-1993, 1994)
Al Harrington, Indiana Pacers (1998-2004, 2006)
Joe Smith, Philadelphia 76ers (1998, 2006-2007), Minnesota Timberwolves (1998-2000, 2001-2003), Cleveland Cavaliers (2008, 2009)
Derrick Coleman, Philadelphia 76ers (1995-1998, 2001-2004)
Artis Gilmore, Chicago Bulls (1978-1982, 1987)
Horace Grant, Orlando Magic (1994-1999, 2001-2003)
Spud Webb, Atlanta Hawks (1985-1991, 1995-1996)
Tim Thomas, New York Knicks (2004-2005, 2008-2009), Chicago Bulls (2005, 2009)
A.C. Green, L.A. Lakers (1985-1993, 1999-2000)
Chris Gatling, Miami HEAT (1996, 2001-2002)
Delonte West, Boston Celtics (2004-2007, 2010-present)
Steve Blake, Portland Trail Blazers (2005-2006, 2007-2010)
Theo Ratliff, Detroit Pistons (1995-1997, 2007-2008), Philadelphia 76ers (1997-2001, 2008-2009)

As far as I know, no team has ever acquired a player three separate times, but if anybody were able to prove me wrong it would be the quick-witted and loyal readers of HOOPSWORLD.  Conversely, you’ve got a guy like Jim Jackson who played for 12 different NBA teams, but never the same one twice.  It just doesn’t always work out to come back for everybody.

But, apparently, that’s how it’s going to be for Battier and Balkman, who already are getting re-accustomed to uniforms they probably thought they’d never wear again.  You really never can say never, though it’s probably safe to say to Cleveland doesn’t expect LeBron James back any time soon.