Oh the irony of these two players. Lets start with Billy Owens. The player from Syracuse, who in 1991 was selected by the Sacramento Kings with the 3rd over-all pick. Well, during this time, the Kings were a very horrible club, a team that struggled to win and always resided in the cellar of the Pacific Division… Well Billy Owens was too good for that. So instead of trying to carve a name for him self and helping a club that could really use his services, he held out and "refused" to play for the lowly Kings.
At the same time, one of the up and coming teams, an exciting team at that, were the Golden State Warriors. Coached by Don Nelson and featuring the high octane offense of Run TMC -- T as in Tim Hardaway, M as in Mitch Richmond, and C as in Chris Mullin. So Don Nelson saw this situation and made an offer that the Kings would not refuse. Run TMC would be disbanded and the Warriors would send the 'Rock' Mitch Richmond (along with Les Jepsen and a draft pick which would become Tyus Edny) to Sacramento in exchange for Billy Owens' rights, where Mitch would quietly become a star on a poor team and Billy Owens would battle injuries.
I guess the irony lies in that Billy Owens would end up in Sacramento (at the expense of Walt Williams *cry*). The Kings did make the playoffs that season but were promptly dismissed by the eventual Western Conference Champions. This would be the last time Billy Owens sniffed the playoffs and Mitch Richmond would piggy back his way to a ring in Los Angeles at the twilight of his career.
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