Growing up in Orlando, the team was always mediocre. Every trip to the TD Waterhouse Centre was still a treat. How could you get excited for the perpetual Grant Hill injury and the consistently 40-42 win team that was the early-2000s Orlando Magic?
Tracy McGrady.
It is easy to forget what a tremendous scorer McGrady was at one time. He was a 30-point per game guy and had the fluidity and athleticism to score in any way he wanted. Forty-point games were commonplace in those days. You would see McGrady high-stepping over the half court line and you and the defense would know that he was about to pull for three and make it… and there was nothing anybody could do.
When knee and back injuries sapped away McGrady’s athleticism and endurance, nobody was ever sure if that McGrady would return. He became a contract albatross for the Rockets, betrayed by his body.
For one night in 2012, the old McGrady returned. As Joe Johnson said after the game, it was “The Return of the Mac.”
McGrady scored 13 of his 16 points off the bench in Atlanta’s somewhat stunning 100-92 win over Miami, handing Miami its first loss of the season. It was a performance very reminiscent of those days when McGrady was a front man for adidas and a perennial All-Star starter. McGrady scored with the smootheness and fluidity that made him all those things and one of the most electrifying players in the league at one time.
“It feels good,” McGrady told Michael Cunningham of the Atlanta Journal Constitution. “It’s been a long time since I’ve had that feeling. My legs feel fresh. Everything just feels good. It feels right. That’s a good sign. I haven’t felt this good in a long time, probably since the beginning of my knee injury.”
This would be quite the season for McGrady to make his comeback. McGrady played 70 games last year for Detroit for the first time since 2007. He is still a far way away from averaging 32.1 points per game like he did with the Magic. Last year, he averaged only 8.0 points per game and dished out 3.5 assists per game, moonlighting as a point guard for the Pistons.
The Hawks brought McGrady in as a cheap option to potentially replace Jamal Crawford’s scoring punch off the bench.
McGrady though has played pretty well for the Hawks in the early going. He is averaging 11.6 points per game and has returned to his scoring mentality. McGrady is likely not going to be back to his epic scoring performances on a nightly basis. Certainly not during this season with all the games crunched into such a short time period.
The season for both McGrady and the Hawks are going to be about playoff success. And that is where, injury or not, McGrady has always struggled. McGrady has still never played in a Playoff game beyond the first round.
McGrady has gone through a lot of trials since his time in Orlando and Houston. It has humbled him in a lot of ways as he tries to reach back and find that former talent that made him a superstar.
“This win wasn’t about one player,” McGrady told The Sports XChange. “It was about the way we grinded as a team. We just dug in and tried to match them blow for blow. All I did was my part. . . . I’m a competitor. Especially competing against the best, LeBron and D-Wade. I’m always up for the challenge. Those guys, they bring the best out of you.”
A win over the Heat in early January is not going to change Playoff fortunes that much. It is a nice win against the prohibitive favorite for the championship.
Consistency is going to be McGrady’s issue as he still has to prove he can play a full season at a high level. That question will be answered in the coming weeks and months. But for the 4-1 Hawks, McGrady turned the clock back… at least for one night.
