Just Missed - NbaInsomniac's Blog

NbaInsomniac's Blog

Just Missed

Posted on September 4, 2013 at 04:44 PM.

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A star has fallen. An angel weeps. Give me a moment. I need to collect myself. Tracy McGrady has retired. This can't be life. I....I need another moment.

*Deep breath* Ok, I'm better. Sometimes it's just so hard to say goodbye to someone who you love so damn much. *Wipes Away Single Tear*

Hahaha. I joke. I joke. I couldn't pass up one last chance to poke McGrady. My buddy Lew wouldn't respect me if I did.

Don't fret. I'm not here to bury McGrady or wax poeticly about the ease with which he moved his lanky 6'9'" frame on the hardwood. The collective Basketball Blogosphere has been submitting their reflective profiles on the enigmatic career of the man they call T-Mac. I'll let them deliver his NBA eulogy.

The thing is, when I think of T-Mac, I don't dwell on his failure to get out of the first round of the playoffs one time in his career, 13 points in 35 seconds on a December evening against the Spurs or him straddling the back of Shawn Bradley like a cowboy breaking in a wild stallion after one particularly vicious dunk. I think about one thing and one thing only. Grant Hill's chronically inured ankle and fragility of greatness. (Ok, so I think about two things.)

Greatness is a combination of factors. Timing, luck, a cheap owner, an incompetent GM and injuries can all derail anyone who seeks to drink from the chalice of immortality. It makes me wonder if greatness is bestowed and not attained. Look at me, getting philosophical. Greatness teases us at times, and she definitely flirted with McGrady and Hill.

Before LeBron. There was Grant Hill.

What are you talking about Insomniac? (I'm giving the alias "Insomniac" a test run.) The guy on ESPN who's really loud and annoying said he's never seen anyone who can do the things on the court LBJ does. I mean he can run an offense, score, rebound and play defense. That's never ever been done by one player, in the history of the galaxy forever and forever.

Slow down Bobby Valentino. It's ok. There's a reason you read my blog. No hype, no bias. Trust me, if I was strictly about site views I would post this piece under the headline "Chris Paul Gay?" Get 5 million views and be well on my way to becoming the greatest blogger ever. But, I'm not about that life.

Anyway, back to Grant Hill. (Wait, isn't this a blog about T-Mac? Confused yet?). Grant Hill was the first modern NBA Swiss Army Knife. He, like LeBron, was miscast by the pundits as the "Air" apparent to Michael Jordan. But comparing Grant Hill and LBJ to Jordan is like equating Mozart and Beethoven to Kurt Cobain. Composers? Yes. Geniuses? Yes. Related in style? No way in hell. I'm not going into detail about the differences between Jordan and Grant Hill's games, my blogs already run longer than Kenyan marathoners. Just take me at my word. Grant Hill was LeBron's forefather in the NBA.

Before Kevin Durant, there was Tracy McGrady.

Long and skinny. Effortlessly brilliant to the untrained eye. Blessed with uncanny range and handles for his height. It's like God Himself molded a sharpshooting point guard for the battle of armageddon and at the last minute thought, I'm going to add 7-10 inches to him just to ensure I don't lose the war of wars between good and evil. Yeah, T-Mac was all of that and then some. Oh, you thought I was talking about Durant? I was. Exactly.

So lets close our eyes together and imagine if LeBron somehow finds his way to play alongside Durant. I know, I wet myself a little too. That image in your mind? The fast breaking, quick passing, alley ooping? A long armed, quick rotating defense? That's what Grant Hill and Tracy McGrady would have been. And for one off season we had it.

The NBA world waited. Two multi faceted perimeter players who defied positions had agreed to play together underneath the warm Florida sun (What you thought Dwyane Wade and LeBron were the first to do it?). A budding dynasty was blooming perhaps, at the very least an Eastern Conference foe was born to challenge the finally famous Lakers instead of the unworthy 76ers and Nets masquerading as title contenders. Greatness awaited T-Mac. Grant Hill was preparing to cement his legacy. The excitement uncontainable, the ceiling limitless. We all know what happened next.

There's no doubt the Magic would have dominated the Eastern Conference from 2000-2002. The East was weaker than a nerdy thirteen year old who hadn't hit puberty yet. The EC Finals in '00: Philly vs Milwaukee, '01 New Jersey vs Boston, '02 New Jersey vs Detroit. Those teams won a total of THREE Finals games over THREE seasons, losing by an average margin of 9.3 a game. And that number really doesn't show how lopsided those games were. There's a reason the Western Conference Finals were dubbed the "Real Finals". I'm taking the Magic against any of those East teams in a series. We nearly had Hill and McGrady vs. Shaq and Kobe Finals three years in a row.

The line between mortality and immortality is at times as thin as a fracture shown on a MRI. Grant Hill's ankle injury he suffered in the playoffs his last season in Detroit was either misdiagnosed or, according to Hill, his rehabilitation was mishandled. The duo played just four games together in their inaugural season. The Magic's unofficial team slogan was "Wait till Grant gets back", it might as well have been plastered on billboards all over Orlando by the Magic's marketing firm. All the while T-Mac was forced to carry the burden by himself, something he was ill prepared for. He could get his, create for others, but he never learned how to walk the fine line of unselfishness and individual brilliance. The entire offense ran through him. And McGrady developed bad habits, like a child forced to grow up too quickly; unaware of the long term damage he was doing to himself and his game.

Over the next three seasons Grant Hill's shadow casted itself over the organization. He was rarely in the lineup playing a total of 47 games during McGrady's time in Orlando, before finally missing the entire '03 season. McGrady became another superstar talent who felt the backlash of the media and fans for his inability to win a playoff series, as the masses conveniently ignored the fact he played with underwhelming talent and was seeded 7th, 5th and 8th over that time span.

After the disastrous 2003 season, (Orlando finished 21-61), the hope of a Grant Hill triumphant return faded and McGrady sulked his way out of town. The Eastern Conference was no longer a pushover. The Detroit Pistons added Rasheed Wallace and dethroned the dysfunctional Lakers (who at last couldn't overcome their horrible team chemistry by rolling out the most talent anymore.) The Magic's greatness which seem preordained by some higher power would never come to fruition. McGrady was now in Houston, teamed with another fragile superstar in Yao Ming, unable to shake off the bad habits he developed or his playoff failures. While Grant Hill was metamorphosizing into a highly qualified role player, extending his NBA shelf life long after we thought he'd expire; he found peace in Phoenix, the ankle no longer failing him.

I enjoy looking back and thinking how close they came to forming something revolutionary. Sometimes "What could have been" is a better story than "What actually happened was.....". We know how T-Mac will be remembered now. An other worldly scorer who failed to win a playoff series one time. Grant Hill's story has a nicer ending (except the Clipper year) but ultimately for both of them it will always be about what they didn't do.

Man, they were so close.....