The Official Site of Tracy McGrady

Thu, Jan 5th 2012, 11:46

McGrady still getting it done

If Tracy McGrady is firing step-back jumpers and slicing inside for finger-rolls, then it must be 2004, right? Thought so, too.
Except he’s almost eight years removed from his peak and now coming off the bench for his sixth different team. And while you may have wondered where he’s been, he’s wondering where you’ve been.

“People sometimes forget what you’ve done in this league,” McGrady said with a laugh. “I haven’t gone anywhere. And I’m only 32. People forget that, too. I’m younger than Kobe, younger than Ray Allen, younger than a lot of guys. I just haven’t been healthy. I haven’t felt like this in a while.”

He laughs again, acknowledging his quickness isn’t the same, and that he’s been in the NBA almost half his life.

“Look, I know I’ve been around, but I can still play. I can help this team. I can make teammates better, I can make the team better.”

The Hawks are sold. They signed T-Mac to a one-year deal, a bargain as it turns out, and asked him to supply some nostalgia whenever possible. Rick Sund, the GM, chose McGrady over giving an extension to Jamal Crawford, the Sixth Man of the Year winner in 2009.

It was the cheaper option for a team unwilling to flirt with luxury tax issues, but was it the better one? The answer, obviously, won’t arrive until the postseason (assuming the Hawks make it) when we see if McGrady’s health and production holds up.

He’s a fixture in the Hawks’ rotation right now. Actually, McGrady is on the floor in the fourth quarter, and he’s not exactly there to set picks or be a decoy, either. Here in his 16th season, when surgeries figured to take their toll by now, McGrady is producing, averaging 10.0 ppg in 21.3 mpg and shooting 51.2 percent. He snuffed Miami a few nights ago with a 13-point fourth quarter, his biggest in almost four years.
So far, he’s the best offseason pickup from a value standpoint, considering he signed for the veteran’s minimum. Rip Hamilton is giving the Bulls a reliable mid-range shooter and 12.0 ppg after being waived by the Pistons. And Kurt Thomas, who was around in Bill Clinton’s first term, is a hired muscle in Portland, where the Blazers also have a 37-year-old Marcus Camby yanking down almost 10 rebounds a night.

But McGrady is different in that he was a seven-time All-Star and two-time scoring champ who fell off the A-list suddenly. Only once in the last five seasons did he play at least 70 games (2006-07). Back pain, shoulder surgery and a repaired left knee all did him in by the time he turned 30.

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