Tracy McGrady: The Magical Career and Transcendence

Tracy Lamar McGrady was a breakout star at Auburndale High School for three years before transferring to Mt. Zion Academy for his senior year and was drafted ninth in the ’97 draft by the Toronto Raptors.  It sounds like a sentence off of a Wikipedia page, but it was off the top of my head. I swear. 

I know a lot of useless facts about T-Mac, because since his days with Toronto, Tracy has been my sports hero.  His current play with the Pistons is quite depressing compared to how good he was, and the role he takes on is humbling.  SwishScout.com presents a nostalgic look back at the career of Tracy McGrady and the special efforts that he is doing off the court.

In the year 2000, all any of my friends could talk about was the greatest slam dunk contest in history. It was when Vince Carter hit the scene and blew everyone away in the event.  Not only was it a great individual performance, but Tracy McGrady and Rocket’s star Steve Francis filled out the lineup, helping make it a great show. Although Vince’s dunks blew everyone away, I was impressed with T-Mac’s dunks. Any other year leading up to that contest, he probably would have won with that aerial artistry. 

I had seen Vince and Tracy play together in Toronto leading up to that, thinking that this could be a great dynamic duo moving forward.  There were times watching them that I felt Tracy was largely overshadowed by his second cousin Carter, and was unfairly riding the bench during games. The athleticism, playmaking, highlight reel plays, and potential was undeniable. He has a nice season in his third year with Toronto, averaging 15 points and six rebounds, but clearly it wasn’t working for him up north.

When he headed to Orlando in 2000 to team up with Grant Hill, everyone knew it was on.  There were murmurs that Tim Duncan might join them, and had he, it would have been considered the first meeting of stars before the Celtics' ‘Big Three’ or ‘Miami Thrice.’  The feelings at the time were that it was Grant Hill’s team and Tracy was going to be his number-two guy.  However, a string of injuries and ankle surgeries sidelined Hill, and that’s when Tracy emerged as a star in the NBA. 

In his first season with Orlando, he put up 26.8 points per night, becoming a de-facto star.  He won the ‘Most Improved Player’ Award and led the NBA in scoring two years in a row (32.1 and 28 ppg, respectively), becoming one of the most popular players in the league. In 2004, he even had a career high 62-point game against Gilbert Arenas and the Wizards. His signature shoe was released by adidas, and it was a hot seller for a few seasons.  McGrady’s reputation and popularity grew much greater when he pioneered the ‘off the backboard dunk’ in the All-Star game.

The knock against him throughout his career was that he never made it out of the first round of the playoffs, and still hasn’t on an active roster.  Honestly, playing with Darrell Armstrong, Pat Garrity, a young Mike Miller, and Horace Grant to round out his starting five, it's pretty clear he was the man who had to carry the team. 

His most memorable playoff series was in 2003, when the Magic were the eighth seed.  Orlando was up against the East’s top team, the Detroit Pistons, who were a year away from beating the Lakers for the title.  It was the series when Orlando took a 3-1 lead, and Tracy infamously said he was ‘looking forward to playing in the second round’.  Doc Rivers was the Magic coach at the time, and after the fact, stated that Tracy ‘played like an all-time great in that series,’ putting up ridiculous scoring numbers.  He averaged nearly 32 points in the playoff series, with a couple 40-point games (and a young LeBron ‘in the crowd’ cameo). After an ugly fallout with the Magic organization and a 19-game losing streak the following season, Tracy was dealt to the Houston Rockets for Steve Francis and Cuttino Mobley.

The Houston Rockets boasted the 2002 NBA Draft’s first overall pick in 7’6” center Yao Ming.  Yao was a Chinese superstar, but surprisingly didn’t even sell the most jerseys in his country, Tracy did.  The coach at the time was Jeff Van Gundy, who had never had a player average more than 20 points on his team, so something had to give and Tracy averaged 25.7 ppg in his first season there.  Houston had some nice pieces on that team. Combined with Tracy, they were on the wrong end of some close seven-game playoff series against the Mavericks and Jazz.  Everyone who watched the 2005 Mavericks series remembers Tracy’s posterizing dunk on Shawn Bradley. Year in year and out, it was the same first round exit for the Rockets, though. The one big highlight from his time in Houston was scoring an epic 13 points in 35 seconds to erase a San Antonio lead.

In early 2010, Tracy was sent to the Knicks after being plagued by injuries.  Throughout his career, T-Mac had nagging knee issues, to which one leg is two inches shorter than the other, and back issues. However, his first game with the Knicks, he had a great showing, putting up 26 points in his debut. 

I even went to go see him take on the Blazers that year, only to watch him score 2 points in the first quarter… He looked like he had lost a step, if not two, with his athleticism clearly diminished by injuries.  His shooting looked lazy and was not nearly as spot on as I had seen in the past.  T-Mac has always been a player who thrives on confidence.  Getting to the basket got him going into some hot perimeter shooting, which ultimately propelled his scoring.  He’s never been an outstanding 3-point shooter, but when he’s on, he looks unstoppable.  His ballhandling was unparalleled for a 6’8” player, and his craftiness for getting to the basket was a thing of beauty.  He routinely settled for jumpers much too often, not being as dominant as he was capable of being.  Even though he had a tendency to kick out a leg and shoot off balance, it still looked really cool, but fundamentally didn’t help shooting accuracy.

Tracy’s career has taken a drastic step back in Detroit at age 31.  He’s coming off the bench this year for the Pistons, and playing only over 16 minutes per game.  Through December 17th, he’s averaging career lows with 4.5 points, 2.6 rebounds, and 1.9 assists per game.  He looks sluggish and arguably washed up, a far cry from his play a decade ago.  His body won’t allow him to take the rigors of demanding practices or an 82-game season.  Unfortunate circumstances, considering he was someone who used to have one of the most fiercest tempers in the NBA. 

Tracy might be on the verge of finding his game back though.  Just recently, he scored 16 points against the Eastern Conference power Atlanta Hawks, including four fourth-quarter threes.  It’s an encouraging sign, and no matter how he plays, I will be a big supporter of T-Mac.  Whatever team he played for throughout his career has my default second favorite team (next to the Blazers).  However, it doesn’t help that one of my new favorite players is facing similar injury circumstances.  Here’s looking at you, Brandon Roy.

Transcending the sport, one of Tracy’s greatest contributions may be off-court.  In 2007, he visited Darfur to get a first-hand look at the impact of genocide in the African country of Sudan.  In a documentary about his trip, “Three Points,” he seeks to raise money and awareness to help set up education for Darfurian refugees who have had their lives ripped away by ethnic cleansing.  To raise awareness for his efforts, he changed his jersey number to ‘3’ in 2008.  If you are more interested in learning about the cause, you can find out more information here.

I will always remember T-Mac for the type of player he was; an all-time great scorer and entertainer with natural flair and talent for the game.   He would probably tell you he would rather be remembered for being a great humanitarian, and he is doing what he can to make that possible. As much as I hate to say this, it's time for him to finish up his time with the Pistons and retire. Cement your legacy by having everyone remember the type of player you were, not the one you are failing to live up to be now.  What Tracy does off the court now will have an immensely greater impact than on it.