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The ballot for the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Class of 2017 has been revealed, and you have to think that this is Geese Ausbie’s year after he was snubbed in 2015. But that’s another conversation for another day, because right now we can’t get enough of Tracy McGrady’s wonderful reaction to learning that he made this year’s list. T-Mac is joined by Muggsy Bogues and Ben Wallace as this year’s first-time player nominees, but, sadly, Rachel Nichols couldn’t get them all into one room. Instead, she only surprised McGrady with the big news, and everyone should be smiling, too.
For his career, McGrady averaged 19.6 points per game, and he was named an All-Star seven times. The ninth overall pick in the 1997 NBA Draft, McGrady ranks 62nd all-time in points scored, and he was the league’s scoring champion (and the only entertaining thing about the Orlando Magic) for the ’02-03 and ’03-04 seasons.
Alas, one of the things that people love to talk about when it comes to McGrady is what could have been. Could his career have been more dynamic if Grant Hill had been healthy in Orlando? What would have happened if Tim Duncan’s wife didn’t talk him out of signing with the Magic to create a monster Big 3? What if the Houston Rockets had that one missing piece in the 2005 NBA Playoffs? We’ll never know. But at least we will always have that time he dunked all over Shawn Bradley.
