It’s rare when a visiting player checks into a game and gets hugs from the Nuggets. But even they thought it was pretty cool that T-Mac was back.
Houston’s Tracy McGrady played just the first 35 games of last season because of knee surgery and had missed all of this season until Tuesday against Detroit, when he played eight minutes. Then on Wednesday, McGrady entered the game, receiving hugs from Kenyon Martin and Chauncey Billups, before playing five minutes, missing his lone shot attempt.
“I’m a huge McGrady guy,” Nuggets coach George Karl said. “I think he’s one of the great talents of the game. He’s been maligned a lot because of his playoff failures, but his regular-season games have been incredible. Some nights, he’s been the best player in the world.”
In fact, McGrady has the record for most points scored by an opponent at Pepsi Center — 51, in 2003. But now, the two-time NBA scoring champion is slowly getting back into game shape.
Rockets coach Rick Adelman said there’s no timetable for when McGrady will start getting more minutes.
“We have to do what’s best for the team, evaluate it and see where he’s at,” Adelman said. “We have four straight back-to-back games between now and around Christmas. So after that, we’ll see where we’re at.”
Trying new things.
The Nuggets continue to hold game-day morning shootarounds for players who played less than 20 minutes the previous game. Karl said for the most part the attitude of the players has been great and that in future shootarounds, he might start mixing up which players attend, so the coaches can home in on players’ individual skills.
