Hardaway and Kidd will be electric together, but …

Sporting News, The, August 16, 1999 by Dave D'Alessandro

In the NBA, the purest joys come in August. When spring arrives, and the only games that matter begin, the joy is often drowned by the thousand memories of disappointment, all of them etched on the somber faces of those who thought the answers were so easy. After August, everything --even victory--is about uncertainty. Often, the unalloyed hope of late summer gives way to wretched frustration.

You can forgive the Suns for their dizzy reaction to the Penny Hardaway acquisition last week, and you can even root for it to work out as well as they hope it to. They have a management team that works as hard as any in sports, one with a genuine desire to bring their fans a champion.

And let's be honest: We defy anybody to watch Jason Kidd and Hardaway take the floor in November--together, same stage--and not expect to have his or her heart leap a bit. The possibilities are enthralling. There hasn't been a backcourt tandem possessing that kind of dazzle since Frazier-Monroe or Jordan-Whoever. No matter how you dissect it, the deal was a tape-measure home run for the Suns, who gave up next to nothing.

But you also figure the expectations for Hardaway will correspond to the change in climate--he's going from hot to hotter. And you wonder exactly how he's going to handle them.

It's not hard to remember the promise Hardaway brought to the league upon his arrival in '93. Those who watched him through the first few years of his career involuntarily had their jaws drop and eyes pop. He played the youth card with runaway enthusiasm, so much that you half expected him to whiz up and down the court on a skateboard. This was a kid whose game had a very special rhythm and a skill level that was as high as any in the NBA. He could score, shoot, slash, board and pass for profit. Only Scottie Pippen had his assortment of skills.

You know what happened next. Shaquille O'Neal couldn't get away from him fast enough. A year later, Hardaway conspired to have his coach whacked. A year after that, he stayed away for long periods of injury rehab in isolation. Then he whined about playing out of position. Most recently, he trashed his team and city about a lack of respect-perceived or otherwise.

"I did some things in Orlando that were out of character for myself," he says. "It was best for me to leave, just move on, start a new career. And just get better as a person and a player."

And always talk a good game. But by now, everyone has stopped wondering what it was that plunged Hardaway into this tetchy state of mind for weeks. We know now this is a kid who requires unconditional love and appreciation to play at the can't-touch-this level we once expected of him. We don't expect him to change anymore, and we don't expect him to shed all that emotional puppy fat. He is who he is, and some other city--Phoenix gets the dubious honor--will live with it.

Alongside Kidd, Hardaway will give the city a jolt it hasn't had since '93 and make the Suns one of the most interesting teams to watch this season. He'll get along with Kidd well, but it's the other Penny stuff you think about. The nagging hurts. The pressure of high expectations. The glaring hole in the middle that still puts the Suns a significant step behind the Shaqs and Duncans. And how Hardaway will deal with all of them.

But those are concerns for another time. "Now," coach Danny Ainge says, "I really believe we're an elite team in the NBA."

In August, that's the stark reality. Get back to us in April.

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