What Did I Miss?

So I just got home from vacation-- did I miss anything?

I mean, other than Tiger shooting 63 at the PGA Championship, Barry Bonds hitting number 755 (and 756), and the Orlando Magic abandoning the Magic Television Network -- did I really miss anything?

I take the family on a beach trip at about this time each year, squeezing in some final vacation days before the beginning of college football season and the end of my social life as I know it. While I have chosen Amelia Island, Florida in the past, we picked Hilton Head, South Carolina this time around. Not the best call, as it turned out.

We arrived in the Low Country just in time for a record-breaking heat wave. As in historic. As in a heat index of 110 or higher every day last week. Seriously, it was hot enough to make one woozy. I was so delirious, I imagined that an NBA franchise had actually signed Penny Hardaway.

What? That really happened?

Given that I watched zero television last week, you cannot imagine my surprise to catch that little nugget in Hilton Head's local paper (an excellent read, by the way). Once I got over the shock, I decided that it wasn't so crazy after all.

Seriously, it's a no-lose for the Heat. Hardaway is guaranteed nothing but a shot at making the team in preseason training camp. If nothing else, it guarantees the franchise some ink after an otherwise tepid off-season, one that saw several other teams in the Eastern Conference make seemingly quantum leaps forward.

When asked about Penny Hardaway -- and it happens more often than you think -- I provide a stock response, one that is based on my four seasons as an Orlando Magic employee, four years that happened to coincide with Hardaway's first four years in the league, from 1993 through 1997. First of all, you must understand this: during that span, he was one of the five best players in the league. I will not argue about this.

Penny Hardaway, when young and healthy, was a bitch. He was completely impossible to guard. Taller than any point guard in the league, faster and more athletic than any two-guard, capable of playing the three when necessary. He was stunning. As good as Shaquille O'Neal was for Orlando during that stretch, it was Penny who truly thrilled the crowds. Off the charts. Unfortunately, we were cheated from seeing him through his full potential for two large and ugly reasons.

One, he was unbelievably thin-skinned. Penny had rabbit ears for criticism, real and imagined. I could offer some bleeding-heart analysis as to why this was true -- no male role models in his life, raised in poverty by his mom and grandmother in horrendous neighborhoods in Memphis -- but all I know for sure is, he internalized everything. When things didn't go his way, he brooded at an Olympic level. His well-publicized leadership of a palace coup in Orlando, the "team meeting" that led to Brian Hill's first firing from the Magic back in '97, was less a sign of any maliciousness on his part and more an indication of his fragile psyche. Brian Hill was an old-school, red-faced screamer, and Penny recoiled from that attention. He needed to be stroked, reminded that he was wonderful and beautiful. That didn't happen in Orlando.

And Two, his body failed him. Hardaway was never a weight-room guy, and by the time he reached his peak in the NBA, he was carrying a ton of tread wear. A lifetime of basketball combined with very little workout maintenance led to a physical breakdown. After enduring multiple surgeries on both knees, he was never the same player -- when your game is predicated on playing above the rim, and you're suddenly hopping at 75 percent of capacity, you've got to change or perish. He perished, professionally speaking. Pretty simple.

There's a chance, I suppose, that the time away from the game may have allowed Penny to heal up a little bit, and Pat Riley has already complimented his new signee for his willingness to get himself back into shape, but if the Heat expect Hardaway to be a standstill shooter, it's going to be a short comeback. Asking an innately physical player like Hardaway to suddenly "get it" at the age of 36 is a tall order. Still, I find myself rooting for Penny to make it with Miami.

When I left the Magic in 1997 to move to Connecticut as an anchor for ESPN, Penny Hardaway was one of only two Magic players who stopped me to say good luck and congrats -- the other, not surprisingly, was Darrell Armstrong. That stuck with me, obviously. I can't help but sympathize with Penny. If nothing else, it would be fascinating to see the Magic fans' response if and when Penny and Shaq return together to the building that once rocked to their beat, this time wearing the road colors of the Miami Heat.

As for the other news of the week -- my seven-year-old son, Zachary, watched the final round of the PGA Championship with me at home on Sunday. At one point, he asked me, as he is wont to do, who I was rooting for.

"I don't know," I said, "but Tiger Woods is the best professional athlete you will ever see in your lifetime. He does his job as well as anyone does any job in the world."

This may have escaped my son, but when I repeated this conversation to my father-in-law on the phone on Sunday night, he paused for a moment, and said,"Yeah...okay."

As in, yes, that is an acceptable and totally honest thing to tell the boy. What else can you explain to a kid? Tiger Woods will exceed Jack Nicklaus's record of 18 professional majors before my oldest child graduates from high school. Heck, he might get there before Zach leaves the 8th grade. I just hope he (Zach) grows to appreciate the golden age in which he lives.

Last point before I start worrying about college football in earnest: while I would love to expound upon the Magic's decision to abandon their over-the-air broadcasts in favor of an expanded agreement with Sun Sports and FSN Florida, I will not, because the negotiations with Bright House Networks in Orlando are ongoing and I'm pretty good at knowing when to keep my mouth shut. Suffice it to say that as a paying cable subscriber in Central Florida, I'm voting for Bright House to add FSN Florida to its basic cable lineup.

But a tip of the cap to the in-house broadcast department at the Orlando Magic -- my former co-workers -- who have put in heroic efforts, under less than ideal circumstances, over the last 15-plus years to produce games on local TV in Orlando. While the knee-jerk reaction is to assume that the Magic are simply chasing the money via increased rights fees from Sun Sports/FSN Florida, it was a far more difficult and complicated decision than that, one that directly affects the lives and careers of several people in the Magic broadcast department that I consider friends. This is their livelihood, and their passion, and I want them to know that I appreciate their efforts.

With luck and skillful negotiations, we'll all be watching Magic games -- all of them -- on basic cable this season. In the meantime, if you're a Magic viewer from way back, take a moment to think about the games you watched on WRBW-65 (or, going even deeper, on WKCF-18) and join me in saying "thank you" to the Magic employees responsible for getting those games on the air. "Thank-you's" last a long time, as I may have mentioned.

That's it. First preseason college football special is taped on Monday afternoon. See you on TV.