My Two Cents On Penny

Remember Anfernee "Penny" Hardaway? When I say that name now what I, you and everyone else thinks of is a crappy basketball player who somehow makes 15 million dollars a year. People even decide to insult him by calling him the "nickel" instead of "penny". I never quite understood how this was an insult, its like if my nickname was "g-spot" and people started calling me "million dollar man." that's an upgrade in cash, therefore its an upgrade in a nickname. Honestly, would you rather have a penny or a nickel? Anyway it is time to jump back into the way back machine, back into the golden age of 1990s basketball. Before all our basketball heroes got 30 year, 700 million dollar contracts then simultaneously hurt their knees or developed drinking problems.

Penny Hardaway was an amazing player back in the day. His height and passing ability drew him comparisons to Magic Johnson, his scoring ability drew him comparisons to Michael Jordan. Basically I think Penny Hardaway was a prequel to LeBron James. Satistical evidence is all I have to support my claims, as I have fuzzy memories of Penny lighting it up back in the day. He was all NBA first team in 1994 and 1995 and 3rd team in 1996. He beat out such greats as Gary Payton, Reggie Miller, Mitch Richmond (wait he was never great), Clyde the Glide and John Stockton to get those first team honors. Those are 90s legends. In 1995 Penny was at the height of his career, on the cusp of a championship (who knows what would have happened if Nick Anderson had not pulled a Nick Anderson). He was also teamed with who was soon to be the most dominate player in the NBA. The follwing year they lost to, who else, Michael and the Bulls. Then Shaq left and took Dennis Scott with him (actually he didn't, Dennis just couldn't contribute without hitting the open jump shots that he got when Shaq was double teamed. 45% with Shaq, 39% without him). Nick Anderson was done after he missed those FTs in 1995 (FG% fell to 39%) and Penny was left with a team featuring such legendary centers as Rony Seikaly, Felton Spencer and Danny Schayes. Penny still tried his best, averaging 31 ppg in the playoffs that year, a loss in 5 games to the #1 seed Miami Heat. Then Penny got hurt. Then Penny got traded to Phoenix to be apart of "Backcourt 2000" with Jason Kidd. Backcourt 2000 became "Back In Court 2000" after the legal troubles both had in 2001. However in 2000 Penny looked like old Penny again. He played great in the playoffs (20, 5 and 5). However he got hurt again in 2001, tried to rush back and got hurt again and his career ended. Lucky for him he was in year 2 of a 500 year, 900 gazillion dollar deal (that only one man in the world would trade for, and he did Mr. Isiah Thomas). So next time you see Penny struggle in the Garden as the Knicks probably get blown out, as his minutes get cut for Nasty Nate Robinson and some other guard you don't know. Do not hate, do not compliment/insult him and call him the "nickel" just step back into the way back machine and remember mid 90s Penny. How sweet it was.

How about an all mid 90s stud, post 2000 overpaid, chronicaly injuried, acholholic, has 20 kids with 15 different women team:
F Vin Baker
F Shawn Kemp
C Diekmbe Mutumbo
G Allan Houston
G Penny