(670 The Score) On the night before the 1997 NBA Draft, prized prospect Tracy McGrady got a midnight phone call from his agent. He had to drive 45 minutes outside of Charlotte for a physical. The Bulls and then-general manager Jerry Krause were planning to trade superstar Scottie Pippen to the Celtics and draft McGrady.
Pippen was entering the final year of his contract in Chicago and the great Michael Jordan was 34 years old and preparing for his famous “Last Dance” season with the Bulls. The trade never happened and basketball history followed from there, with the Bulls winning their sixth NBA championship in eight years that next season and McGrady embarking on a Hall of Fame career. But the details of that potential trade still remain vivid.
That draft night trade that never happened was one of multiple chances where McGrady could’ve played for the Bulls.
“I might be traded for Scottie Pippen on draft night, and I'm like, ‘Oh, my gosh,’” McGrady recalled Wednesday afternoon on the Parkins & Spiegel Show. “Like, it was such a surreal feeling that I could’ve been a freaking Bull and teaming up with Michael Jordan.
“At the time, I thought when they did nix the trade, I thought it was M.J. that did that. But I got close to a reliable source and said it was (Bulls team chairman) Jerry Reinsdorf that did it.”
Three years later, McGrady was a coveted free agent and the Bulls were preparing their pitch. They greeted him at the airport with mascot Benny The Bull, had a video message from Oprah Winfrey waiting at his hotel room and even had him sing the Seventh Inning Stretch at Wrigley Field.
“I was very appreciative that the Chicago Bulls went above and beyond of trying to recruit me,” McGrady said. “Listen, I loved every bit of it. It was just, they were recruiting against Orlando, which is where I grew up. That’s a tough recruitment to go over and steal me away from that. I was so fixated on going home to play in Orland because I grew up watching Nick Anderson, Penny (Hardaway) and Shaq.
“That’s where I wanted to play ball. To have that opportunity to play there, it presented itself at that time in 2000, I couldn't pass that up. That was the only reason why I chose to go home and not sign with the Bulls.”
McGrady was enshrined into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2017.
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