SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Near the end of the evening, when the television cameras were finally turned off, but fans were still clicking photos, Tim Hardaway tried on the orange blazer that all Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductees are gifted.
You could sense right away that the jacket wasn’t his style, and he wouldn’t likely wear it as much as the massive ring. But it fit.
In that moment, he dipped his left shoulder, put an imaginary basketball through his legs and into his left hand, and then changed hands back to his right — it was his iconic killer crossover. I was lucky I didn’t blink or I’d have missed it, it happened that quick. Then he laughed at his own inside joke, bringing an end to a magical night that should have happened a decade ago.
Hardaway walked the gauntlet of fans then, out of Springfield’s Symphony Hall,…
