The 10 Best Tracy McGrady Vs. Kobe Bryant Matchups

The book officially closed on my teenage years earlier this week. When Tracy McGrady announced he was retiring from the NBA after 16 seasons, a part of me died with it. He was possibly the smoothest player of this generation, and he made scoring 40 look easier than pumping gas. From the sneakers to the lobs off the glass to the way he dominated individually in the playoffs and yet was still criticized all the same, McGrady was unique.

His rise also directly coincided with Kobe Bryant‘s ascension in Los Angeles. They probably would’ve developed a rivalry regardless of the circumstances, but between the adidas connection, their longstanding friendly relationship, both owning something the other craved (McGrady owned control of a team; Kobe owned rings) and the fact that both were Generation X guards that had incredibly similar games, skill-sets and were comparable sizes, it made for some amazing matchups.

There were often comparisons, reaching a pinnacle in 2002-03 when the two looked like — by far — the best perimeter players in the world. As Ralph Wiley once described, you had Kobe, “young Luke with the Force, pedigreed up the wazoo” and T-Mac, “as if someone grafted Penny Hardaway with a fire-breathing dragon.”

The two players faced off against each other 21 times during their careers, with Bryant winning 14 of them. McGrady would drop 17.9 points, 4.8 rebounds and 4.8 assists during those contests while Bryant pumped in 26.9 points, 5.4 rebounds and 5.2 assists. Both contributed to a bundle of nasty duels over the years, even if T-Mac denies they ever played one-on-one. Here are their 10 best matchups.

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10. HOUSTON WINS 22nd STRAIGHT GAME
This wasn’t so much a duel as it was history. Bryant smothered McGrady all over the floor, holding him to 11 points… and yet Kobe was actually worse. Houston hounded him into a 11-for-33 shooting night, one of his worst games of the season. The Rockets got key contributions from the “Kobe Stopper,” Shane Battier, and even without Yao Ming, they won their 22nd straight game. I’m not sure what was crazier: that winning streak or Rafer Alston pouring in eight bombs and 31 points off the bench.

9. TMAC GETS THE W; KB GETS THE TRIPLE-DOUBLE
Even as Kobe went for 19 points, 10 boards and 10 dimes (while being hounded into 4-for-19 shooting), McGrady scored a game-high 27 and led Houston to an easy win with some incredibly difficult shots. At this point, the Lakers had just lost their 13th in 14 games and were officially out of playoff contention. Houston would make the playoffs, go up 2-0 on Dallas, and then blow the series even as McGrady averaged nearly 31 points a game.

8. TMAC DOMINATES
In the two prior meetings between them while McGrady was in Toronto, he’d scored only 10 points. In this one, their first matchup in Disney World, T-Mac dominated Bryant, scoring 29 to Kobe’s 16, to go along with 10 boards. While the two didn’t always check each other, this set the stage for the next three or four years.

7. 2001 NBA ALL-STAR GAME
This game was a milestone for T-Mac. Midway through his first season with the Magic, he had officially arrived, getting voted into the starting lineup for the East and going toe-to-toe with Bryant.

While ‘Mac was passive offensively and scored just two points to Bryant’s 19, the two young stars had the best one-on-one matchup of the entire first half. As a young player, McGrady often confided in Bryant. The two were close friends playing the same position under the same sneaker company (adidas). When T-Mac was a youngster in Toronto, Kobe often advised McGrady to buy his time, work hard and his chance in the spotlight would come. This game closed the book on that. McGrady blocked Bryant’s fadeaway (something he did more than any other player KB’s ever played against), stole an intended lob for him and even disrupted multiple Bryant dribbling exhibitions. In the end, even the mic’d up refs were wondering why they were going so hard against each other.

6. T-MAC GAME-WINNER IN LATE 2005
On his way to leading the NBA in scoring with a 35.4 average, Bryant outscored McGrady in this one, 24-20. But T-Mac not only got the W, he finished it off with a game-winner. In a defensive battle where neither team could even eclipse 80, Kwame Brown of all people tied the score in the closing seconds. That set the stage for ‘Mac’s bucket in the lane against basically the entire Lakers team.

5. 2002/2003 NBA ALL-STAR GAME
Two years in a row, Bryant and McGrady clashed in the NBA’s midseason classic. In 2002, McGrady came off the bench to throw in 24 points, including an off-the-glass alley-oop to himself and a reverse lob. Kobe still had 31 points, the W and the MVP.

However, in 2003, which was a double-overtime thriller in MJ‘s final All-Star Game, McGrady won the matchup. He finished with 29 points, and blocked Kobe’s shot in a few different ways.

4. 2007 OPENING NIGHT
Laker fans will remember this one as the first game after Bryant’s infamous trade request. By this point, no one was quite sure exactly what was going to happen with Kobe, and the fans let him know, booing him for much of the first half. Eventually, he won them over, going for 45 points and almost leading a miraculous comeback. It still didn’t matter. McGrady gave him 30 to think about and Houston walked out as two-point victors.

3. MASSIVE LAKERS COMEBACK
During McGrady’s final season in Orlando, he led the league in scoring and yet didn’t have much to celebrate. The team started off slow, Doc Rivers was fired and T-Mac was mired by season-long accusations that he wasn’t giving it his all. Still, for one night in L.A., you could’ve thought these two were playing for a title.

By the end of the third, the Magic were up 15 and T-Mac had 32 points. From there, Kobe exploded, scoring 26 of his 38 in the fourth quarter and overtime, all while shutting down McGrady as the Lakers stormed back to win by three in the extra frame. Kobe’s 24-point fourth quarter tied a franchise record for points in a quarter set by Elgin Baylor in 1960 and equaled by Jerry West two years later (Bryant would later break it).

McGrady very nearly won this one in regulation, banking in a wild three-pointer just after time expired.

2. COMBINING FOR 83 POINTS
As Phil Jackson often liked to point out, the two players “piqued” each other’s interests. The matchups were never predictable, but at the worst, at least you knew they’d go super hard against each other. Towards the end of the 2006-07 season, Bryant dropped 53 on McGrady’s head and yet Houston won as T-Mac put up 30 points, 10 assists and a number of key buckets in overtime.

1. KOBE 38, T-MAC 38
Not surprisingly, the best matchup of all came during the 2002-03 season. McGrady would lead the NBA in scoring that year, putting together one of the greatest seasons of any guard EVER, while Bryant would have one of his best all-around seasons, digging the Lakers out of a grave by going on a run of nine straight 40-point games.

In this one, McGrady got the W and the two played to a standstill with both players reaching 38 points. In one memorable sequence, Tracy dropped Kobe with a nasty half-spin in the lane, canning a fallaway and going back on D like it was nothing. The Lakers guard came roaring back up the floor, embarrassed. We all knew what was coming. He went right by McGrady, dunked on the whole team, and then got called for a tech after slapping the glass in frustration.

The debate over which player you’d rather have was never hotter.

What do you think?

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