TSN

After sitting out all but four games last season because of knee surgery -- the fourth knee surgery of his career -- Penny Hardaway has returned to the Suns and is playing like he never missed a beat. Entering this week, Hardaway is averaging 18.5 points, 5.2 rebounds and 4.5 assists, helping the Suns to a 13-9 record. In this week's edition of One-on-One, TSN's Sean Deveney catches up with Hardaway and talks about the Suns, his image problem and how knee surgery helped his golf game.

PH: I am feeling great. It's like every normal basketball game now, I am a little sore when it is over, all over my body. But the next day I recover.

PH: The mental part, I would say. You're wondering if you are going to get well for one thing, wondering if you are ever going to play again. And you are getting all this bad press for being out. I was sick of it. It was really tough. It was discouraging.

PH: It is hard, because you are doing all this leg work, and you are in constant pain. That is, all rehab is about is pain. How much pain can you take today? Then we'll add a little more pain tomorrow.

PH: Of course they were. Of course they were being unfair. It was not like I was being a bad guy, like I was in jail. It was not like all the sudden I just lost my game. I had surgery.

PH: No, not at all. They thought that it was just a plain scope on my knee. A scope lasts four to six weeks. I was taking a lot longer than that, so everybody thought, "Well, why is he taking so long? He is dogging it." No one knew about the microfractures I had, and most people did not even know what microfractures are. So they just started to get on me for things that they did not even know what they were. All I could do was sit out and wait till I was well, and take all the bad press until I got well. Then I could prove them all wrong.

PH: Very satisfying. Nobody is really talking about me, but that's cool, it's OK. But I know I did not give up. There is a story to tell in my life right now. I have been through four knee surgeries and yet I am still able to play at a high level in this league. A lot of guys can't say that. A lot of guys would have already given up and not even tried to come back and play. So it is very gratifying to come back this season and be able to play this way. I know there are a lot of guys, most guys, who would not have even tried to come back. Especially with all the negative press, and all the people who gave up on me. So it is very gratifying to come back and play at a high level this season.

PH: If I kept feeling pain to where I could not play anymore, then, yeah, I would have retired. But I was not going to give up. I was going to do all I could to get back to where I am now, and it worked for me. But if you can't run jump or move laterally, then you can't play this game at a high level, so you have to retire.

PH: At one point, I was. Because I was feeling so much pain. I have never been a guy to miss too much time because of my injuries. I played through a lot of injuries, which is part of the problem. That is part of what got me to the point I was at last year. I could not run, I could not jump, I had so much surgery that everything was worn out.

TSN: Is there a double standard, if you play hurt, you can't play as well and you get criticized, but if you sit out, you get criticized, too?

PH: Definitely. People want you to play hurt. They go, "You should play hurt." But then they only give a few players credit for playing hurt. I am not one of those players. They don't give me credit for playing hurt. I may not have been playing up to my own standards of where I am supposed to be, so they criticize me for not being the player I once was, but I was out there playing hurt. So it was a lose-lose situation. But I see a lot of players get credit for playing hurt, even if they are not playing well.

PH: Like Grant Hill. No one criticizes him. All last year I watched Allen Iverson get credit for playing hurt and [the media] was praising him, and their whole entire team, because they were all bandaged up or whatever. But they got praise for it. It is just a matter of who the media feels like praising. It's a fine line, you are playing injured and you get criticized, or you are playing injured and they feel like praising you.

PH: The trade with Jason [Kidd] and Stephon [Marbury] was a huge trade, it changes us completely. Jason is a guy who comes into a game and wants to distribute the ball. Stephon is a scorer. It took us a minute to get used to his style. And he had to get used to us.

PH: Well, we traded Cliff for John Wallace and Jud Buechler, and Jud is gone now, Bo is in. John does not play that much, so it means we have a lot of new players out there trying to get used to each other but it is all coming together.

TSN: When you heard about Marbury coming to the Suns, were you nervous? Were you thinking at all, "Jeez, Jason used to dish it off, now we have . . . "

PH: Well, it was more shock that a player like Jason would get traded. I did not have a chance to think about whether Stephon would pass me the ball. I was thinking, "I have to welcome him in." He is coming to a new situation and we have to figure out how to win games. I was not afraid that he would not pass me the ball.

PH: It is, it is definitely. It's my hometown and we deserved an NBA team. It was a lot of fun going back and playing there. I am glad the city gets the opportunity to see its favorite players.

PH: They will stick with them. They are young and they are new in that city. But you look at Shane Battier and Pau Gasol, they have some good young players. They will be patient this year. Next year, they are going to have to win.

PH: I have not played golf in about five or six months. Not in a long time. Now that I can play basketball, I don't play anymore. No time now.