SAN FRANCISCO — They are Walk TMC now. Chris Mullin has a bum left foot, Mitch Richmond rarely shoots a basketball these days and Tim Hardaway arrived for this on-court reunion by patting the ample midsection of his tight-fitting jersey.
“Maaaaan, we used to run around all sexy,’’ Hardaway, 58, lamented as he stepped into the Golden State Warriors practice facility. “Not now. It’s all pot belly.”
Despite their infirmities, the mere sight of Hardaway, Richmond and Mullin reuniting to launch shots again was enough to quicken the pulse and widen the eyes. Somewhere, a long-ago defender felt a disturbance in the force and awakened without knowing why.
Once upon a time, these three were Run TMC, and their too-brief Warriors career looked like one long fast break.
In 1990-91, their second and final season together, they formed the NBA’s highest-scoring trio by averaging 72.5 points per game. (The Warriors averaged 116.6 points per game that season, second in the league.) All three finished among the league’s top dozen scorers that season, with Mullin ranking eighth (25.7 ppg), Richmond 10th (23.9) and Hardaway 11th (23.9).
They all wound up in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.
“We had a sick run,” said Richmond, 59.
The Warriors secretly got the band back together for a video shoot to help promote the NBA All-Star Weekend in the Bay Area next week. Mullin, Hardaway and Richmond participated in a 3-point shooting contest, with Baron Davis representing the franchise’s “We Believe” era.
This was Run TMC’s acoustic set. Because there were no fans in the building for this Dec. 20 shootout, every bounce, swish and wisecrack reverberated off the walls like a bygone soundtrack.
Who would win? That was a topic the players kicked around, too. Richmond and Mullin reasoned that Davis should be the favorite, even though he made just 32 percent of his career 3s. He got the nod because he was a mere 45.
Davis, who grew up idolizing Hardaway, wasn’t having it.
“I’m already at a disadvantage,” Davis protested, scanning his competitors. “Legend, legend, legend — and me.”
Hardaway, meanwhile, picked Mullin to win it all. And that had nothing to do with the fact that Mullin was wearing a pair of custom-made Stephen Curry sneakers.
“He doesn’t even need those on, he can still shoot,” Hardaway said. “If Steph Curry himself were here, I’d still be taking Chris Mullin.”
As the players stretched out before this turn-back-the-clock competition — let’s call it Re-Run TMC — any fears about moving too quickly were put to rest. “The slowest 3-point contest I’ve ever been a part of,’’ Richmond cracked.
Their famous nickname owes its roots to Run DMC, rap pioneers who found stardom in the mid-1980s and in 2009 became just the second hip-hop group inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. For the basketball version, TMC refers to the initials of their first names — Tim, Mitch and Chris. On this day, however, it could have stood for where it hurt most: Tendons, Muscles and Cartilage.
Mullin looked the smoothest during warm-ups, quickly recapturing that sweet and lethal left-handed release. Then again, Mullin was just a few shots in when he fretted about needing a headband because of the sweat gathering on his forehead like a storm cloud.
He’d been taking warm-up shots for all of three minutes.
Mullin: Hey, Mitch.
Richmond: Yeah?
Mullin: I’m tired.
But as more warm-up shots started to fall and the semblance of competition began to simmer, TMC settled into a familiar zone. And for a few glorious hours in an empty gym in December, an exhilarating era of Warriors basketball was off and running again.
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