Four years ago, Grant Hill leaned on a training room table inside the visiting dressing room of Madison Square Garden, politely deflecting the suggestion that the burden belonged to him now. He had just scored 34 points to beat the Knicks this night, a smooth, effortless grace blurring the Pistons' No. 33 into the Bulls' No. 23. Everyone wanted to believe Hill was the chosen one. Everyone seemed so sure of it.

"I see it every day in practice," his teammate, Lindsey Hunter, said a few feet away. "I'm always trying to get him to believe how good he is, but it's hard with him. He's such a naturally centered person. I always tell him: 'After Michael's gone, it's you.' "

Before Kobe and Vince, McGrady and Iverson, the burden belonged to Grant Hill. He was chosen to chase Michael Jordan's legacy, the rising star of perfect pedigree and a peerless persona. Sometimes, it seemed he was born to the duty of greatness. There was an aura to him, a touch of royalty. For so long, there was a sense that Hill was a prince awaiting his turn to the throne.

And yet now, Hill isn't turning into his generation's Jordan, because so sadly, he's turning into its Bill Walton. The Orlando Magic lost him for the season on Tuesday, sending him to his third operation within 20 months. He has three pins holding the brittle left ankle together, and now, the bone spurs inside his left foot need surgery. He wasn't ever terribly interested in turning into Michael Jordan. He wanted to be Grant Hill. Worst of all, he can't be himself now.

If you care about the good and decent of sports, you should be rooting for Hill to make a most improbable comeback. This was the week of George O'Leary's dishonesty and Dan Issel's foolishness, the week of Randy Moss's petulance and Cleveland's hooligan behavior. It isn't only the Magic who need Hill on the court, but all of sports could benefit from it.

Basketball can use Grant Hill. Always, there will be a spot waiting for him. He would've been one of the game's greatest ever, but our best memories of him will mostly bring us back to his college days. Who can ever forget Duke beating Kentucky in overtime on Hill's 70 foot pass to Christian Laettner nearly a decade ago, completely the greatest play of the greatest game ever?

Perhaps, those championship seasons with Duke will be as good as it ever gets for Hill. Sometimes, it just works out that way. It's hard to believe that battered ankle will ever be able to withstand the pounding of a long basketball season. It just breaks down. It just breaks Hill's heart.

Everything seemed there for Hill to grab, but circumstances conspired to never let it happen. Back on that November night at the Garden four years ago, Knicks coach Jeff Van Gundy was asked this: Outside of Jordan, name a tougher swingman to stop in the NBA than Grant Hill. "There isn't one," Van Gundy replied. Hill was amazing that night, beating the Knicks with 16 of his 34 points in the fourth, passing off for the winning baskets as New York's defense collapsed on him.

He made it seem so easy, just like Jordan did.

Lindsey Hunter had every reason to believe the weight of his words: 'After Michael's gone, it's you, Grant.' It never happened. Near the Garden, in the Olympic Towers, Commissioner David Stern wanted so desperately for it to happen. Hill was the chosen one, the blue blood son of Yale and NFL graduate Calvin Hill. He was the star the NBA wanted kids to emulate. He stayed four years as a Duke Blue Devil, earned his degree and graduated to the NBA as a polished product. After that, the kids started flooding into the draft as high school seniors and college freshmen, learning on the job and passing a hobbled Hill in the fast lane.

He never won a playoff series with the Pistons, inspiring him to chase his championship dream to the Magic, where he signed for $93 million, along with one those high school kids, Tracy McGrady. Across two seasons, Hill's played 18 games. He lost his explosiveness and his spring; it's hard to believe he'll ever get it back. When Hill tries his comeback next season, he'll be 30 years old. He'll be the longest of odds to recapture his old self.

The rehabilitation will be the hardest for Hill now. For most of the two years, this has been his life. Now, he starts over again. And it will be a lonely process. After all, he's human. He understands there are no guarantees. Deep down, he also knows he's done nothing to earn his enormous contract since getting it, an issue that forever tortured Jayson Williams with New Jersey. These bad breaks happened to Williams, too, a shattered leg eventually sending him to retirement after playing just part of one season in '99 after signing his $90 million contract.

Williams didn't have a fraction of Hill's talent, but he had every ounce of his heart and soul. Williams is the son of a construction worker, assuredly the lone NBA player to own a bricklayers union card. He was taught to deliver an honest day's work for an honest day's pay. Two years ago, Williams talked in a lounge off the Nets' locker room, speaking of the frustration and fear that awaits Hill now.

"Sometimes I'll be driving in my car and I'll just start hyperventilating, sweating," Williams said. "I'll just shudder. I haven't had a good night's sleep in so long. If this is over, I want to know. That's all. I just want to know. I can always do construction after basketball, but that isn't what I want to do now. I'm out there all morning with my father and the guys, until about 11 (a.m.) when I leave to go work out. I've got to do something to make myself feel like I'm earning my money, but I'm a basketball player, you know?

"I don't want that to be over. I don't want to walk away."

The burden of being like Jordan is long gone for Hill now. Of course, he never wanted to be Jordan. Once more, Grant Hill just wants to be Grant Hill.

Adrian Wojnarowski is a sports columnist for The Record (Northern N.J.) and a regular contributor to ESPN.com.