As the man glided onto the Delta Center floor, only a few paces away from his greatest act of thievery, the cameras began clicking furiously.
   Four years after Michael Jordan swiped the basketball away from Karl Malone and then buried the NBA championship-clinching jump shot over Bryon Russell, he returned to Utah. And thousands will have a photograph to prove it.
   No matter that the Utah Jazz beat the Washington Wizards 94-79 Thursday, Jordan was the show. A capacity crowd of 19,911 and a horde of news media members certainly didn't come only to see two teams fighting to make the playoffs.
   Even in a different uniform, Jordan is still No. 23.
   After he won his sixth championship with the Chicago Bulls in 1998, Jordan walked away from the game. Itching to play, he left his job as Wizards team president to join the team last fall.
   "It's always good to come back to Utah," he said. "Great memories here."
   Three weeks after having knee surgery, Jordan scored 11 points in 22 minutes. At age 39, he falls short of the magic that made him the greatest player ever.
   But his presence still dominates the moment.
   Before the game, hundreds of fans gathered near the tunnel that leads to Washington's locker room. News photographers jostled for position to capture His Airness.
   Dozens of signs -- "MJ for President," "MJ is the Man," "The Lord of Rings" -- dotted the crowd. One female admirer, seated a few rows behind the Wizards' bench, held up a large poster of Jordan wearing his six championship rings. To a friend standing one row off the floor, she shouted: "Should we tell Karl [Malone] that's what they look like?"
   Bitter memories die hard.