Sunday was the third night of episodes for the Bulls documentary, “The Last Dance,” airing on ESPN. Each episode has a different insight into the legendary Michael Jordan teams in Chicago.
Without any sports to watch, the show has come to fans at just the right time. It has been crushing ratings and trends on social media during airings.
Kobe
The start of the episode had a little bit about Kobe Bryant. It was definitely hard to watch and still grasp what happened with Black Mamba. As plenty of people realized at Kobe’s memorial service at Staples Center, he and Michael Jordan had a close relationship.
“I truly hate having discussions about who would win one-on-one,” Bryant said. “You heard fans saying, ‘Hey, Kobe, you’d beat Michael one-on-one.’ And I feel like, yo, what you get from me is from him. I don’t get five championships here without him because he guided me so much and gave me so much great advice.”
Kobe discussed how Jordan truly took him under his wing. When Kobe was 19, he was the youngest All-Star ever. He had to go up against MJ in Madison Square Garden. This is the moment that he reached out to Jordan for some pointers.
The Shoes
An interesting part of the episode was figuring out how Jordan’s signature Nike shoes came to be. Converse was the shoe company that had all of the stars, and Jordan’s agent wanted him to stand out from those faces.
Jordan admits that he initially wanted to sign with Adidas. That was his favorite shoe. But at the time, they told his manager that they couldn’t make his own shoe right away.
Nike was willing to do just that, but Jordan wasn’t so excited about it. At the time, Nike was mostly a track shoe that hadn’t caught on in the basketball community. Jordan had to be convinced by his parents to even go to the Nike campus to hear their pitch.
After that, it was done. He realized the deal was too good to pass up. “Air Jordan” was created, and kids everywhere wanted to “Be Like Mike.”
Gambling Drama
It didn’t seem much of a secret that MJ loved to gamble. Many people saw him out at casinos playing blackjack. But once he started losing in the playoffs, he mattered more.
After losing Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals, someone reported Jordan being at a casino in New Jersey until late into the night the night before the game. He admitted he was there, but not that late.
Later on, someone came out and talked about the golf gambling debt that Jordan had at the time. People started wondering if this was a problem.
Dream Team
Michael Jordan became international with the Dream Team. The greatest team ever assembled did not disappoint during the Olympic Games.
The documentary also showed the bond that some of the top talents in the NBA had over that time. However, they were also the most competitive, even in practice against each other.
