NBA 75 Series: #1 Michael Jordan
At last, we have reached #1 on my highly revered NBA 75 Greatest Players of All Time List, and at #1 is a man who jumped from the free throw line, defying gravity as he mesmerized the crowd and millions globally around the world with his aerial exploits as he stuck his tongue out, led the Chicago Bulls to their six and only championship rings in franchise history, defined an era of sports and pop culture, and is arguably the most influential and greatest athlete who made flying in the air as cool and stylish like no one ever before or since with the best selling shoe of all time, Michael Jeffrey Jordan!
Jordan was born on February 17, 1963, in Brooklyn, NY to his mother, Deloris, and father James. In 1968 he moved to Wilmington, North Carolina, where he ended up spending his adolescent years attending Emsley A. Laney High School.
Growing up, Jordan had famous, legendary battles in the backyard with his older brother Larry, whom he idolized and was a spectacular athlete in his own right, which helped get Jordan into the game of basketball.
Larry and Jordan would have many one-on-one battles, with Larry coming up on top for many years, taunting him and letting him know all about it (something Jordan did to opponents all his career) until Jordan ultimately got good enough to beat him.
That older brother’s love and toughness helped form Jordan’s competitive fervor and game that has become synonymous with his legend. Most people consider him to be the greatest player of all time (GOAT), so you might think he was a prodigy and phenom as he came up through the ranks… think again.
Jordan was anything but that; in fact, he tried out for the varsity basketball team as a 5-foot-10 sophomore and was cut from the team because he was deemed too short to play at that level. Talk about adding more motivation to a man who had fuel like a cigarette lighter dropped on gasoline! Jordan wanted to quit at first, but his mother encouraged him to keep playing and work as diligently as he could.
He did just that, dominating the junior varsity level to prove his worth by tallying some 40-point games and showing he can be the star of a team. That summer, heading into his junior year, Jordan worked tirelessly on his game and ended up growing four inches, now listed at 6-foot-3.
Jordan’s relentless work ethic that summer helped him come his junior season as he made the varsity team and averaged more than 25 points per game (ppg) over his final two seasons as a Laney Buccaneer, averaging 27 points, 12 rebounds, and six assists per game as a senior. Jordan’s remarkable performance during his two years on varsity led to his selection for the 1981 McDonald’s All-American Game, where he made a significant impact by scoring 30 points.
As Jordan started to garner more national attention, he started getting recruited by big-time colleges such as Duke, North Carolina, South Carolina, Syracuse, and Virginia to name a few. Jordan ended up staying home by committing to play for the North Carolina Tar Heels under legendary head coach and life teacher Dean Smith.
Under the vision of Smith, Jordan’s game developed massively as he learned discipline and the fundamentals of the game early on from the legendary Tar Heel coach who would be beneficial for him throughout the duration of his career. While with the Tar Heels, Jordan didn’t put up eye-popping stats as you would assume from someone who eventually became the Greatest of All Time (GOAT) in most people’s eyes and arguably the greatest and most influential athlete ever.
The Tar Heels played in a very team-oriented system that included NBA legend James Worthy and former NBA player Sam Perkins who was picked right after Jordan in the famed 1984 NBA Draft. In Jordan’s freshman season, he averaged 13.5 points, 4.4 rebounds, 1.8 assists, and 1.2 steals per game on 53% from the field, garnering ACC Freshman of the Year honors in the process.
Jordan was considered “Mike Jordan,” but once the Tar Heels made it to the NCAA title game in 1982 against the Georgetown Hoyas where he would go against legendary Hall of Fame coach John Thompson and future NBA rival Patrick Ewing, where everyone would learn the name.
Jordan, the scrawny freshman would hit arguably the biggest, most clutch shot in NCAA history against the Hoyas in the 1982 National Championship game that helped uplift the Tar Heels over the Hoyas with a game-winning jumper with 17 seconds left in the game to give the Tar Heels a 63-62 win to and the National Championship.
As you see in his jumper, he had supreme confidence in the elevation of his shot, the extreme focus, and the beautiful form and follow-through to swish it right through the net.
He was waving his hand for the ball in a highly pressurized moment, an 18-year-old freshman on a team with All-Americans like Worthy, who became the No.1 pick that year, and other older players such as Perkins. They trusted the young skinny freshman from Wilmington, North Carolina… And he delivered.
I mean, look at this incredible, inspirational, bone-chilling scene in the movie “AIR” (which I suggest you all go see an incredible movie) where Matt Damon played Sonny Vaccaro (former Nike executive), where he grabbed the Jordan family and Jordan to get him to sign with Nike.
Vaccaro saw the vision and the future in Jordan, and he displayed that with that shot against Georgetown, which changed Jordan’s life forever, hence why Nike gave him the full $250,000 offer they had to him solely instead of splitting it between four players which they were initially going to do.
Jordan would go on to be selected as an All-American in back-to-back seasons his sophomore and junior seasons, as well as winning the National Player of the Year in 1984 to cap off a remarkable collegiate career for the gravity-defying star.
The highly acclaimed guard would forgo his senior year as a Tar Heel to enter his name for the legendary 1984 NBA Draft, a draft that featured future Hall of Famers and contemporaries of Jordan in Hakeem Olajuwon, Charles Barkley, and John Stockton. The Houston Rockets had the 1st overall pick in that class and selected Olajuwon who’d go on to become one of the absolute greatest players of all time and the all-time shot-blocking leader, revolutionizing the big man position.
Then came the controversy: the Portland Trail Blazers had the 2nd overall pick in that class and already had a young high-flying shooting guard in Clyde Drexler, who played the same position as Jordan, whom they drafted a year earlier. Portland needed a big man and looked at Kentucky big man Sam Bowie, who they ultimately selected. Hall of Fame coach Bobby Knight even said to the Blazers GM Stu Inman, who was wary of selecting another guard, “Play him [Jordan] at center, and he will be the best center in the league.”
If Inman would’ve listened to his advice that would’ve changed the whole course of NBA and sports history, but instead, the Chicago Bulls made the biggest/greatest selection not just in their franchise’s history, but in Chicago sports history and arguably sports history by selection the scrawny turbo-athletic shooting guard out of North Carolina.
Jordan was so special that Nike even paid $5,000 in fines per game for the league with the way his first shoe color design (black and red) violated league policy at the time, because shoes had to be 51% white and in accordance with what the rest of the team was wearing.
Jordan proved to be worth all the stress and every single penny. His debut came with a lot of fanfare, with the Chicago crowd screaming and cheering in his first-ever NBA game, where he scored 16 points, but it just wasn’t 16 points; it was the way he scored them.
Whether it was his first career points that came off a turnaround spin move that resulted in a beautiful double clutch off-the-glass shot, or when he stole the ball, took it the length of the court on two defenders, and soared in the air, hanging for what felt like forever, to kiss it beautifully in with his right hand. It was a taste of what was to come for many years for Bulls fans, the NBA, and sports.
Jordan went on to have one of the most spectacular rookie seasons in NBA history by putting up gaudy statistical numbers of 28.2 points per game on 51% from the field, 6.5 rebounds, 5.9 assists, 2.4 steals, and a shade under a block per game… His impressive stat line was astounding for a player in his prime, let alone a rookie.
He became a fan favorite immediately, being named an All-Star starter in his first season, and brought a new dimension to the game that had never been seen before with his aerial artistry and charisma.
In fact, Jordan was so good that many veteran All-Stars at the All-Star festivities in 1985 (most notably Detroit Pistons legend & Jordan’s nemesis Isiah Thomas) were bitter about the attention he was receiving at such an early stage of the year and “froze” him out of the game by refusing to pass him the ball.
Jordan’s impressive numbers helped the Bulls make the playoffs in 1985, finishing with a 38-44 record. They would end up losing to the Milwaukee Bucks in the first round. However, he won the 1985 NBA Rookie of the Year award, and it was just a small taste of what was to come.
Many were excited to see what the Bulls star would do in his sophomore season, but unfortunately, he broke his foot in just the third game of the year in 1985-86, causing him to miss 64 games. In the aftermath of a devastating injury, Jordan at least would leave many mesmerized with one of the greatest performances in sports history, with a 63-point outing in Game 2 on April 20, 1986, against the 1986 Boston Celtics (one of the greatest teams ever).
A team that had Larry Bird (who went on to win his 3rd consecutive MVP that season), Kevin McHale, Robert Parish, defensive stalwart Dennis Johnson, and a former MVP turned Sixth Man of the Year in Bill Walton.
Against one of the toughest arenas to play in and arguably the greatest frontcourt lineups of all time with also one of the greatest defensive guards ever in Johnson, Jordan torched the Celtics and left many in awe despite the Bulls coming up short in a double-overtime 135-131 loss to the eventual champions in the Celtics.
