It's possible.
It's so hard to believe that more than a quarter century has passed since Michael Jordan reached the height of his dominance. I remember vividly the ubiquitous "Be Like Mike" posters, and that nearly every male my age wore a pair of Air Jordans. Be like Mike! They would say.
The shoes didn't help. No third grader at Charles Wright Elementary School was ever able to dunk a basketball. To be fair, no one on any basketball court anywhere could be like Mike.
I also remember the shirts. That number 23 emblazoned across their backs. How many times I thought I could strike up a conversation with a fellow fan of Dan Mattingly, only to be disappointed.
What I did not know was that no one was more uncomfortable with this level of cult-status hero worship than Michael Jordan.
"I'm not a statue," said Jordan. "I'm a human being."
But an extraordinary human being: An All-Star. A Champion. An Olympic Gold Medalist. It was hard to see him as simply human. To err is human, but to Air like Jordan is Divine.
Shocking news would change how we saw a superstar. James R. Jordan, father of Michael Jordan, killed for his car at a rest stop in North Carolina. The perpetrators turned themselves in when they discovered the victim was. A harsh, harrowing, and heartbreaking reminder of how fragile our life on this Earth can be.
"I felt I was being engulfed in the success that I'd gathered at that time, and then my father passed." Said Jordan. "That was the last straw."
A human being indeed. I was only 11 years old when a larger than life basketball superhero announced that at the height of dominance, he would walk away from the game. Apparently, I wasn't the only one who how trouble understanding why. At a press conference, Jordan explained to the world his decision.
"When you lose the sense of motivation, and the sense of to prove something as a basketball player," he said. "It's time to move away from the game of basketball."
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| Sad and stunned, Jordan's Chicago Bulls teammates attend his retirement conference. |
"I thought he would give that up after one bus ride," said Reinsdorf.
It's not hard to argue with that logic. It's a steep drop from flying first class and checking into the posh luxury hotels to the utterly unglamourous life that is a minor league baseball player. But that's not how Jordan saw it. After dropping a routine fly ball and striking out twice in his first game as a Baron, Jordan was ecstatic.
"It takes the pressure off," he said.
The rest is history. A .202 batting average, 104 strikeouts, and 11 errors in centerfield. And yet . . .
And yet this was a man who hadn't played organized baseball in over ten years. A man who hadn't played baseball since Jimmy Carter was president. Someone else hit .202 in the minor leagues right after high school. That someone else? Derek Jeter!
Could Jordan's career have taken a similar trajectory? Terry Francona--Jordan's manager in Birmingham--deemed it possible.
Could Jordan's career have taken a similar trajectory? Terry Francona--Jordan's manager in Birmingham--deemed it possible.
"You've got to get 1200 at bats before you can consider someone playing in the big leagues," said Francona. "If he would've been willing to give it a couple more years, he would've found a way to the big leagues: If you tell him no, he's going to find a way to make it be yes."
Could it have been yes? Against better competition in the Arizona Fall League, Jordan's batting average jumped 50 points. He stopped dropping fly balls and started making shoestring catches. In March of 1995, he was slated to gain a promotion to the White Sox AAA affiliate in Nashville.
But with the use of replacement players and baseball mired in its never-ending player strike, MJ traded in hardball for hardwood with a simple statement: "I'm Back!"
But could Jordan and Jeter have been teammates? Consider this: In 1996, The Yankees needed a new left fielder and signed Tim Raines from the Chicago White Sox. Had the strike been resolved, and Jordan completed a full season at AAA, he could have earned a spot with the White Sox in September, when the rosters expanded to 40 players.
It's well-known that George Steinbrenner always wanted a big star, and Jordan would have been the biggest of them all.
Could Jordan have excelled in baseball, as Terry Francona predicted? Consider this: Who has better reaction time and better bodily kinesthetic skills than Michael Jordan? With MJ's blessed combination of strength and speed, he could have easily morphed into a player akin to Willie Mays or Mickey Mantle. It certainly would have helped the Yankees, who went through a revolving door of left-fielders for the first half of Jeter's career.
Famed law professor and statistician John Donohue considered this possibility on the 20 year anniversary of Jordan's re-entry to basketball. A lawyer first and economist second, Donohue was measured in his off-the-cuff analysis.
"Someone asked me if I wanted to see him play on his first day back," recalled Donohue, "but the prices were exorbitant, so I went the second game."
And?
"He [Jordan] was good, but he wasn't very good. The Bulls didn't win that year, then they won three consecutive championships. It's safe to assume that if he doesn't take a year off to play baseball, he wins another two championship rings."
Good point. While one can say with the certainty of a full-court shot that MJ would have succeeded in baseball, his success probability in basketball is a slam dunk!
And yes, while Jordan could have succeeded in baseball, he was simply the best of his kind in basketball. The buzzer beating jump shots. The reverse layups. The no-look passes. And the amazing acrobatic slam dunks. His combination of speed, strength, and snap judgement made him an artist on the baseball court--an artist we may never be fortunate enough to witness again.
Could it have been yes? Against better competition in the Arizona Fall League, Jordan's batting average jumped 50 points. He stopped dropping fly balls and started making shoestring catches. In March of 1995, he was slated to gain a promotion to the White Sox AAA affiliate in Nashville.
But with the use of replacement players and baseball mired in its never-ending player strike, MJ traded in hardball for hardwood with a simple statement: "I'm Back!"
But could Jordan and Jeter have been teammates? Consider this: In 1996, The Yankees needed a new left fielder and signed Tim Raines from the Chicago White Sox. Had the strike been resolved, and Jordan completed a full season at AAA, he could have earned a spot with the White Sox in September, when the rosters expanded to 40 players.
It's well-known that George Steinbrenner always wanted a big star, and Jordan would have been the biggest of them all.
Could Jordan have excelled in baseball, as Terry Francona predicted? Consider this: Who has better reaction time and better bodily kinesthetic skills than Michael Jordan? With MJ's blessed combination of strength and speed, he could have easily morphed into a player akin to Willie Mays or Mickey Mantle. It certainly would have helped the Yankees, who went through a revolving door of left-fielders for the first half of Jeter's career.
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| Jordan would have fit right in playing alongside Posada, Martinez and Jeter. |
Famed law professor and statistician John Donohue considered this possibility on the 20 year anniversary of Jordan's re-entry to basketball. A lawyer first and economist second, Donohue was measured in his off-the-cuff analysis.
"Someone asked me if I wanted to see him play on his first day back," recalled Donohue, "but the prices were exorbitant, so I went the second game."
And?
"He [Jordan] was good, but he wasn't very good. The Bulls didn't win that year, then they won three consecutive championships. It's safe to assume that if he doesn't take a year off to play baseball, he wins another two championship rings."
Good point. While one can say with the certainty of a full-court shot that MJ would have succeeded in baseball, his success probability in basketball is a slam dunk!
And yes, while Jordan could have succeeded in baseball, he was simply the best of his kind in basketball. The buzzer beating jump shots. The reverse layups. The no-look passes. And the amazing acrobatic slam dunks. His combination of speed, strength, and snap judgement made him an artist on the baseball court--an artist we may never be fortunate enough to witness again.
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