Maybe Jordan's departure a good
thing
Posted: Wed May 6,
1998
We have been diverted too long by the question: who will be
the next Michael Jordan? We should know the answer: nobody.
Sometimes there just isn't a next. But as we all have sat
about, fretting, waiting for Godot, the NBA has been eroded
by all those
players who have been given the license of our dreams to
audition to be that next Michael
Jordan.
The result is that right now, the National Basketball
Association doesn't need to look ahead for the next Michael
Jordan. It needs to look back to the way it was
beforeMichael
Jordan.
Maybe basketball just hasn't been prepared to accept its
new respect and imminence. It was a seedy sport that
couldn't compete with baseball, which featured family and
community, or football, which was a party game, a
spectacle. Even hockey, fast and
rough, had a certain panache. But basketball, itwas
de
classe,played in sweaty gymnasiums—sometimes even enclosed in
wire mesh. It's been almost forgotten, but basketball
players were called "cagers" because they existed
in this athletic
zoo.
Then, almost overnight, thanks to some magnificent talents
and some clever marketing, basketball was turned right-side
up. Suddenly, the grubbiest game was the most glamorous.
The word "artistic" began to appear ...
pretentiously. More practically,
basketball didn't become art so much as show biz. Instead of
prizing plays, we began to celebrate
moves. And, as with other forms of theatre, the performance
became subsidiary to the
performers.
It certainly isn't Jordan's fault, but maybe the worst
thing that ever happened to basketball was that he was too
good for the game. Whereas Bill Russell, and then Larry
Bird and Magic Johnson, were reknowned for
leading their teams, Jordan is known for carrying
his.
And so, in his image, the players play, each for
themselves. Selfishness rules and culture excuses.
"It's all right on the street," Pat Riley said
the other day, justifying another fight. So, venerated and
forgiven, the stars proclaim their manliness—on
and off the court. They pout, whine, demand, taunt, fight
and, by all
accounts,
as
Sports
Illustrated detailed so graphically last week—they live sybaritic
lives, siring more offspring than do Kentucky Derby
winners. It's all me, all now, and it's just become so
very tawdry.
At the annual awards dinner of the National Association of
Sportscasters and Sportswriters last week, Dave Kindred of
The Sporting
News,voted the sportswriter of the year, used that occasion to
announce that he was sorry, all these years he had
supported the players over the owners. He couldn't do that
anymore.
Kindred's proclamation—for he is a most respected
voice—had the ring of that time a generation ago, when
American officials announced they had changed their minds
completely to stand against
Vietnam.
For now, anyway, for a few weeks, maybe even another year
or two, we remain in the presence of Jordan, one so
brilliant we don't stop to consider the shabby world he
gives shine to. But when he does depart, the league will
have to finally understand
that there can't be a next to guide the future by if nobody can
any longer stomach the here and
now.
These commentaries, which appear each Wednesday on National
Public Radio's Morning Edition, are posted weekly by
CNN/SI.
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