| Even allowing that we might overstate the point, it is not uncommon for the most
memorable of our athletes to reflect their times. Certainly, the Babe was at one
with the Roaring Twenties, just as Jackie Robinson perfectly represented the
grand societal advances of the postwar years, and as Ali and Billie Jean so
symbolized the turmoil of their period. Likewise, Michael Jordan is not merely
so extraordinary for what he does. He has also been the right, best athlete for
us now, for this relatively serene and altogether prosperous fin de
siecle, when the United States rules alone, as much superculture as
superpower ... Nowadays, it is blithely accepted that the tall, dark and bald
young man has become the most familiar face on the planet Earth, that with the
death of Diana, princess of Wales, Michael Jeffrey Jordan, late of Wilmington,
N.C., has become the First Celebrity of the World, positively ubiquitous, the
human Hard Rock Café
T-shirt.
--From "One Of A Kind", Sports Illustrated, June 22, 1998, by Frank
Deford
|
