If I Could Be 'Like Mike' (The Last Dance Episodes 5 & 6)

What a dream it would be to have endless amounts of money and fame, and to be the most popular human on the planet.... but what does it cost?

Episode 5 started off with a tribute and a short interview with Kobe Bryant. Something that we were all expecting: but it was short. Honestly, I am glad it was short because I didn't want the waterworks to come out in the first five minutes, and to sit for the next two hours with a stuffy nose and puffy eyes. So, thankfully, it was short and sweet, yet it still was Kobe offering that he wouldn't have been as good as he was without MJ. Something we have seen a lot throughout this documentary is a mutual respect amongst big names in the basketball world (poor one out for Isiah Thomas and Jerry Krause). Kobe's interview consisted a lot of talk about the All-Star game and that must've been one of the coldest lineups of all stars we have ever seen... nonetheless in the Mecca of basketball, what an atmosphere it must've been.

Episode 5 talked a lot about the sneakers. Especially on MJ's farewell tour in MSG, we got to hear a lot of the history of how the Nike-Jordan relationship came to be. At the time, it must've been like the high-school quarterback dating the new girl. Like Nike was well known, but surely MJ wasn't going to sign with a track shoe...? Thank God he did because now, we have 30+ kinds of Jordan sneakers that Nike produces that nobody can afford anyway.

MJ talking about wearing the "One's" a decade after they were produced and his feet just soaking in blood might be the most relatable thing of all time. I owned a pair of one's in like 3rd of 4th grade. I wore them to hoop for an entire season. Now, I wasn't some incredible 8 year-old who needed the best shoes, but to this day those were the only shoes that I have had blisters and bloody feet from. You can bet your ass I was wearing 'em every practice and game because I was going to be 'Like Mike' every time I wore them. In my opinion, the sneaker game was created by MJ. It is hard to name any other athlete who has three dozen pairs of shoes that people cherish 30 years after that players last performance.

Hot Seat of the night: Adidas for "not being able to make one person the face of a brand". There goes a multi-billion dollar opportunity.

The Dream Team was a whole different beast. This isn't news to anyone. #2 in the World at the time... Croatia. Yep, you heard that right, Croatia. Croatia played the '92 Dream Team twice in Barcelona: they lost the first game by 33 and the second (the Gold Medal game) by 28. There was no competition for this team. It maybe the single greatest team ever assembled. The only other team that could compete on this floor would be the 2012 Olympic team. Even then I hate doing generational comparisons because people argue that "Players in the 80s and 90s were plumbers and grocery store clerks..." and I know we have all heard or made this argument at one point, so I am not here to debate who would win that matchup but rather to think about how BANANAs that matchup would be.

Let's talk about this 'practice' that the Dream Team had. The dudes in the practice were easily the top 12 basketball players in the world at the time (sorry Isiah Thomas...) and they were talking about what a dog fight it was. Basically it came down to three players from what I took away. Magic and Chuck vs. MJ... "We were up by 8 or so" is what Magic said. Then he started talking trash to Jordan, and basically Jordan flipped the game upside down. Jordan's squad ended up winning, and my story telling ability of this practice is pretty garbage (just like the court they were practicing on), but you could imagine having 12 dudes just watch 3 competitive natured men take over this court in a sheer battle of pride. I'd pay cruel amounts of money to watch that scrimmage.

The 'Like Mike' commercial -- I have heard the song a million times. Being a Marketing student, one of my primary things to study is advertisements and the way that they have developed over the years... so I have also seen the commercial probably 100 times... Gatorade hit the nail on the head in this commercial. They did everything right. HOWEVER, 1990s Gatorade was bought IN GLASS BOTTLES. You pull up to a friends house and ask for a Gatorade, and he has to go to the China cabinet to pull it out???? That is utter blasphemy. I seriously cannot believe you replenished your electrolytes like you were sitting at the bar in the 1990s.

The competitive nature of MJ was nothing short of a Lion. He was the king and everyone had to know it. Whether it was on the court, on the links, or throwing damn quarters at the wall, Jordan had to be the best. First of all Jordan winning the Olympics and loving Nike so much that he refused to show the Reebok logo on his jumpsuit is hilarious. "Harvey Schiller. What a dick." "They not gonna cover it up [the Reebok logo] like me". These two quotes from MJ showed how much wearing a logo other than Nike really bothered him. He flat out showed up to the Medal ceremony with a PHAT American flag over the logo so that there was no doubt anyone would see him in anything other than the swoosh: HILARIOUS. THAT is chess a move while everyone else [Reebok and Adidas] were playing checkers.

Not a Reebok logo in sight...

Toni Kukoč was also in the hot seat a little bit in episode 5... And again, it somehow is tied to Jerry Krause's name. Krause fell in love with Kukoč and drafted him. Kukoč decided to continue playing in Europe, which in turn would be a mistake. Krause was looking to sign him for cheap to essentially replace Pippen. One, Pippen was already getting WAY under paid, and two, Kukoč wasn't the teammate that MJ was used to. Could you imagine if Kukoč agreed to the terms and went to the Bulls (which would get Pippen to probably leave)... We probably wouldn't have a 10 part documentary because quite frankly with Kukoč replacing Pippen, the Bulls wouldn't have been half the team they were. Once Pippen and Jordan knew that Kukoč was the kid that Krause was in-love with, it was automatically "step-on #7's throat because I said so" in the Dream Team locker room. Nothing against Kukoč but I found it funny that just because Krause liked him even a little bit, MJ and Pippen automatically hated him. (Same thing with Dan Majerle in the Suns/Bulls finals. Krause liked Majerle so MJ had to absolutely eat on offense when Majerle was guarding him... just to piss off Krause)

Now last week we saw Dennis Rodman in need of a 48 hour vacation... But Micheal had to get a round of golf in during a playoff series, and this wasn't the first time. He had done it previously against the Celtics, but now Micheal, after losing game one to the Knicks was betting $57,000 against some criminal in the middle of the playoffs? I mean I am not one to hobby-shame, however, Rodman took criticism for going to Vegas (which was seemingly his hobby), but no one shook a head at MJ betting $57k against a convicted felon? I thought that was an interesting way to show MJ's gambling addic--- I mean, competitive nature.

Let's talk about this throwing quarter game. MJ HAD TO beat everyone at everything no matter what it was. We just talked about golf, basketball is obvious, we can talk about regular gambling on card games and what-not, but this quarter game is PEAK boredom competition. "I bet you $20 I can throw this quarter closer to the wall than you......????" Who put $20 on that? The most competitively natured human on the planet that's who... He wanted to be the best so badly he gave his security guard 4-1 chances on doing it.. The security guard needed one chance to beat him...

Now, to wrap it all up, I think it would take a lot for me to 'be Like Mike'. The conversation of "it was so peaceful until you all showed up" (while he was laying on the couch) made that very clear. This dude lived hotel room to hotel room on the road for months at a time (I know he had home games, but let me make my point). When he wasn't in the hotel room he was doing one of three things: gambling, playing basketball, or stuck with press. Now, I know basically all NBA players do that, but it has to be different for the most famous players. No one had ever seen an athlete take over the entire world like this, so no matter what city, state, or country he was in, SOMEBODY recognized him and begged him for a autograph at least. I don't know if I could do it. You couldn't go anywhere without being recognized. Like I'm willing to bet players love going overseas on vacation where they are significantly less recognizable, but this showed that for MJ, he was recognized quite literally everywhere, and everyone wanted to have an experience shaking his hand or getting the latest 'retirement news'. I couldn't be 'Like Mike' and be able to put up with millions of crazed fans daily: I would probably explode. Imagine that your life was this picture every time you walked outside:

Again, to restate from the two previous blog posts about this documentary: I missed a lot. This documentary is continually proving itself and I still only have the "jump around" complaint. I can't get enough of sports. I miss it.

Tweets of the Night:

Hot Seat for all 10 episodes... Jerry Krause:

^ The "it was all peaceful until you all came in"