According to sources to Yahoo! sports, after a loss to the Phoenix Suns on March 30th, Bulls vice president John Paxson entered coach Vinny Del Negro's office in an irate fashion regarding the playing time of Joakim Noah.
Sources say Paxson grabbed a hold of Del Negro's tie and gave him two jabs to the chest, even challenging him to a fight.
Coach Bernie Bickerstaff was said to have pulled Paxson away from Del Negro.
Sources stated Del Negro did not retaliate, for fear of the voiding of his contract leading to no pay and hurting the opportunity for future employment chances.
After a Feb. 26th game against Portland, Paxson and general manager Gar Forman also became angry when Noah's minutes exceeded the limit management that team doctors had specified.
Noah played 27 minutes in the 111-105 loss to the Suns on the March 30 game when the Paxson incident supposedly occurred.
Noah's minutes have been a topic of conversation since Del Negro elected to only play Noah for 12 seconds in the extra two frames of the double overtime loss to the New Jersey Nets, with the Bulls having a chance to take a one game lead on the Toronto Raptors for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.
Can you blame Del Negro at this point?
His job has been threatened more than enough times during the first two months of this season.
Why would he do anything to upset management this late in the season?
If management is literally going to fight Del Negro over playing Noah 27 minutes in a tight game against a good team like the Suns, why wouldn't they stab him over playing Noah more than 35 minutes and 51 seconds in a game against the Nets?
Given Sam Smith's immense sources and basketball contacts through the years, you know he was aware of this story.
So instead of Yahoo's Adrian Wojnarowski's breaks the story. Just like he had about the team's lack of backing in December when the local outlets failed to report that management was searching for his in-season replacement.
I don't know if the Sun-Times even covers Bulls basketball anymore as John Jackson plays both reporter and columnist and never really iterates a line of insight. I'm still befuddled as to what he does exactly.
So this, the hard-cracking newspapers vs the digital world of Yahoo, shows that reputation is still keeping some reporters afloat.
K.C. Johnson was supposedly trying to be respectful of DelNegro since he is sure to be unemployed in a week or two.
But wasn't DelNegro the one who leaked the story to the papers?
That's why "sources" leak anything in the first place unless it's over some whiskey stupor at the hotel - but those days between reporter and coach have faded. They have something to gain by dispensing some protected information.
So, sure, the Chicago outlets whiffed on this one and Sam Smith plays this one down again. It's just a friendly feud. Never mind that it got physical. Of course when this was about Tyrus Thomas disrespecting DelNegro, it was news.
This stuff never mattered when Michael Jordan owned the Bulls.
During the Jordan regime, sideshows were an entertaining diversion from the monotony of those long, arduous NBA championship seasons. Hey, Dennis Rodman just kicked a photographer and got suspended for 11 games, what a hoot!
Nothing really mattered, because when Rodman would miss 11 games, the Bulls would go 9-2, lead the NBA with a 42-6 record and still be on pace to win an NBA-record 72 games. When Jordan would cause a stir by going to Atlantic City during the playoffs, he'd score 54 points against the Knicks a few nights later and render the Atlantic City episode a non-story.
But ever since Jerry Reinsdorf took over after the 1997-98 season, every off-the-court issue has had long-term, big-picture ramifications. If Jerry Krause would have assaulted Phil Jackson, it would have been written off as creative tension. When John Paxson grabs Vinny Del Negro by the tie and challenges him to a fight, it's a shakes the foundation of the entire Bulls organization -- from the bottom straight to the top. The absolute top.
Jerry Reinsdorf's desk.
If Reinsdorf still owns the Bulls, he needs to speak up now, because the latest embarrassment for the Bulls organization reflects on him more than anyone else. If published reports are as accurate as they appear to be, the guy Reinsdorf hand-picked to return his organization to glory initiated a confrontation with the coach Reinsdorf at least indirectly hired. I kind of doubt Paxson would have confronted Mike D'Antoni or Doug Collins -- or even had reason to do so.
If Reinsdorf wouldn't hire Collins because he didn't want to fire him, he never should have hired Paxson -- because he's going to have to fire him sooner or later at the rate Pax is going. The sloppy apparent "mis-firing" of Del Negro in December, the whole Joakim Noah-minutes ordeal and now this.
Derrick Rose is carrying the team like never before -- he's averaging 24.9 points and 41.6 minutes over the last eight games -- and the Bulls still are scrapping and clawing for the eighth and final playoff berth in the Eastern Conference and the right to get wiped out by a refreshed LeBron James and the Cavaliers in the first round.
And the price of Chris Bosh or Dwyane Wade just went up, because any agent knows how badly Paxson needs a superstar player for a shot at turning the Bulls into a serious playoff contender.
Chicago Bulls coach Vinny Del Negro initiated the physical contact with executive vice president John Paxson during an altercation on March 30 -- contrary to a report that painted Paxson as the aggressor -- a source close to the situation told ESPNChicago.com.
Yahoo Sports reported Tuesday that Paxson grabbed Del Negro by the tie, jabbed him twice in the chest and seemingly challenged him to a fight because Del Negro exceeded the time limit management set for Joakim Noah, who has been recovering from plantar fasciitis in his left foot. In Yahoo Sports' report it was suggested that Del Negro didn't retaliate against Paxson during the altercation because he was worried the Bulls could void his contract.
However, a source close to the situation disputed who initiated that argument, and said that it wasn't the first altercation Del Negro has had with management. The source said that Del Negro and Bulls general manager Gar Forman had an altercation in Forman's office that was similar, but did not give details.
"So this was not the first time [Del Negro] exhibited this behavior," the source said.
A call placed to Del Negro on Wednesday afternoon was not immediately returned.
The relationship between Paxson and Del Negro has been deteriorating for some time and reached a head over the use of Noah, who has been hurting since mid-January. Del Negro, the source said, directly defied orders by Paxson and Forman in playing Noah seven minutes longer than ordered to against the Portland Trail Blazers on Feb. 26 when Noah was "clearly hurting," according to the source.
"[Del Negro] put his own interest ahead of the Bulls," the source said.
Back in the spring of 2005, while Scott Skiles was holding the Bulls hostage, the question seemed painfully obvious.
Why would they bother handing all that money to Skiles in a new contract when Phil Jackson was available?
Jackson was on hiatus and discussing with several teams a return to the NBA, but the Bulls buckled to Skiles' demands, and that young core of Ben Gordon, Kirk Hinrich and Luol Deng never amounted to much under the burden of a beast.
They whiffed on the chance to get Jackson, the window closed, and he's been in Los Angeles ever since.
Well, that window is open again and it might allow both Jackson and Kobe Bryant to jump right through it and land in Chicago.
Jackson's a free agent after this season, and the talk in L.A. is that the Lakers will expect him to take a big pay cut from the $12 million he's currently earning.
And while that may seem a bit out of the Bulls' price range, considering they found the cheapest deal imaginable in Vinny Del Negro, they can take some of the money they saved with Vinny and pay Jackson.
The homecoming itself, along with the burial of all the bad blood and memories, would be worth whatever Jackson costs, not to mention the fact that he's a great coach and he'd be terrific for Derrick Rose.
John Paxson, vice president of basketball operations, spoke at half time of the Bulls awful loss to the Wizards last night on ESPN 1000.
I refuse to talk about the game because let's be honest it was a very bad loss to a equally bad team that may have the Bulls on the outside looking in come playoff time. I will say one quick thing, Derrick Rose needs the ball in his hands. After he single handily brought them back from being down after they blew their halftime lead with them down by 1 with 1:55 left in the game and then they don't score another point while losing to the Wiz 101-95.
Ok back to Pax. He had some interesting things to say about free agency and why the Bulls should be appealing to teams.
"We know there's no certainty in [free agency]," "There are a lot of teams with cap space, but our view is we have an All-Star player in Derrick Rose; we have an up-and-coming outstanding center in Joakim Noah; a dependable, very good small forward -- definitely a top-10 small forward in the league -- in Luol Deng, and we have Taj [Gibson], who's been terrific."
Really is Deng a top ten small forward?
"You factor in this is Chicago, and we have a great history, it's a great city and there are opportunities outside of basketball if they want them. We think we're sitting in a very nice position to try to attract."
We all know Plan A for the Bulls and Knicks and Nets and Clippers and Heat and Kings and Timberwolves and Wizards and anyone else who can get far enough under the salary cap to add one major free agent, like LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.
I happen to be for Plan C because I believe the odds are long that any of those three actually leave their teams and leave $30 million or more on the table—the NBA labor deal was set up to try to keep free agents from leaving their teams. And even if they do leave, it would be near impossible in some places to put together a competitive team around them.
The Bulls may be the best prepared with an actual nucleus of signed, competent NBA players, like Derrick Rose, Luol Deng, Joakim Noah, Kirk Hinrich and Taj Gibson. But once you reach the salary cap estimated at about $53 million, which the Bulls would come close to by adding one max free agent and a team like the Knicks would with two, then you have to fill out the rest of your roster with minimum salaried free agents or second round draft picks. For a team like the Bulls, for example, that would mean adding maybe a half dozen minimum salaried players to go with their core and one top player.
Is that enough to be a championship contender? Perhaps, as in this NBA era there aren't many teams with quality bench depth or strength. In fact, this is what most believe the new NBA is likely to look like after the new collective bargaining agreement eventually comes into effect, a league of a few super salaried players and three quarters of the roster minimum or low salaried players.
Sort of a mirror of what may be the coming U.S. economy of the super rich and everyone else shopping at the second hand store.
Does Hakim Warrick come back for the league minimum? Flip Murray? Brad Miller? Aaron Gray? OK, maybe Gray.
Look at the Knicks, talking about signing, say, James and Bosh. They'd have to let go David Lee and recently acquired Tracy McGrady for two max free agents. They'd have left Danilo Gallinari, Wilson Chandler, Toney Douglas and Eddy Curry. So you've got LeBron and Bosh. Anyone getting a rebound? Setting a screen? It's why I believe they aren't going there and why I think the Knicks' plan is to try to retain Lee, sign someone like perhaps Wade or maybe Carlos Boozer or Amar'e Stoudemire or Joe Johnson, and then after getting rid of Curry next season, sign Carmelo Anthony, who has a 2011 opt out about the time Kenyon Martin and Chauncey Billups will be fading. Plus, Anthony supposedly has longed for a return to the East Coast to get the attention he feels he's been denied in Denver.
I still believe the Bulls will exhaust Plans A and B and take hard shots at Bosh or Wade. But here's a Plan C to consider to show there are options:
Yes, I'm back on Monta Ellis. You hear the Warriors will trade him this summer as they want to settle on Stephen Curry at shooting guard and know the two cannot play together. The Warriors have long had interest in Kirk Hinrich, who'd fit better with Curry and can defend. Plus, maybe you throw in James Johnson and that No. 1 you got from Charlotte in the Tyrus Thomas trade. Then you sign Lee, who'd require far less than the estimated $16.5 million maximum. Now, you've also got $5 million or $6 million or more left to maybe bring back Warrick and Miller or go out into a market for some pretty impressive players who will be looking for deals as the market dries up.
Seriously? Monta and David Lee? Not sure why I linked to this.
Like fellow NBA stars such as Kobe Bryant, the Bulls' Derrick Rose keeps his video game system locked inside his briefcase, making his passion for "NBA 2K10" portable.
"It's sick," Rose said of the case that holds an Xbox 360, a TV and controllers. "Mine has the Bulls logo on it, my number. We '2K' it out on the road all the time.
2K Sports delivered these secret agent-like gaming devices to top stars throughout the league, including Brandon Jennings, Josh Smith, Chris Paul and Tyreke Evans.
The Tulsa 66ers announced today the re-acquisition of forward Chris Richard.
The 6-9 forward was called-up on a 10-day contract to the Chicago Bulls on Feb. 6, averaging 2.2 points, 4.6 rebounds and 1.0 assists in five games.
The two-time national champion from the University of Florida started nine games earlier this season with the 66ers, averaging 10.1 points, 8.6 rebounds and 1.1 blocks. The former number one selection for the 66ers in the 2008 NBA D-League Draft played 20 games during the 2008-09 season, averaging 12.0 points, 8.3 rebounds, and 1.7 assists for Tulsa.
In order to make room on the roster for Richard, the 66ers released forward Rodney Webb. Richard will wear number 32 and is expected to be in uniform tonight at home against the Springfield Armor at 7 p.m.
I like Chris Richard. It's not the NBA, but I'm glad he found a place to continue playing basketball.
A couple of weeks ago, at the Bulls' mind-numbingly dull media day, I was obsessed with the idea that the Bulls need a singular go-to scorer to replace Ben Gordon, the Gucci-wearing, 3-point-dropping, late-game gunner who led the team in scoring 43 times last season.
Derrick Rose is the natural successor to Gordon's honorary title as Last Shot Taker, given his skill set and position as point guard, but most people I questioned assured me that the team will have to find its late-game identity organically and that more than one guy could assume Gordon's status. Joakim Noah even patted me on the shoulder good-naturedly as I rambled on about it.
I bring this up because -- in a game that probably no one watched live -- rookie James Johnson dropped in a game-winning, buzzer-beating jumper from the baseline to beat the Utah Jazz in London's O2 Arena the other day. The shot came off a Derrick Byars miss, and if you forgot this was a preseason game, Byars' taking the last shot is a good reminder. Perhaps Byars was inspired by wearing Gordon's old No. 7 jersey, but mostly it was because Rose sat out the game, flying to London on his 21st birthday just to make some promotional appearances for his personal brand that he's touting. Tyrus Thomas missed the game, as well.
There is nothing interesting about the top of the Central. The Cavs are going to win the division again, and it's not even going to be that close (don't get too excited Cleveland ... playoffs are another story).
The rest of the division is divided evenly. Chicago and Detroit are playoff teams who will fall somewhere in the 4-7 range, Milwaukee and Indiana have no shot.
My thoughts on the Pistons are readily available on the Web, so let's focus on the Bulls here. They might be the most intriguing team in the NBA.
Derrick Rose will join the Chris Paul/Deron Williams group of young, elite point guards this season. He might not be a MVP contender yet like his PG brethren, but he's very close. Ben Gordon had the big scoring numbers in last year's near-upset of the Celtics, but make no mistake: the Bulls pushed the champs so much because of D-Rose.
His supporting cast is pretty good. They will rotate athletic freak of nature Ty Thomas, with rebounding machine Joakim Noah and non-rebounding/non-athletic but decent offensively Brad Miller up front.
Luol Deng is healthy -- remember, the Bulls didn't want to include him in a potential Kobe Bryant trade a couple years back. He can play. They may have overvalued him a tad by not including him in proposed deals for Kobe, KG and Gasol, but don't let that undervalue him: if he's right, his mid-range game is only rivaled by Rip Hamilton's.
When the Bulls return to practice Friday at the Berto Center, it will mark two weeks since Luol Deng conceded even he wouldn't know how his right leg would respond until he played hard on it every day.
Deng has played actively and aggressively through the Bulls' first two exhibition games, thrilling his adopted hometown fans with 18 points in 25 minutes during Tuesday's preseason victory over the Jazz in London.
Some of those fans chanted Deng's name as he sat the entire fourth quarter, hoping he'd return.
But even though the stress fracture that Deng recovered from hasn't caused anything more than minor irritation, it remains an influence on Deng's preseason.
"It was exciting to be home and I wanted to play a lot of minutes," Deng said. "But coach ( Vinny Del Negro) and I talked, and it's right to keep managing my minutes. Overall, I feel happy with where I am. But we want to stick with the plan."
That plan, according to Del Negro, calls for Deng's minutes to increase as the preseason progresses. That likely won't happen in Saturday's game against the Bucks in Green Bay, where Deng's minutes should hover in the 24-28 range.
I consider myself to be an October guy for four reasons. First, hay fever season starts in late April (and always crushes me). Second, living on the West Coast makes me ineligible for April's "Cool, it's gonna be nice outside soon!" buzz in cold-weather cities. Third, I'm a sucker for Halloween, dating back to my first costume (Freddie Lynn, a big hit) and the original John Carpenter "Halloween" movie (my first favorite scary movie and the one that prompted me to once write a "SportsCentury: Michael Myers" column). I love Halloween so much that I'll be stopping my book tour for two days -- even though it's the first week, only the most crucial part of the tour -- so I could fly cross-country to trick-or-treat with my kids. It's my favorite day of the year other than Kanye West's annual public breakdown.
...
Fourth, only October (and this year, thanks to a random calendar fluke, the first few days of November) features games from all four professional sports. We're headed for a surreal final week Oct. 25-31: Week 7 of the NFL and a possible Game 7 of an ALCS/NLCS (Sunday); "Monday Night Football" (Monday); opening night for the NBA (Tuesday); Game 1 of the World Series (Wednesday); Game 2 of the World Series and two TNT NBA games (Thursday); an NBA doubleheader on ESPN (Friday); college football, Game 3 of the World Series and Halloween (Saturday).
In the hope of helping oncologists remove every piece of tumor tissue during surgery, researchers are developing new imaging tools that work in real time in the operating room. European researchers have now demonstrated that a chemical analysis instrument called a mass spectrometer can be coupled with an electroscalpel to create a molecular profile of tissue during surgery. The researchers have shown that the method can be used to map out different tissue types and distinguish cancerous tissue. The device will begin clinical trials next month.
"When a surgeon is performing cancer surgery, he doesn't have any direct information on where the tumor is," says Zoltán Takáts, a professor at Justus-Liebig University in Giessen, Germany. Instead, surgeons rely on preoperative imaging scans and on feedback from pathologists examining tissue biopsies under a microscope. "We want to provide a tool that's right in their hands, so that if they think a structure looks suspicious, they can just test it," says Takáts.
Mass spectrometry, a very precise method for identifying molecules by analyzing the ratio between their mass and charge, is already being used by a handful of research groups to study biological samples. Researchers have known for many years that tumor tissue and healthy tissue have different molecular profiles and that this can be used to tell them apart, or even to determine how aggressive a particular tumor is. Other research groups have used mass spectrometry to analyze biopsied tissue and have shown that it can make these differentiations. The problem with using mass spectrometry in the operating room is sample collection. Before molecules can be analyzed, they have to be ionized and sucked up into the machine. Creating ions requires bombarding a sample with a stream of charged particles, often a gas, and these methods aren't suitable for the operating room. "A high-voltage nitrogen jet is not compatible with the human body," says Takáts.
Bulls legend Michael Jordan, basketball’s greatest player ever, is among a class of five named for enshrinement in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. The Class of 2009 will be inducted during festivities in Springfield, MA September 10-12, 2009. Coverage
Chicago, IL (August 31, 2009) – Comcast SportsNet, the television home of the Chicago Bulls, Blackhawks, Cubs and White Sox, will provide viewers with a two-day celebration of Michael Jordan’s induction into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame with complete game telecasts of five of his greatest games in a Bulls uniform, along with a pair of original, half-hour Comcast SportsNet specials chronicling his unsurpassed basketball career. This comprehensive, two-day programming event entitled 23 Hours of MJ: A Hall of Fame Celebration begins Thursday, September 10 at 5:30 PM with a Jordan-focused edition of Chicago Tribune Live hosted by David Kaplan and concludes on Friday, September 11, also with Chicago Tribune Live at 5:30 PM, featuring SportsNite’s Mark Schanowski reporting live from the Hall of Fame induction ceremonies in Springfield, MA.
Paxson also pointed out that Jordan has never been given enough credit for how intelligent of a basketball player he was, constantly aware of game and clock situations. His leadership was highly evident even when play was stopped, as he was always the most vocal player during timeouts. In addition, the communication that existed between Jordan and Pippen on the floor allowed them to talk through a lot of game situations.
Not only was it Jordan’s ability and talent that made him the best of the best, it was his desire to put it all on the line when it mattered most.
“He always wanted to take the big shot and he was never afraid of failing,” said Paxson. “If you could get into the minds of a lot of players in this league, whether they are playing now or used to play, to take on the pressure of making the big plays that count with that amount of consistency just didn’t happen very often. He just accepted it.”
Jackson, for the most part, stays away from the Kobe versus Michael debate. But the coach with an NBA-record ten championships was clear about his opinion on Jordan’s contributions.
“I don’t think anybody will ever really touch what Michael has done for the game,” he said when asked if Kobe or LeBron James could ever vie for Jordan’s “best-ever” title. “They may be able to break a record he had or maybe win more championships. Michael was 28 when he won his first championship, and LeBron could win one before he reaches that age and have a chance at winning more than six. But Michael’s image as a player will always stand and his greatness will never be superseded.”
For Jackson, Jordan’s defining moment came during the team’s first championship run in 1991. After losing the series opener in Chicago, the Bulls won four straight games to defeat the Los Angeles Lakers, 4-1, in the Finals. During the fifth and deciding game, the Bulls faced a resilient Lakers team on their homecourt.
“We got stalled,” he recalled. “The Lakers were damn sure that Michael wasn’t going to beat them and stacked their defense against him. When I called a timeout, we talked a little bit about it on the bench. I asked him to tell me who was open because of how they were crowding him. He said Paxson. He knew it. I said, ‘OK,’ and that’s all I had to say.”
Jordan promptly fed Paxson for several jump shots, who connected on four-of-five down the stretch and finished with 20 points in 33 minutes.
It was his will to win that Reinsdorf saw in Jordan, a trait that Reinsdorf believes drove Jordan to be the best of the best.
“There probably have been players with similar skills to his, although I doubt there has ever been a player as good offensively and defensively as Michael,” Reinsdorf said from his U.S. Cellular Field office. “The thing that separated him from all the other athletes I’ve ever seen was his desire to win.”
When is the last time you bought a Beckett magazine? As a matter of fact, do you even know what Beckett is? If you collected sports cards growing up and wanted to stay up to date with the value of your cards, Beckett was the go-to book.
A number of magazines are paying homage to Michael Jordan’s induction into the Hall of Fame by placing MJ on the cover of their September ‘09 issue. The image above gives you a peak at the Air Jordan section that was done by SoleCollector. SC put together a feature which they priced out every colorway of each original Air Jordan, based on market value, rarity, nostalgia and completed auction prices.
As we all know, Michael Jordan will officially be inducted into the NBA Hall of Fame on September 11th, 2009. Recently, we have seen everything from magazine covers, sneaker packs, look books and other things that are associated with the induction. In the same manner, we have now spotted a one-of-a-kind collectible Michael Jordan Hall of Fame Gatorade bottle on eBay.
Similar to the Michael Jordan Gatorade Cooler Set that surfaced in July, this bottle features MJ’s signature along with a photo of him. This time, the photo is of Jordan shooting the ‘Last Shot’ against the Utah Jazz in the 1998 NBA Finals (Byron Russell is nowhere to be found in the picture). There is still two days left on this collectible, so head on over to eBay to bid now
That has to be what all of them are thinking. David Robinson. John Stockton. Cynthia Cooper. Don Nelson. The Basketball Hall of Fame's Class of 2009 will be announced Monday, and all the other candidates must be thinking: "Why do I have to share what should be the greatest day in my career with him?" None of them will ever say it out loud, but they'd be something other than human if they weren't feeling that way.
MJ certainly isn't your ordinary Hall of Famer.
That "him" is special, though. In fact, he's more than special; he's beyond that. What that "him" has done is something no one else has done, before or since. He eclipsed damn near everything that everyone else has accomplished in the game. That old saying, "No one remembers who comes in second"? Well, no one remembers anything anyone else did if he or she played or coached during the Era of Jordan.
And that's just a fact we all have to live with. A fact the other players and coaches who will be inducted into the Hall of Fame alongside Michael Jordan in September have to live with. The same fact they've had to live with for most of their careers.
At this point, hasn't it become a little unfair? Unfair to them? Unfair to the game?
It's like, "Damn, can we please catch a break?"
Which is why the Hall of Fame -- if it really cares about players and being true to transcendence of the game -- should induct Jordan alone.
Last week I posted -13- "The Michael Jordan Collection, Part 1" ... The 'limited-edition-collectibles and cards' side of my collection will be dropping next Tuesday in "Part 2".
The first time I saw him, the summer before his freshman year, we were playing pickup games on campus. We all knew about him, but I'm from New York, and he looked like a scrawny country bumpkin from North Carolina. -- Sam Perkins, Jordan's UNC teammate
When people ask me if I knew Michael would become a Hall of Fame player when I recruited him to play at North Carolina, I laugh and say, "Who did?" He was an exceptionally quick athlete who improved every year ... Of course, he made the game-winner against Georgetown as a freshman to help us win the national championship, but he didn't become a confident shooter until years later after he worked so hard on that part of his game. To be sure, one of the things that made him such a great player is his competitive fire. -- Dean Smith, UNC coach
Yesterday we reported on the Beckett Michael Jordan Hall of Fame tribute issue, and today we shed light on the SLAM magazine issue. SLAM presents Jordan (A Hall of Fame Tribute) hits newsstands next week, but is now available online. The issue is 100% Mike with exclusive interviews, rare photos, greatest dunks, the UNC years, taking over Chicago, Air Jordans 1-XX3, and more. You’ll definitely want to add this issue to your magazine collection.
In two weeks Michael Jeffrey Jordan will be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame as the G.O.A.T. It’s a fitting acknowledgment and the crowning achievement in the career of the best basketball player to ever play this game of ours.
SLAM has always acknowledged his dopeness, so as the NKOTB whMichael Jordano also happened to grow up in Chicago during the Jordan Era, I figured it would be cool to share a few fond memories I have of the man during his ascent to the title as one of the best to ever do it.
There are two types of Jordan fans; those who are from Chicago, and those who aren’t. Being a member of the former, it’s impossible to explain in words what it meant to grow up in this city during Jordan’s reign. His influence and his presence were everywhere. For me, it was more akin to a religious experience than anything having to do with basketball. The best way to describe it, or better yet, the closest thing to it would have to be when Jesus walked the Earth. After Jesus of Nazareth and before Jesus of Coney Island, there was Jesus of Madison Street.
Whether you're a native of Chicago, or simply one of the millions of basketball fans worldwide who got swept up in the mania that was Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls, ESPN has a special edition magazine on newsstands now that you'll want to check out. In what is called a "Hall Of Fame Collector's Issue," ESPN has put together an entire book together to celebrate the life and career of the man they call "The Best Ever."
The focus here will be the Chicago Bulls, and occasionally some Bears and White Sox news. BullBearSock will mostly feature links and quotes from other websites and blogs, but also feature the thoughts of 5 regular (die-hard) Bulls, Bears and White Sox fans. Join the discussion by commenting and sending links. [Contributors: 2j, DC, Kmart, Pete and PK]
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