New Kanye Song: “We Should Have Never Ever Let Michael Jordan Play For the Wizards”

Kanye West’s Yeezus tour hit Chicago’s United Center last Wednesday, and the outspoken, controversial, narcissistic and undeniably talented rapper unveiled a new song that seems to be a light joke at first, but then, as per usual Ye style, digs deep into racial/social injustices in America.

The song’s titled “We Should Have Never Ever Let MJ Play For the Wizards,” and the chorus consists of West singing variations of that title repeatedly, with reminiscent lines about the 90s Bulls -- all in autotune style, a la his album 808s & Heartbreak.

We should have never ever let MJ play for the Wizards. If we could have stopped it, we would have stopped it, why did that happen? Six championships, the best years of our lives, claim NBA gold, every single night, I believed I could fly, and I wanted to be just like Mike, I believed I could fly and I wanted to be just like Mike.

But then the verse of the song kicks in and touches on the lack of respect the Chicago Bulls owners have shown Jordan and most of its Bulls players.

When a player wants to become an owner, when a player that’s done more for the league than the league could have done for him, when a player that made the NBA wants to become an owner of a team he brought so much glory to, a team that has his statue on the front of the motherfucking building, but do you know what the owners of that team told MJ? “You’re just a player my boy, you can’t get no pay, you can’t own shit.” They told Michael Jordan that he couldn’t own shit!

While we can't speak to the claims made and it's highly unlikely that Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf actually called Jordan "boy," West's insinuation that the billionaire owner didn't take his star player seriously might possibly have merit. The Bulls' front office has had a long history of disrespecting its players, from openly courting and raving about Toni Kukoc to the point that it annoyed Jordan and Scottie Pippen (which led to the two players going out of their way to humiliate Kukoc in the '92 Olympics); to severely underpaying Scottie Pippen; to rumors of developing a rift with current coach Tom Thibodeau, who has by all accounts been excellent; to not protecting Derrick Rose from scrutiny earlier this spring when fans started criticizing him for not returning.