Six and Out: `The Last Dance' Leaves Bulls Fans Wondering if There Could Have Been More
Interesting isn’t it? How Chicago sports fans can watch The Last Dance, about the greatest team in the city’s history—Six NBA championships in eight years!—and come away feeling angry and frustrated that the Jordan Bulls weren’t given an opportunity to take a shot at a seventh championship?
There were some emotional controversies stirred up in the first two episodes on Sunday. (Episodes 3 and 4 air on ESPN on Sunday at 8 p.m., Central.) It jumps around a bit, but is great viewing overall.
One thing I will be interested to see: How the 10-part series handles the nearly two years that Jordan took off—``retiring’’ from basketball to try his hand at baseball. I have seen speculation that MJ was avoiding NBA penalties for his gambling habit. Hard to believe there is any truth to that. But I’m hoping this documentary addresses that.
In the opening episodes, we don’t know which Jerry to be to be more angry with: general manager Jerry ``Earth to Jerry’’ Krause, who was gifted at personnel but often clueless at personal.
Or smug owner Jerry Reinsdorf, who apparently saw everything but didn’t fix things he might have fixed. He told Scottie Pippen it was a bad contract. Faced with a choice between Krause and Phil Jackson/Michael Jordan/Pippen/et al, he sat on his hands and let Krause blow up a dynasty.
I remember hearing comments at the time from team officials and media friends who covered the team—that the Bulls’ front office was looking forward to rebuilding, looking forward to proving they could put fannies in the seats after Michael Jordan.
I thought that was kind of dopey. Although they have put fannies in the seats since MJ, that’s also a comment on how hungry people are for sports entertainment. Who would be eager to break up a team for the ages?
Contrarians have been popping up since Episodes 1 and 2 were shown. For example, Pippen’s ex-wife says supposedly-underpaid Scottie actually ended up making more in career NBA salary than MJ.
Meanwhile, Krause, who died at 77 two years ago, isn’t able to defend himself from this new avalanche of scorn.
Bottom line: Bulls’ basketball was a joy in the ’90s until it wasn’t. I’ve always admired championship teams that didn’t depend on size and muscle, teams that emphasized skill and determination. And who isn’t mesmerized by Jordan, the best player, all things considered, who ever touched a basketball?
But the melodrama?
That produces mixed feelings for me. Part of that is the bias of an old pro-sports beat writer. I was traipsing around North America with the Blackhawks during the first Bulls’ first three-peat. Fortunately, the games were shown in Edmonton.
When you’re a beat writer and somebody moans about something, if you don’t have it, you’re going to hear about it from the sports editor. And even if you don’t, getting beat is still going to make your stomach churn, if you take pride in your work.
Two big differences now: In the 21st Century, when you have what we used to call ``a scoop,’’ you put it on the internet and it lasts for about seven minutes. In the early 1990s, a scoop that came out in the morning paper was good until the next morning. When you won, you were King for a Day. But when you lost, the egg on the face really hardened.
In the 21st Century, there are layers and layers of team PR people, controlled access and buttoned-down players who are very wary of rocking the boat In other words, scoops are fewer and farther between.
Back in the day, for example, the Blackhawks had a winger named Wayne Presley, who knew he was going to see limited ice time from coach Mike Keenan.
So he ripped into Keenan with us beat writers in training camp. We said, ``Elvis,’’ which was his nickname, ``you’re going to get traded if we write this.’’
``Do it,’’ he said. We did. And he quickly was traded to the expansion San Jose Sharks. At least nobody got scooped in that melodrama, which actually was kind of fun. Especially when we told Keenan what Elvis had said.
That was different, though. It was bitching with a purpose.
With these `Last Dance’ Bulls, a lot of the bitching is about egos. And ego-tripping. That, I tend to find tiresome.
It’s not like clubhouse turmoil is new. It was rampant during the Cubs’ dynasty of 1906-1910, which produced four pennants and two World Series titles, Chicago's best baseball run.
It might have been five straight pennants, except that catcher Johnny Kling sat out 1909 in his pool hall when owner Charlie Murphy wouldn’t give him a raise. Part of Murphy’s argument: Kling didn’t need a raise if he included all the money he made hustling pool while on the road with the Cubs, who were paying his travel overhead.
When Shortstop Joe Tinker and second baseman Johnny Evers agreed not to speak to each other, that was ego. When Murphy publicly carved up manager/first baseman Frank Chance while Chance was in the hospital, recovering from surgery to remove a blood clot that was giving excruciating headaches, that was tactical bitching. Very tactical.
Chance and Murphy parted ways shortly after that. But that was at the end of 1912—when the Cubs’ winning ways were in the rear-view mirror.
With the Last Dance Bulls, we are left with What-Ifs.
If it’s your first time around this Bulls block, it’s a great show. If you’re a Chicago sports fan fortunate enough to have been around for Michael Jordan in realtime, The Last Dance stirs up a lot of feelings—the good, the bad and the frustrating.
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If you like sports history with an extra bit of drama, please check out my 1908 Cubs novel, The Run Don’t Count. Excerpts and other information at facebook/therundontcount. It’s available in paperback and Kindle at Amazon.com.