Though The Last Dance often comes down on the side of Michael Jordan in the various controversies of his career, the way the national media reacted to Jordan’s baseball career clearly crossed a line. In the film, Jordan explains how part of his reasoning for retiring in 1993 was the emotional exhaustion of being one of the most famous athletes on the planet for a decade. None of that slowed down when Jordan joined up with the White Sox AA affiliate that year, though, and it even prompted a seething article from Sports Illustrated entitled “Bag It, Michael.”
The story criticizes Jordan for attempting to play baseball, with the sub-headline “Jordan and the White Sox are embarrassing baseball.” The reporter who wrote the story all those years ago regrets doing so.
In a recent episode of the ESPN Daily podcast, writer Steve Wulf told host Mina Kimes, “I think he was rightly insulted. He wasn’t out to embarrass baseball. He was out to pursue a dream that we thought at the time was delusional, but we should not have come down on him that hard.”
Michael Jordan’s stint in baseball was the most unusual chapter of his career. How good could he have been?
Steve Wulf wrote an SI cover story criticizing his chances…but came to change his mind. He joins us on ESPN Daily to explain why—listen here: https://t.co/7jD1bmAjCX pic.twitter.com/tZP0bpBJTi
— Mina Kimes (@minakimes) May 8, 2020
In The Last Dance, Jordan reiterates that he was never interviewed for the story, though Wulf still says he got the sense from reporting on the White Sox that there was resentment about Jordan trying baseball. Of course, it’s wild to write a whole story criticizing a player as famous and accessible as Jordan without interviewing, well, Jordan.
While Wulf’s regret is notable, it only added fuel to the fire that pushed Jordan away from the game the first time and fed into the ridiculous way superstar athletes are often covered.