scareface
16.12.02, 17:20
http://espn.go.com/nba/s/2002/1215/1477327.html
By Mitchell Krugel
Special to ESPN.com
Editor's note: The following are excerpts from Mitchell Krugel's "One Last
Shot," a new book about Michael Jordan's return to the NBA.
Michael Jordan won't succumb to time, to age, to pain, to his own management
gambles of the past 18 months. And definitely not to expectations. Not
tonight. Three months from now, he will reluctantly but exhaustedly admit
he's not that player, the one known worldwide as The Greatest Of All Time.
But not tonight. Sure, his side aches where the broken ribs he suffered last
summer while getting ready for this are still healing. His back spasms from
time to time. He looks eerily older in the unfamiliar, almost traitorous blue
of his new team, the Washington Wizards, and his right knee swells to a
tormenting reminder that he is now 38 years old. He was wrapped in so many
ice packs this morning that if somebody put a swoosh on them, he would have
been sporting a new line of Nike apparel. He says he will eventually get to
the point where we will see plays "similar to what we're used to seeing." But
not tonight.
Tonight, Madison Square Garden in New York buzzes like the red carpet at the
Academy Awards. Opening night of this National Basketball Association season
not coincidentally matches Michael's Wizards against the Knicks, for where
else would the third coming of Michael Jordan premiere but around the corner
from Broadway. Woody Allen is here and so is Spike Lee and Kevin Kline and
Diane Sawyer and all of the other renowned Garden partiers who saw Michael
score 42 points when he supposedly made a farewell visit here in 1998. And
Jessica DeRubbio, a 12-year-old sitting next to Spike. Spike auctioned off
the courtside seat usually reserved for his wife to an anonymous person who
paid $101,000 that went to the fund for the victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist
attack. Jessica is one of those victims. Her father, Dave, and several other
firefighters from Engine 226 in Brooklyn were lost in the attack. More than
600 media men and women, including the usual suspects from Japan, France,
Brazil and Israel, also have come here to make this event more of a spectacle
than any of the NBA Finals Michael Jordan ever played. The BBC is here to
televise the game live back to London. It might be 7:30 p.m. on Oct. 30 in
New York, but it's the middle of the night in England. Still, Michael
Jordan's return to active duty in the NBA after more than three years marks
the first time the BBC has ever televised an NBA game live.
Approximately 90 seconds into the season, Michael Jordan lets us know what to
expect in what will be revered and maligned as his Third Coming. Wizards
center Jahidi White steals a pass and springs Jordan on the runway toward the
Knicks' basket. He slips past New York's Latrell Sprewell leaving only 6-foot-
11 Felton Spencer as a 300-pound heavy bag standing in the way of a poster-
perfect beginning to this Third Coming. Michael takes off, the Garden
expecting him to strike the Air Jordan brand pose, arm extended, legs spread,
a reassurance that he still hovers above all this. But he finds only enough
lift to duck under Spencer and scoop the ball "up" to the hoop, a shot that
bounces three feet above the rim and wiggles into the basket. For a moment
there is hope
