Thoughts on The Last Dance

I just finished watching The Last Dance documentary, about the ’90s Bulls, and it was great. Really brought it back for me, and cool to get such an in-depth look. A few thoughts…

• Jordan is the greatest to ever play the game. Six Finals appearances, Six Finals wins, Six Finals MVPs. How is this for dominance: From the ’90-91 season, to the ’97-98 season, Jordan won a championship every year he played the whole season. (He took a year and a half off for baseball in between the three-peats.) Jordan and the Bulls WERE the ’90s, and he was probably the most famous person in the world during that time.
• It was great to hear from so many people involved with the ’90s Bulls (players, coaches, writers, reporters, celebrities, etc.), get a behind-the-scenes look into the team (fun to see Rodman getting ushered out the back door so he could avoid the media after taking a quick break from the Finals to do WWE), but a couple related things really stood out for me. The first was seeing John Stockton and Karl Malone—two of the very best players in their own right—wait outside the Bulls locker room after the Jazz lost a game in the Finals, so they could shake hands with Jordan. And the other was when Malone went onto the Bulls bus after the Bulls won the championship over the Jazz in ’98, so he could congratulate the team, and especially Jordan. That level of respect and sportsmanship was really nice to see.
• Jordan was a gregarious guy. He joked around, was respectful to people, and seemed fun to be around. Sometimes he gave his teammates a hard time, but it was for the benefit of the team, with the goal of winning. And guess what? It worked. That style reminded me of someone else at the head of a company who did not tolerate anything less than the highest level from his employees: Steve Jobs. They both might have been tough to work with, and had incredibly high standards, but what they produced was the best.
• Scottie Pippen sometimes took things very personally, and acted out when he felt slighted. First when he cursed at the General Manager when he was being discussed as possibly being traded. Then when he decided to get surgery that overlapped with the season because he was upset with management that he wasn’t getting paid enough. And finally when he refused to go in the game when the coach called the last shot for someone else. That’s disrespectful to the coach, the team, the fans, really everyone. It’s putting yourself above the group, and that’s not cool.
• Kerr was a role player, but he hit two huge shots that helped the Bulls win their championships in ’97 and ’98. In ’97 he hit the winning shot that sealed the championship, and in ’98 he hit the key three-pointer in game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals. Also, Kerr went on to win a fourth straight championship with the Spurs the year after. And then three more as the Warriors coach down the line.
• It was interesting that there was a slight possibility of keeping the team together, including coach Phil Jackson, for one more year after they won in ’98. Could that team have won a seventh title? We’ll never know. But what a way to go out.
• The famous flu game in the ’97 Finals was really food poisoning. Makes you wonder what they put on that pizza. But that didn’t stop Jordan and Bulls from winning the game the next day. Karma!