Sports WI: No Michael Jordan

If Michael Jordan never played basketball, how would it affect basketball and basketballs mainstream popularity?
 

Jasen777

Donor
Basketball is a bit less popular as Jordan was a transcendent marketing icon. This is somewhat balanced however by the Knicks winning two titles and the resulting greater coverage of the sport by the New York based media.
 
An old Texas Sports Column AH I did where Jordan's foot injury never healed right. Speaking of TSC, I should probably update it!

On November 4, 1985 in a game against the Golden State Warriors, sensational sophomore Michael Jordan was running down the court and began to experience pain. He would later be diagnosed with a stress fracture in his right foot and would miss six weeks of the 85’-86’ NBA season. Jordan returned to the team just in time for the playoffs where the hapless young Bulls met the Boston Celtics and their team of legends. Jordan played games one and two, game two being a famous game in which Jordan logged 55 points against the Celtics before landing awkwardly on his foot once more and fracturing it again. The Celtics went on to win the NBA Championship but Jordan would never be the same.

The next season Jordan came out believing he was fully healed, unfortunately during his rehab he never put his usual in game competitiveness on trial. After a phenomenally good start in which he was among the league leaders in scoring and defense, the foot was re-injured again by the second week of the season. Jordan struggled with his foot for most of his career, it simply would not heal and thus prevented him from achieving the greatness he would show in flashes randomly from his rookie season in 1984 to his retirement year in 1991 when the foot simply would no longer allow him to play.

There is no doubt in my mind that had Jordan never broken his foot the second time during the Celtics series in 86’, he would have ended up amongst the stars of the era. He possessed an uncanny ability to do everything perfectly, he was as solid
a defender as he was an electrifying dunker. Who knows how many MVP’s he would have won? He
certainly would have a second gold medal around his neck after what the dream team did in Barcelona
in 92’.

Then there’s the city of Chicago. Jordan had all the tools to lead them to the promised land, had
he stayed in the game who knows what would have happened. Would he had derailed the Pistons teams
of the late 80’s? Would we have had the nostalgia finals of 1991 where the Celtics and Lakers and Bird
and Magic met for the final time with the Celtics getting their last gasp title? Would Drexler and the Blazers
have beaten Jordan and the Bulls in 1992 like they did the Cavs? Would the Bulls have upset the Suns
in 1993 like the Knicks and Patrick Ewing did? What would have happened to the Rocket’s Dynasty in the
mid 90’s? Would he have stayed around long enough to derail the Jazz Dynasty?

What if we went further. During those flashes of greatness, no one could stop Jordan. To this day he
remains and avid competitor albeit on the golf course instead of the basketball court. When Jordan went
on one of his healthy streaks, most notably the four month stretch in 1989, no one was better. Magic
Johnson made the famous quote “There’s Michael Jordan and then there the rest of us.” Referring to
Jordan when he was healthy. What if, just what if, it was Jordan who became the unabated greatest player
in NBA history instead of today’s hodge podge of arguments for Magic, Bird, Chamberlin, Erving, and about ten
others. What effect would that have on the game?

Would one player dominating have killed the game or transcended the game? Would Jordan’s marketability and impressive dunks have made such an impact on NBA culture that instead of today’s game, which has changed little from the game of the 80’s (except for the longer shorts of course) , would we have a whole new NBA culture. And where would that culture be? Would we have a bunch of uber competitive Jordan clones flying through the air making each step more impressive than their last? Or would we have a strange hybrid of players who care all about the flashy dunk and the highlight while lacking Jordan’s work ethic and competitiveness. Would the NBA have transcended football in the 90’s in terms of commercial marketability with Jordan who was making big splashes with his Air Jordan sneakers before the injury (which in turn killed the shoe due to the rampant myth that Air Jordan’s didn’t protect Jordan’s feet enough.) instead of the disaster that was Spud Webb’s “Air Spuds” (more commonly referred to as Air Duds) . On another note, had Jordan fufilled his potential would it be Nike instead of Reebok that is the most famous shoe and sports apparell provider in the world?

These are the questions one must ask when looking back on a career of what could have been. It’s strange to think of a world where Ewing never got a championship or the Jazz never had their dynasty or the Celtics and Lakers had their last gasp. It’s strange to think of a world where the highlight and the dunk transcend the game. It's strange to think of a world where the Blazer's pick of Sam Bowie is lambasted everytime on reflects on the greatness that could have been Jordan. It’s strange to think of a world where Jordan, not Magic or Bird tops everyone “Greatest of all Time lists”. But when we consider how close it could have been, it suddenly becomes much more realistic.
 
Assuming Jordan had turned his talents to some other career, it's possible the NBA might have gone under altogether: don't forget that in the early 1980s, there was serious talk of an NBA players' strike, and the consensus at the time held that if that happened, the league would contract sharply or collapse altogether. The NBA was less mainstream then than it is today, and a strike, particularly a prolonged one, would have been devastating.

Without the prospect of Jordan as a marketing ploy, the owners and players might have both taken hard-line stands that would have led to a strike--possibly eliminating the '82-'83 or '83-'84 season, causing numerous teams on the financial edge to fold completely, and many of the remaining franchises to be in dire straits from a lack of turnstile revenue. I think what you might have today might be the remnants of the league, with perhaps 12 teams, and nothing like today's lucrative TV or apparel/gear deals. It would occupy a slot roughly equal to that the NHL occupied in the late 1950s/early 1960s.

Ironically, probably the NHL would not have hired that consummate numbskull Gary Bettman: who would want a commissioner whose league almost collapsed completely under his watch? As a result, the NHL might not have expanded into some questionable markets (Columbus; Nashville; Carolina) and would still have more Canadian teams (Winnipeg; Quebec), and perhaps fewer teams altogether. Hockey would occupy the winter sports viewing market, and basketball would be relegated to the fourth slot; i.e., a special interest sport. (Oh, how I wish this were true...)
 
I don't think there would be much of an impact. The NCAA tournament would guarantee a constant focus on a new group of stars each year. And the fundamental nature of basketball, that it is a sport that can be played anywhere with minimal investment of equipment, guarantees an ample supply of players. There probably wouldn't be the movie Space Jam, though.

Something I've wondered is, what happens if the Portland Trail Blazers draft Michael Jordan instead of the Chicago Bulls?
 
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