Random Wild Stories And Rumors About Michael Jordan (21 items)

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  (#16) Jordan Reportedly Drank A Lot Of Beer After Games

  Roland Lazenby's book Blood on the Horns: The Long Strange Ride of Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls is currently out of print. In it the author wrote that the rumors about Jordan's drinking after games were true. But he also stated that this wasn't unusual behavior in the NBA.

  "In the first half hour after a game, Jordan and various teammates would pound down five or six beers and often fire up a cigar," the book reads. "It’s not unusual for pro basketball players to drink beer after games. They’ve been doing it for decades. It helped them replace the body fluids they’ve sweated away."

  Sam Smith, the longtime Bulls' reporter and author of The Jordan Rules agreed with Lazenby, telling First We Feast "It was fairly common back then for beer to be in locker rooms and players to have a can or two in the hour or so they’d linger after. Maybe take a few with them to drink later. No one much hurried to leave [the locker room]."

  Of course, since Toni Kukoc apparently drank wine before games and Ron Artest admitted in an interview with the Sporting News that he used to drink Hennessy during halftime of games, it's no wonder that drinking after games wasn't seen as unusual, let alone scandalous.
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  (#8) The Oakland A's Offered Jordan A Major League Contract In 1994, But He Wanted To Earn His Spot

  According to former Oakland A's GM Sandy Alderson, Jordan could have skipped playing minor league baseball and gone straight to the majors. In a May 2020 Baseball Tonight podcast, Alderson admitted he offered Jordan a major league contract when he heard the White Sox were going to send Jordan to the minors.

  "When I heard that was happening, or about to happen, I called his agent right away and said, 'Hey look, I understand he may be going to Double-A. I don't even know who the 25th man is on our major league team right now, I will sign him and put him on the major league roster," Alderson told Buster Olney. "He'll be part of our 25-man team. Tomorrow.'

  The former GM admitted that the reasoning for his offer was to spur more interest in the A's, who had been 21st in attendance the previous season. According to David Falk, who was Jordan's agent at the time, Jordan turned down the A's offer because he wanted to earn his spot, not just be a gimmick. “I was excited about [the offer], and Michael was very appreciative,” Falk told MLB.com. “But he wanted to do the baseball thing from the ground up. He didn’t feel he deserved a spot on the Major League roster and didn’t feel he was ready. He didn’t want to be a Herb Washington type who would just steal bases and be a part-time outfielder.”

  Loyalty to Jerry Reinsdorf, who owned both the Bulls and the White Sox, also played a role in Jordan's decision. “Michael’s an amazingly loyal guy,” Falk said. “If not for his relationship with the White Sox, [the A’s offer] might have been something he might have done.”
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  (#12) Jordan Hates Isiah Thomas, But Claims He Didn't Keep Thomas Off The Olympic 'Dream Team'

  It's no secret that there is a long-running feud between Jordan and Isiah Thomas. In The Last Dance documentary, Jordan openly admitted that he hates the Hall of Fame guard, even as he called him the second best point guard in NBA history. The documentary has reignited the feud and caused the question of whether Jordan was responsible for Thomas being left off the 1992 U.S. Olympic men's basketball team (the "Dream Team").

  It's not clear what started the feud. Some point to a theory that Thomas conspired to freeze the rookie Jordan out in the 1985 All-Star Game - an allegation that Thomas has denied. Others suggest that Thomas - a native of Chicago - was jealous that Jordan had come along and become a superstar in that city. Then there's the fact that Thomas and his Detroit Pistons' teammates were the roadblock standing in Jordan's path to the NBA Finals - Detroit defeated the Bulls in three straight playoff meetings between 1987-88 and 1989-90, going on to win the NBA championship in the latter two seasons.

  When Chicago finally broke through and swept Detroit in the 1991 Eastern Conference Finals, the Pistons left the floor before the final buzzer sounded, refusing to congratulate the victors. Jordan was among the Bulls' players who considered that a classless act, and he still holds that event against Thomas, “There’s no way,” Jordan said, “you can convince me he wasn’t an a–hole.”

  In The Last Dance, Jordan denied that had any influence in the decision to leave Thomas off the "Dream Team" roster. “You want to attribute it to me, go ahead and be my guest. But it wasn’t me.” And Jordan wasn't the only other NBA star who allegedly didn't particularly want the Pistons' guard on the team. But Jordan's denial contradicts a quote in Jack McCallum's book Dream Team in which the Bulls' superstar allegedly told Rod Thorn [who was responsible for assembling the roster], "Rod, I don't want to play if Isiah is on the tea.,"
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  (#1) Jordan Believes His Infamous 'Flu Game' Was Actually Caused By Poisoned Pizza - But The Pizza Maker Denies This

  One of Jordan's famous performances was when, despite feeling sick, he had 38 points, seven rebounds and five assists in the Bulls' 90-88 win over the Utah Jazz  in Game 5 of the 1997 NBA Finals. It was referred to as the "flu game," but instead of influenza, the cause of the superstar's illness may have been pizza.

  Around 10:30 p.m. on the night prior to Game 5, Jordan was hanging out with his personal assistant George Koehler and his trainer Tim Grover when he arranged for a local Pizza Hut to deliver a pepperoni pizza to be delivered to his hotel room. But that's where the accounts of the night's events start to differ. Tim Grover claimed that five Pizza Hut employees showed up at the hotel room, all trying to get a look at Jordan.  

  “I take the pizza. I pay them. I put this pizza down. I say, 'I've got a bad feeling about this pizza.’” On Barstool Sports' Pardon My Take podcast, the trainer said he was sure the food gave Jordan food poisoning, recounting,  " ... Nobody ate the pizza but him [Jordan]. Nobody. And there were no signs of flu, anything, being sick before that. Then, about 3 o' clock in the morning, I get a call to my room that just says, 'Hey, man, come to MJ's room' and he's literally curled up in the fetal position. ... I've not known any flu that can hit you that fast, but I know how quickly food poisoning can hit you."

  In Episode 9 of The Last Dance documentary, Jordan himself said he believed he had food poisoning, not the flu, and hinted that the pizza may have been deliberately tampered with by someone at Pizza Hut  - the insinuation being that the employees were fans of the hometown Jazz team and hoped that if Jordan got ill, Utah would have a better chance of winning the contest.

  But just days after this episode aired on ESPN, the man who claims to have made the pizza in question denied that the food had been poisoned. Ironically, Craig Fite was a Bulls' fan - the only Bulls' fan who worked at the Pizza Hut at the time. He told The Big Show podcast that when the order was called in, "I remember saying 'I'm doing it, I will make the pizza because I don't want anyone of you doing anything to it.'" 

  Fite told 1280 The Zone in Salt Lake City that he had taken extra precautions in making the pizza to make sure it was safe to eat.  “I'm 100 percent certain it wasn't food poisoning. Or, it sure as heck wasn't that pizza.” He also disputed Grover's account of how many Pizza Hut employees showed up at the hotel room. "The crap story the guy said, that there was five people, there was two of us — and I didn't even have that many people working at the time at the store — but there was two of us," Fite said. He said he asked at the door if he could say hello to Jordan, and that Jordan waved to him from the room.

  So if the pizza wasn't poisoned and Jordan didn't have the flu, how did he get sick? Jason Hehir, the director of The Last Dance, provided an possible explanation when he told ESPN's  Jalen and Jacoby that Jordan had spit on the pizza - a tactic he had used in the past to keep others from eating his food.

  Yet another rumor is that Jordan was simply hung over after having spent the night in Vegas - or at Robert Redford's home.
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  (#19) Jordan Taunted Dikembe Mutombo By Hitting A Free Throw With His Eyes Closed

  Dikembe Mutombo is best remembered a great shot blocker, and for the finger wag that he liked to break out after stopping an opponent from scoring on him. According to Mutombo, it took Jordan seven years before he was successful in dunking on the big man. But the Bulls' star was able to get to him in other ways. Early in the center's rookie season, Jordan dropped 37 points in a game against Mutombo's Denver Nuggets. The last of those points came on a free throw that Jordan took with his eyes shut, telling Mutombo that although he hadn't dunked on him, "I'm giving you this."
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  (#21) Brooks Koepka's Attempt At Trash Talking Jordan Ended Up Backfiring On Him

  Brooks Koepka is a four-time major champion, but the golfer might want to refrain from any trash talk when playing Jordan. Koepka revealed on ESPN's SportsCenter that the second time the two ever played, Koepka was leading by one stroke when he decided to engage in a little friendly trash talk on the way to the 17th tee. Bad idea:

  " I just said something like ‘I’ve got you right where I want you,’ and he just tees the ball up, he takes his practice swing," Koepka explained. "He looks at me and goes ‘it’s fourth quarter baby, I don’t lose’"

  Sure enough, Jordan won the final two holes - and the match. Koepka said that was the last time he tried trash talking Jordan.

   

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