What is Basketball without Michael Jordan
When someone says the name Michael Jordan, the first thing that might come to mind is basketball, Nike shoes, or Wheaties. Through the years Michael Jordan has proved time and time again that he is the greatest basketball player ever and by doing that he has gained tremendous popularity throughout the world. People of all ages and from all nationalities have gathered to watch him play. 'Even your Aunt Matilda, who might not know anything about basketball, liked watching him play,'; said Daniel. He has become more than just an entertainer, he is a hero and a role model. It has been said 'He's the most famous American in the World'; (Daniel.)
After winning his sixth National Basketball Association Championship, Michael Jordan has decided to walk away from the world of basketball for the second time in his life. Why would the greatest player to ever play the game leave at the highest point of his career? He claims the sport is no longer a challenge to him. After his many awards, trophies and titles this is not hard to comprehend. At this time in his life, Jordan wants to devote all of his time to his friends and family. Now that he has left the world of basketball a great void has been left. Many questions have rose as to what is going to happen now that he's gone. What will happen with the NBA? What will happen to the Chicago Bulls dynasty? Who will be the next Michael Jordan? Could there ever be another Michael Jordan?
The first thing any sane person would ask is how could Jordan leave basketball and walk away from all of that money? Last year he was the highest paid basketball player in NBA history. But in dollar terms, Jordan was even more successful as a corporate spokesman, which earned him $45 million in 1998, than he was on the basketball court in which he earned $35 million. (Peyser.) Jordan currently does endorsements for thirteen companies. Out of all the companies, Nike pays the most for his endorsements at $16 million per year.
Jordan is by far the best endorser out there in the market. Many of the celebrities can't compare to Jordan. 'He's handsome, articulate, classy. He had purity to his performance on court and off. It's hard to find the perfect celebrity these days,'; said Peyser. With such slogans as 'Be Like Mike'; and 'It's gotta be the shoes,'; companies have attempted to make consumers believe ...
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...ecial place in their heart for Michael Jordan. They will tell their sons and daughters about him, they will get out the old VHS tapes of games that they have recorded and they will pass along the Basketball cards that will be worth hundreds of dollars. Those of us who have seen him play will always remember him and what he has done for the game of basketball. For those who haven't, you will have to settle for the endless highlight reels and Nike commercials to keep his memory alive.
Works Cited
Daniel, Jonathan. 'The One and Only.'; People Magazine. January 25, 1999:58
Greene, Bob. Rebound: The Odyssey of Michael Jordan. New York: Viking. 1995.
Peyser, Marc, Temma Enrenfeld and Alisha Davis. 'No Heirs to Air Jordan.';
Newsweek. January 1999: 54
Samuels, Allison, 'MJ's Court'; Newsweek. January 1999: 46
Starr, Mark. 'Basketball Looks at Life After 23.'; Newsweek. January 1999: 56
Stein, Joel. 'Splitting Bulls: How the NBA Champion Chicago Bulls fell apart within days of Michael Jordan's retirement'; Online. 25 January 1999. http://www. cgi.pathfinder.com/time/magazine/articles/0,3266,18727,00.html
Tresniowski, Alex. 'The One and Only.'; People Magazine January 1999: 56
Unfortunately, the comparison is being made seemingly every day, and the article by Mr. Mathis is full of fallacious material. His extreme uses of exaggeration and card stacking, along with many harsh examples of hasty generalizations, makes a claim that Michael Jordan is and always will be the greatest player to play basketball. An opinion is simply an opinion and anyone is entitled to their opinion, but using fallacies to formulate his response to the issue makes it too finite and too biased in favor of Michael Jordan. There are so many clear and dramatic exaggerations throughout the article. Michael Jordan is described as being “the most unstoppable assassin of all-time, the smartest marketer of all-time” and then sarcastically mentioned as “the savviest shoe salesman of all-time” (Mathis, par. 2).
In the history of business, there has been a clear record of industry heads finding something or someone as a mainstay and bedrock for their respective companies or corporations; there is often a chief product that keeps many businesses afloat, even in the rough times. Apple found it's own in 2001 with the iPod. McDonald's has had the Big Mac since the late 1960s. Nike, however, found their goldmine in a person with Michael Jordan. Walter LaFeber's Michael Jordan and the New Global Capitalism tells the paints the picture of the rise of young Michael Jordan from his middle-class family in racist North Carolina up through college and into the NBA where he becomes an international sports icon. It tells the story of how Jordan catches the eye of Nike's ambitious co-founder and CEO, Phil Knight, and how he was transformed from a young, rebellious black hoopster into the face of a multi-billion dollar transnational corporation while stretching its touch all of the way to the far reaches of Asia. LeFeber's book also delves into the darker issues and topics addressing Jordan and Nike, such as race and sports and how they played a part during scandals that surrounded MJ off of the court along with the growth of Nike abroad and their dealing with technological changes in manufacturing while facing criticism for their labor practices.
Michael Jordans talent is so amazing. “Maybe this guy is God disguised”, former Boston Celtic Larry Bird said about Jordans talent. This really shows how people viewed his talent and liked the way he played the game of basketball. Michael Jordans talent is so amazing , he’s so incredible and beyond unreal. The things he did and accomplished in the basketball league shows his true talent. In 1984, at 21 years of age, Jordan made the United States Olympic Games basketball team under coach Bobby Knight. Averaging a remarkable seventeen points a game, Jordan led the team to a gold medal in eight straight wins! The Olympic win brought Jordan to high visibility in basketball circles and made him a household name in America. Jordan continued soaring new heights , even when he fractured his ankle early in the 1...
In Jim Naughton’s book Taking To The Air, the main character is Michael Jordan. The book is Jordan’s life and talents. Michael Jeffrey Jordan was born February 17, 1963, in Brooklyn, New York. He was the fourth child and the youngest of three boys. Michael Jordan is by any measure, the most popular athlete in America and perhaps the best-known figure in the world. I have chosen to use Maslow’s Theory of Hierarchy of Need to analysis Jordan’s personality. I will do my analysis by focusing on Jordan’s healthy personality, which is marked by his continued personal growth.
The other reason why everyone should know mike is that he was the highest paid player in the world basketball in the 80?s and 90?s (?Breaking Sports News?). His contract is worth 30mil sign with the Chicago Bulls in 1984. This breaking news during the 1984-1985 season was all over the sports world excited to see what he can accomplish in this great sport of basketball. According to Time magazine, ?Jordan was the best to ever player to the game?. He changed the way basketball was played.
Michael Jordan, what comes to your mind when you hear that name? Michael had played for the bulls and had gotten 6 championship rings with the team. Well, is it just me or does that sound like a lot of time in the game of basketball? In 1982 he took a big step up from highschool to college, where he wanted to pursue the basketball dream. He went to college at North Carolina where he played NCAA basketball for just one year before he was drafted in 1984. All eyes were on him when he went on the court, because that just how good he was at the game of basketball. Michael Jordan is one of the greatest players in NBA history, maybe even the greatest of all time.
Michael Jordan is a retired, extremely successful basketball player who played in the large, National Basketball Association. He was born on February 17, 1963 and his nationality is American. Michael Jordan is a big as most average shooting guards in the NBA at 6 feet 6 inches and his weight is listed at 216 lb. For many people, Michael Jordan is considered the best basketball player to live on the planet. For his whole career, he only played for two different franchises, the successful Chicago Bulls, and the improving Washington Wizards. This amazing player had a couple of large breaks in his career, he retired three times in all, but the first two time he had retired from the league, he returned to the NBA in nearly 3 years each time. After he retired, he played baseball in the MLB, but figured that he was meant for basketball then eventually returned to the NBA. He had astonishing stats in the regular season of the NBA and the playoffs. Michael Jordan is one of the greats because of several different statistics and accomplishments that prove his brilliance.
When I began my report I didn’t know much about Michael Jordan, but I did know that he was “undoubtedly the greatest player in the history of the NBA'; (“Michael Air Jordan'; 1). It seemed like every time I heard the word basketball I also heard the name Michael Jordan. There’s just no avoiding him. If you are watching television you might see him playing basketball or golf. If you were reading a magazine there will probably be an advertisement with his picture. If you were walking down the street you might see a kid wearing Air Jordan shoes or a Bulls jersey with “JORDAN'; on the back of it. This man is probably as recognizable as the Pope.
...d now has annual revenues of more than $1 billion with MJ getting a piece of the action…. The Jordan Brand's market share of the U.S. basketball shoe market is 71% according to SportsOneSource.
He was the Rookie of the Year in 1984, has six NBA championships, a five-time NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP), the fourth highest scorer in NBA, the richest athlete in the world, and the best basketball player in the history, Michael Jordan aka his airness or MJ. He is the role model in my life not because of his accomplishments, but his past. Michael Jordan was born in Brooklyn, New York along with his four siblings, they moved to Wilmington, North Carolina for working reasons. In his high school year, he played baseball, football, and basketball, although he was very athletic, but he was not the best of the best. He did not make into the basketball varsity team until his senior year because he was too short and his high school coach despises
Thesis Statement: Michael Jordan set records and has set the example of what the greatest basketball player can accomplish and really set the standards of what a hall of famer basketball player looks like.
The former Utah Jazz ball boy Preston Trueman sold Michael Jordan shoes worn in game 5 of the 1997 National Basketball Association finals auctioned for $104,765. December of 1999 Jordan was announced the ESPN player of the century (“Michael Jordan Fast Fact.”). In 2003 his jersey was hung after the season with the wizards. Then, in April of 2009, Jordan received basketballs greatest honor being introduced into Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall Of Fame (Biography.com Editors).
Michael Jordan, portrayed by Jim Naughton in the biography Taking To The Air: The Rise of Michael Jordan, is well regarded as not only the greatest basketball player of all time but also the face of a generation. During the mid to late 1980s NBA basketball was simply treading water. As a result of the lack of a marketable superstar, the NBA was losing popularity to the National Football League and Major League Baseball. Following Jordan’s emergence, the NBA’s attendance rose dramatically and it’s worldwide popularity skyrocketed. Michael Jordan returned basketball to its past popularity in the United States and revolutionized the way the world viewed the game of basketball. (Harriman) Michael Jordan’s life is succinctly depicted in Taking to The Air: The Rise of Michael Jordan. Jim Naughton focuses on Jordan’s influence on worldwide sports and culture as one of the most publicized and marketed athletes of all time. Naughton explains the circumstances in Jordan’s upbringing that gave him the ability to be a humungous star. This biography is examined by Kirkus Reviews. They describe Naughton’s biography: “Besides offering a solid chronological biography and record of Michael Jordan’s basketball career, here Naughton also gives an astute assessment of this superstar’s impact on society.” (“Taking to the Air”) The article in the Kirkus Review explains that this biography investigates Jordan’s impact on marketing while telling the story of his life. Like Kirkus Reviews, I too believe that Naughton’s work goes into great description about Jordan’s upbringing and later career while also examining his cultural impact. Throughout his life, Michael Jordan has topped the sports and entertainment worlds by becoming the greatest basketball pl...
...retirement, feeling that he had nothing else to accomplish. "This would not be the last time Jordan would see the hardwood ("Michael Jordan")." On September 25, 2001, Jordan announced his second comeback This seasons was ended early due to injuries that Jordan had to cope with. In the 2002-03 season, Jordan was the only Washington player to play in all 82 games and started in 67 of them. Michael played his final NBA game in Philadelphia, on April 16 2003. Michael would retire for the last time ("Michael Jordan" Wikipedia).
When you look at a basketball what do you see? Most would see an orange, sphere, shaped rubber ball. There are black lines and real leather. If you look closer, you would even see the size of the ball in which you are playing with. A basketball could be just a toy for many, or even represent a release for others, but for me, it means a lot more. A basketball represents my blood, sweat, tears, passion, sacrifice, and most of all, a sense of belonging, like a family. At this moment in my life, there are only three things I devote my life to- family, friends, and basketball. Basketball has shaped my life probably more than anything else. Basketball has instilled in me a vicious will to achieve and embrace my ambitions instead of fearing them. Basketball gave me an open opportunity to try something new. New opportunities and experiences are not such a big deal anymore. From academics to personal matters, the lessons that I have learned from basketball has impacted my life.