Original subtitles

Well...

First of all, there's no backstabbing going on here, okay?

Okay? You understand me when I say that?

There's no backstabbing going on here, okay?

Second part of it is, no, I'm not surprised at all,

and I'm amazed that you would even make a statement like that.

But I'm not surprised at all because this team is composed of professionals.

It's composed of guys who understand what they have to do

and who are winners, unlike the comment you just made.

Gentlemen, good night.

A spectacular move!

And the game's over!

Chicago stadium is going wild.

First of all, there's no backstabbing going on here.

It's time for me to move on.

This will be Phil's last year as the coach of the bulls.

Are the expectations way too h/gh 7

Where do we go from here?

The only question: How long can it last?

[Announced I/I/e 're at the united center in Chicago.

Opening of the NBA playoffs.

Ton/ght, game 7 of round 7 and the start of a best-of-fl've series

against the New Jersey nets.

Michael Jordan actually said to lose a game to the nets,

lose a game to the nets,

his team would have to "fall asleep."

Can that backfire on him or does that just not happen to Superman?

These are the bulls. They're not worried about the nets.

This is a sweep. Bring the brooms out, 3-0, move on to the next series, man.

Come on.

- What time is it? - Game time!

The playoffs is the highest level competition that we have in our game.

You got 82 games in a regular season,

but you can kick all that aside.

The playoffs is the playoffs.

And to be able to play against the best competition,

that was the driving force for me, without a doubt.

And the opening up. And it will be bu/is ' possession.

And Keith Van horn gives the nets the lead

and you can see the athleticism of the New Jersey nets early on.

And a shocked crowd

and Phil Jackson watches the bulls trail by seven.

And here is k er/y kitties with a great sweeping la y-in,

and New Jersey have taken a 72 to 3 lead

here's Ron Harper stuffing it through,

and the bulls have come back to trail John cal/pari's nets.

Jordan over kitties. Hits.

But the nets keep coming.

Under two minutes to go. It's gatling.

He had 24. Here are two of them.

7'ied at 89, we go to overtime.

Knocked away. Stolen by Michael!

/I/I.j. On the run/

Michael dunks the ball and fouled/ oh, my/

and here come the nets.

Douglas for a three at the horn. Short rebound p/ppen.

And that'll do it.

The bulls win it, not without a scare from the nets.

A pretty bumpy start for the bulls.

If Friday's opener is any indication, Chicago could be in for a long series.

Watching this team as they embarked on the playoffs,

you just had the feeling that Michael Jordan was mentally,

emotionally exhausted.

He kind of looked like the Michael Jordan of 1993.

Oliver ll/li/ler plays him. Here's Johnson.

Johnson get... No, he could not get it off

knocked away by Grant it's all over.

The Chicago Bulls have made it three stra/ght NBA championsh/ps.

After we won the championship, I sat in the gym with my father.

In the back of my mind, I knew that that was probably my last game,

and no one really knew, except for my father and myself.

He was my rock.

You know, we were very close.

He constantly gave me advice.

I remember, in ninth grade, I got suspended three times in one year,

and my father pulled me aside that summer and said,

"look, you don't look like you're heading in the right direction.

You know, if you want to go about doing all this mischievous stuff,

you can forget sports."

And that's all I needed to hear.

From that point on, it was like tunnel vision,

and I never got in trouble from that point on.

He had a very strong influence on Michael's life.

He just was a wonderful, wonderful, positive man.

Hey, I'm here for this man.

I want to negotiate my contract.

If you knew Michael,

you pretty much knew James, because they were always together.

They were very close, best friends.

We'd hang out before the games,

and he'd find some kid in the stand somewhere,

some kid that never had a chance in the world of ever meeting Michael Jordan,

and when the game was over, he'd walk that kid into the locker room.

The kid would just be through the roof.

James Jordan was there when his son, Michael,

led the Chicago Bulls to their first NBA championship in 7997.

James and deloris Jordan remained an anchor for him.

They attended eve/y bulls game they could

Around the NBA,

James Jordan relished his stand-in role for a superstar son.

To tell you how proud I am, um...

I'd have to search for more words than what I've got.

He's the voice of reason that always drove and challenged me.

That's the type of father I had.

Yeah, like a friend.

I was supposed to pick up Michael's father from the airport.

He was supposed to come into town

for a charity event that Michael was throwing.

And I went to the airport to pick up his dad,

and he never showed up.

So, of course, I called his mom and I said,

"hey, you know, pops isn't here."

We knew he was down at the Hilton head house playing golf.

When we didn't hear from him, we both thought,

"well, okay, they're still playing golf."

She said, "well, just come on back.

Don't worry about him. He probably got sidetracked a little bit.

He'll show up."

I was off doing my thing, and, you know,

my mom said she hadn't talked to him in some time.

He drives and goes down to Wilmington to visit old friends,

stay a couple of days,

drive back, but my mother's always in dialogue with him.

When she got worried, we all got worried.

Oh, yes. Definitely unusual.

I knew something wasn't right.

James Jordan, the father of bulls superstar Michael Jordan,

has not been seen for three weeks.

His car was found stripped and hidden

in some woods near fayetteville, north Carolina.

The car, a red Lexus,

was missing the license plates. It was battered

the windows were broken out.

You know, and we tried to backtrack what his actions were.

He left a certain day.

He was driving back and just got tired.

Instead of driving, he pulled off and he just took a nap.

Next thing you know, things happened the way they happened.

Good day. I/I/e're coming on the air now with word

that the body of James Jordan has been found in a creek

near the border between south and north Carolina.

In vest/gators say Jordan was driving late at n/ght,

when he pulled off the road to take a nap.

And he was awakened,

and at that time, he was shot once in the chest.

Two 78-year-old men

are charged with the robbery and murder of James Jordan.

As for Michael Jordan,

he arrived back home today in north Carolina,

back to face the most painful moments of an already-troubled year.

Meanwhile, Jordan's murder adds another bitter twist to the dark side

of an all-American success story.

You know, that's just such a horrible, hard thing to talk about.

I can remember that, flying into north Carolina.

Michael couldn't tie his tie,

so I had to tie the tie for him,

and that moment was just so hard, so hard of what we were there for.

We all were together, and it was devastating,

but it was about support.

You know, we had to support each other.

You know, my mother was so strong.

And the first thing she says, "you know, you got to be thankful."

You know, and I started looking at the positive.

Michael's the one got up and spoke, and he spoke about,

I think, what a father he'd been to him,

more a father, but also a friend.

He'd been there. A lot of things he wouldn't share with anybody else,

he shared with his dad.

One of the things that he always taught me is that you have to take a negative

and turn it into a positive.

So I started looking to the other side of it,

and that helped me get through it.

When his dad was murdered,

all the articles, the speculation that came out...

It was not journalism's finest hour.

The violent death sparked a half-dozen theories about the motive,

some including possible connections to gambling.

That was really bad.

That was really unfair. Can you imagine that?

Your father gets killed, and now they're blaming you?

I mean, that was really cheap-shot stuff.

It did hurt, you know, but you had people that were throwing darts

who wanted to hurt me anyway.

It wasn't from the people that I loved

or the people that knew me and people that cares.

It was the people that, you know, got tired of me being on top.

Basketball superstar Michael Jordan issued a statement Thursday.

He expressed that he was outraged by some media speculation

linking his behavior to his father's murder.

Jordan said, "I simply cannot comprehend how others could intentionally pour salt

in my open wound by insinuating that mistakes in my life

are in some way connected to my father's death."

There isn't a thimble's worth of evidence

to connect that horrible incident to Michael Jordan's gambling,

or any other aspect of Michael Jordan's behavior.

Police said it was no more than brutality and greed,

that James Jordan, "could have been any one of us."

What is still unclear, and will be for some time,

is what effect this tragedy will have on Michael Jordan

and his future with the Chicago Bulls.

Basketball? Haven't even thought about basketball.

And I didn't even think about basketball before all this happened,

so, right now, everything's tentative for my schedule from this point on.

David falk came over to me at a charity dinner

that was sponsored by Michael and said,

"you're not going to believe this, but Michael wants to retire."

I said, “I don't believe it."

At that time, we were coming off of three championships.

I'd fulfilled my responsibility to the city,

to the bulls, to my teammates.

I did not try to talk him out of it, but I did say to him,

"you can't make a final decision, until you talk to Phil."

Reinsdorf's office, in the berto center.

Yeah.

And I told Phil, I said, "look, I'm about here. I'm about done.

I have no more challenges. I have no motivation."

I was done.

This was a young man that had gone through some heartrending things.

You're denying a gift to society, but I understand.

You know, I understand.

Game 7 of the American league championship series,

as the Chicago white sox greet the world champion Toronto blue jays.

Michael was scheduled to throw out the first pitch.

He threw out the first pitch of game 7 of the al cs,

and then he went up into a private box with his family.

I'm watching a white sox playoff game in comiskey park.

A kid comes up and says, "Mr. Reinsdorf wants to talk to you.“

so I went up and I grabbed Jerry and, "what's up?"

He said, "Michael's quitting."

I said, "what? No, no, what's up?

Don't joke with me. That's serious stuff."

He said, "no, he's quitting, jerr."

That game was a Tuesday,

and we wanted to hold the story until Wednesday,

but it leaked out.

Breaking story here.

The Chicago Bulls have called a press conference for tomorrow morning,

and there's high speculation and a report

that Michael Jordan will retire from basketball forever.

So, all hell broke out at the ballpark on a Tuesday night.

Go on, move it back!

Media trying to get into my box to get to Michael. It was wild.

Michael decided to exit stage left in the seventh inning.

Jordan speeding away from comiske y park without comment.

Did Michael talk to you about it?

So, too, Chicago Bulls owner, Jerry reinsdorf

before we continue tonight,

a late-breaking story of enormous interest.

A shocking revelation tonight for all chicagoans.

Sources with the Chicago Bulls have confirmed that Michael Jordan

will announce his retirement effective immediately

at a Wednesday morning press conference.

CBS news will carry Michael Jordan's announcement live.

Our coverage will begin this morning at 11:00 eastern time.

Alison, this is the ultimate press conference.

Every cameraman, every reporter I've ever known in this business,

from all parts of the country, from dick schaap, to Tom brokaw,

to everyone here, waiting for the arrival of players,

Michael Jordan and his entourage and the bulls management.

And whether you agree or not

that this should be the news story of the year, it is.

Close to 700 cameras from around the world..

Get ready for entry on camera.

And three times as many reporters.

They come from everywhere,

from the local weeklies to network news.

That's a tribute to Michael Jordan's presence in American life

as the greatest basketball player who ever lived.

Here they come. Here they come. Here he comes. Here he comes.

Here he comes. Here he comes.

Michael Jordan now is entering.

Our hearts are with you, Michael.

Here's Michael Jordan right now, taking his place at the podium,

surrounded by security.

It's hard to overstate the loss of Michael Jordan

to the national basketball association

and to the heartbeat of this community of Chicago.

He has led this team to three NBA championsh/ps, of course.

The superstar's frequently the talk of the town,

but this time, the talk is more like a chorus of mourning.

Michael, all smiles, really.

Jerry reinsdorf Phil Jackson, Jerry k rause.

NBA commissioner David stern even in attendance.

It looks like the last supper.

This is a very bittersweet day.

There's a certain sadness, because the greatest athlete

to ever play a team sport is leaving the game.

But it's really, for me, a very, very happy day,

because somebody who I admire and respect...

Is doing exactly what he wants to do.

And I'm absolutely convinced that he's doing the right thing.

Michael?

Thanks, Jerry.

I'm a very optimistic person.

I guess the biggest positive thing that I can take out of my father

not being here with me today is that he saw my last basketball game,

and that means a lot. Um...

The word "retire" means you can do anything you want from this day on.

So if I desire to come back and play again, maybe that's what I want to do.

Maybe that's a challenge that I may need some day down the road.

I'm not going to close that door.

I was at peace with that decision.

Totally, 100%.

You know, I felt ready.

Michael Jordan's retirement in 1993

was one of those seismic,

"where were you when you heard the news?" Moments.

And you immediately think, "why?"

Nobody could rationalize that Michael would just walk away.

There's one side of this that maybe we ought to mention,

and I don't want to sound negative,

but Michael did leave, abruptly, in the middle of a gambling investigation.

Look at some of the events that have recently happened.

His father was tragically murdered.

There's a number of questions about his gambling.

And you start to connect some dots and you think,

"is this all related?

Was this a secret suspension?"

The retirement... there were any number people who would say,

"well, David stern suspended him, right? Wink-wink.

A suspension, right?"

And that was... it was out there.

You're telling me that David stern,

the ultimate capitalist,

takes his number-one player on his number-one franchise

and unilaterally decides to lower the value

of the rest of the league franchises by taking him out and the bulls out,

effectively, um... For some secret penalty,

and no one ever finds out about it?

How can I phrase this delicately?

Total bullshit.

Can you use that?

Total bullshit.

There was so much speculative reporting.

Nobody had concrete facts. Nobody had anything.

The folklore, the urban legend that I sent him away

because he was gambling...

Ridiculous. It never... No basis in fact whatever.

I could bang on the table and say,

"it's a calumny, a slanderous lie," or whatever.

It's just not true.

Never was and never will be,

no matter how many times people ask the question.

Yes, he did.

I didn't retire because he kicked me out,

or they suspended me for a year and a half.

That is not true. There is no truth to that.

Uh, I needed a break. You know, my father just passed,

and I retired.

You know, and I retired with the notion that I wasn't going to come back.

The conspiracy stuff was stupid,

because I had sat with him a year earlier,

and he told me what he was going to do.

The summer of '92, and it's the dream team summer.

You can tell he was really tired.

As tired as he looked and as beat up as he looked,

I said, "so, what are you going to do?"

There's a long pause, and he said, "I'm going to shock the world."

He said, "no, I'm going to quit and go play baseball."

And I said, "when?"

And he said, "well, I'd do it right now,

except bird and magic never won three in a row,

and I got to do the Olympics.

But if it wasn't for that, I'd be playing this summer."

The b/g top for this circus went up at 70:45 this morning.

Michael went through a series of drills, including fielding,

catching and throwing.

I/I/ith batting practice done,

mj. Headed to his news conference, and rumor became reality.

Thank you all for coming out here today and getting a glimpse of Michael.

After watching the progress that Michael has made in the past two months,

I'd like to announce that the Chicago white sox are extending an invitation

to major league camp in sarasota.

Along with the bulls, I owned the Chicago white sox.

And when Michael was signed to play baseball,

I continued paying him his basketball contract,

which was something over $3 million a year.

There was no reason to pay him other than he was underpaid his entire career,

and he'd made a lot of money for a lot of people.

Picture this now, bottom of the ninth, bases loaded,

3-2, Michael Jordan takes one out of the yard.

Michael Jordan got what he wanted

he is a rookie again.

A lot of people may think this off the wall.

Maybe it is, but, I mean, I'm doing something that I choose to do,

and that's try to follow one of the dreams that I had when I was a kid.

He'd always loved playing baseball.

You know, we thought we was going to be major league baseball players, man,

growing up as kids.

He loves baseball and his father always wanted him to play baseball.

We were debating, me and him.

We were debating about me playing baseball.

"Dad, I want to go play baseball.

I'm thinking about retiring, I want to go play baseball."

All the things that he was saying, "do it, do it."

'Cause he got me started in baseball.

It was always his father's dream that he'd be a baseball player,

and so I didn't try to talk him out of it, but I did say to him,

"you know, playing baseball is a lot harder than you think it is."

I said, "what position are you going to be playing?"

He says, "I'm going to be in the outfield."

So, I said, "Michael, let's understand something here."

I said, "the workouts are going to be totally different.

Two totally different methods of training your body and muscles.

This is going to be detrimental to your basketball game."

He's like, "I don't care." He goes, "baseball, I'm all in."

He played baseball until he was 17 years old,

and then doesn't play baseball again until he's 31 years old.

We don't send anybody to double-a after they come out of college or high school,

because it's too high a level.

We start them out either at rookie ball or at a-ball,

but we couldn't do that with Michael,

because the press facilities were inadequate below double-a.

So we put him at double-a,

strictly because we needed to be able to handle the media.

Michael Jordan went to the Birmingham barons,

the double-a farm team of the Chicago white sox.

When we found out he was coming to the Birmingham work group,

there was about four days left in spring training.

And I just said,

"hey, man, I'm Terry, and I guess I'm going to be your manager."

Let's go, Mike!

I remember being in Birmingham, Alabama.

You never, in a zillion years,

would have thought you were at a minor league game.

You can't believe commotion, the excitement.

Never has one rookie gotten so much attention.

Folks are lying on the ground for a glimpse of m. J.

Reporters and photographers continue to arrive

from all over the world

Every ballpark we go to sold out.

Everybody wants a piece of him.

J“ if you can't take the heat get your ass out the kitchen j“

j“ we on a mission j“

j“ come along and ride on a j“

j“ fantastic voyage slide, slide, who-ride j“

j“ you better be ready when the five roll byj“

it was kind of fashionable to roll your eyes at him playing baseball.

After I met him,

I realized quickly how much he respected what we were doing.

7-7 pitch to Michael.

Looping drive. It will score at least one.

The thing that people forget about that season

was he started out with a 13-game hitting streak.

Jordan, base hit, left field

and Jordan delivers a two-rb/ single to right-center field

Every night during that 13-game hitting streak,

I'm kind of going, "when's it going to happen?"

And, finally, it did.

He did not see a fastball in the strike zone

for probably a month and a half.

Now they're trying to get him out with breaking balls,

and it's breaking ball after breaking ball after breaking ball.

And he's swinging at every one of them that came up there.

Second strikeout in a row for Michael Jordan.

Seen a lot of breaking balls the last two n/ghts, hasn't he 7

That hitting streak in April was kind of a fluke.

At that point, the national media was just giving him some shit.

I think his chances of being any good at all are almost nil.

Playing. And can't make the play.

Just because you're considered the best to have ever played basketball

does not mean you'll find similar success on the diamond.

And now they put him on the cover of sports illustrated

he's missing a pitch by about that much, anditsays,

"bag it, Michael! Jordan embarrasses baseball."

I remember seeing that and thinking, “oh, no."

He calls it his dream that he wants to be a major league baseball player.

I call it a delusion.

He never spoke to anybody from sports illustrated again.

Definitely.

I never was interviewed for that.

They came out to critique me

without understanding what my passion was at the time.

If you had a question, ask.

And then if you want to write it, then you write it.

I said, "fine. No problem. That's your opinion."

But I can care less what people do. This is what I want to do.

It's not what... I'm not doing what they think I should be doing.

My father already told me I was doing the right thing,

and I did it.

Being away from basketball gave him an opportunity to adjust his life

to not having his dad and moving on.

That fueled me more so than anything

and it drove me to make this thing work.

I got to play catch-up, but I'm going to do it, I'm going to do it.

I had fucking blisters, the second skin, swinging that bat.

His work ethic was the best I've ever been around.

He would hit early in the day.

He'd hit off the breaking-ball machine.

He would come in after regular batting practice,

hit some more before the game,

and then would hit again after the game.

By the time we got to August...

You can see it just building.

And he kept getting better and better and better.

In the seventh. Hits a fly ball.

That's deep, left field that's back and.. Gone.

Home run, Michael Jordan.

And he hit over .200.

That was amazing that he did that well.

I can't believe he actually hit .202

and he drove in 50 runs.

We had a lot of good prospects that didn't drive in 50 runs.

In my opinion, with 1,500 at bats,

he'd have found a way to get to the major league.

Swing, and this is a live ball.

I think the time away in baseball freed his mind of, you know,

obviously, what had happened to his father.

When you're out on the road with a baseball team,

that's who you're with.

Your family doesn't travel with you,

so you hang out with the guys that you're with,

and that was all of his teammates.

I think he enjoyed it immensely.

Sure, I mean, I was this big icon but...

They treated me just as I wanted to be treated, just one of the guys.

It was good. It was good for him.

He was like a kid again.

The pre-playoff buzz around the league

was that the Chicago Bulls were vulnerable.

Now, we've heard those same declarations in the past from the so-called pundits,

but maybe this year they finally have some merit,

especially after the injury-riddled and eighth-seeded New Jersey nets

took the five-time NBA world champions into overtime.

Every time we would play good and we were winning games,

everything was okay.

But everybody was always on alert around Michael

after a bad game like that.

He would say, "you motherfuckers didn't do a thing today.

Come ready tomorrow to practice."

His theory was, "if you can't handle pressure from me,

um, you're not going to be able to handle pressure of the NBA playoffs."

And so he talked trash in practice.

He went at guys.

He challenged guys.

Eeh! Eeh! Eeh!

Whoo! Yee!

Whoo!

"Ooh!" Yeah, I remember. I remember. Yeah.

Um, he wants to win, and you got to earn everything in Chicago.

There was nothing easy, nothing given to you.

You better go out there and earn it, and you earned it in practice.

Huh?

I mean, they just rode Scotty,

and Scotty just smiled at Michael and took it and fired right back at him.

You don't want... hey!

I got Scott.

Scotty burrell was a talented guy.

And Scott burrell,

an exceptional basketball player, out of the university of Connecticut.

What Scotty was lacking was commitment,

determination, seriousness,

so he became, you know, my guy to kind of push,

keep pushing, keep pushing.

I tried to get him to fight me a couple of times,

in a good sense, you know,

just to get him, "all right, man, I'm tired of you picking on me."

You know, that type of mentality.

I could never get him.

He's such a nice guy.

But I knew we were gonna need him at some point in time.

"Man, he's going to remember this

and he's going to get out there and he's going to fight."

You're playing with a guy that has the highest standards

of any basketball player ever.

You want to live up to that challenge.

It's tough, tough love.

I mean, you got to go out there and do your job.

He'd get feisty at a practice and maybe get up against people.

You know, I'd have to talk a little bit about toning it down and make amends

and, you know, keep that level of team camaraderie.

That's your role, too, you know, as a part of this and being a captain.

My mentality was to go out and win,

at any cost.

If you don't want to live that regimented mentality,

then you don't need to be alongside of me,

'cause I'm going to ridicule you until you get on the same level with me.

And if you don't get on the same level, then it's going to be hell for you.

Why you keep fucking up that play, you big, fathead motherfucker?

People were afraid of him.

We were his teammates and we were afraid of him. There was just fear.

- Catch the ball when I throw it to you. - What?

I just threw it to you.

Ignore this guy. He's coming through, but he's overplaying.

The fear factor of m.J. Was so, so thick.

Yeah, let's not get it wrong. He was an asshole. He was a jerk.

He crossed the line numerous times.

But as time goes on and you think back

about what he was actually trying to accomplish,

you're like, "yeah, he was a hell of a teammate."

He was pushing us all to be better 'cause he wanted to win.

And guess what. It worked.

We kind of needed that. You know what I'm saying?

I needed him to be the bad guy, the tough guy.

It was a struggle.

You know, Scott got a great personality.

He took it like a man and he embraced it.

There you go.

Each and every day, he's going to push you and push you

to try to get you where he is,

but I'm not sure if he knows that only he can achieve those goals.

But he can push other guys to try to get there though.

The bulls held their first workout minus Michael Jordan today,

the central peg gone from a nine-year era

that left the bulls with several key challenges and question marks

about the upcoming season.

It's a great opportunity for ballplayers that have wanted larger roles

on this team to step up and fill some shoes.

Scottie has now stepped out of the shadow of a great figure

and he's now got the light all shining on him.

We just got to put the story behind with having Michael and go on.

I mean, our lives goes on, the game goes on, basketball goes on.

Now p/ppen on the move.

P/ppen accelerates. P/ppen down the Lane.

And that is vintage scottie p/ppen.

Rider takes it in. Blocked away by scottie/

Horace Grant running down the left side.

P/ppen on the fight. Scottie gives it back to Steve kerr,

lets fiy.

Time winding down. Battles. Scottie p/ppen/

Oh, man/

Scottie was our prime motivator, initiator,

organized the offense.

He, you know, really stepped into that role.

Great.

They had nobody yelling at them.

Um, they got up plenty of shots.

Michael would just bludgeon everybody around him,

and scottie was the much softer touch.

He was the guy who would sort of comfort you

when things weren't going well and put his arm around you and,

"hang in there. You'll be all right."

Everyone expected me to try to be the man,

but we beat teams by committee

and we just learned to play together and share the ball and win together.

Eventually picked up off of that.

And here's Pete Myers. Good trailing.

That particular season, when Michael was gone,

that was the season Phil did his best coaching.

Coach, I heard Chuck daly, the other day say,

"let's see the triangle offense work now without Michael."

- Did he really say that? - Yeah.

Wait till I see Chuck.

Everybody criticizes the triangle and says, "yeah, it works.

When you have Michael, you know, then it works."

But that one year,

his star player was pippen,

who was not a scorer.

He's a facilitator.

Paxson looks down the fioor. Got kerr and p/ppen baseline.

Kerr back to scottie.

And they ran the triangle to perfection.

Toni k ukoc makes the move on the baseline.

Back to I/I/ennington. Paxson over to scottie.

Baseline, Steve kerr drives in. Delivers to wennington.

His shot twirls around and goes in.

Another surprise for the bulls

has been the emergence of rookie Toni k ukoc.

The international superstar from Croatia came to the bulls

after a long courtsh/p by bulls general manager Jerry k rause.

For those... for those...

For those of you who are new to number 7...

Number 7, in Europe, is the most popular number on the continent.

A lot of youngsters want to be like Toni.

He was a typical European player at that time,

who was an incredible shooter,

but defense is not his thing.

One-on-three and, guess what, put it in.

Phil was very tough on him.

Well, I understood that part, that coming here,

nothing's going to be given to me just 'cause I was really good in Europe.

Like I say, you need the time to prove some things to each other.

That season, we were winning a lot.

And the Chicago Bulls will advance into round number two.

I felt, "okay, there is a chance

we might actually get to the NBA finals without Michael."

We ended up playing the Knicks in the east semis.

We were down 2-0 and we were trying to get back in the series.

Patrick ewing made a shot with about two seconds left to tie the game,

and we were at risk of losing the whole series right there.

Chicago have taken their last time-out

to set up a shot with 7.8 seconds on the clock.

So, we come to the bench, and I have this sequence

that Toni has run before, and he's scored before on it.

I know he can do this.

I did hit a lot of last-second shots during the season.

Here's a pick. Toni long three.

Scores./ -

Here's kukoc, he hits on the left...

Toni got it. Putting it up. Look out/ he got it/

so, anyway, I set this up, and then scottie was angry about it.

I felt like it was an insult coming from Phil.

I was the most dangerous guy on our team,

so why are you asking me to take the ball out?

This is a season where he's taken the role of Michael.

He's had this mvp-caliber season.

He thought it should be him taking the shot.

And, so, Jim cleamons came over and said,

“scottie's not going in."

And then Phil said, “what do you mean he's not going in?"

And I go down and said, “are you in or out?" And he said...

"I'm out."

I remember Phil said, "fuck him. Pete Myers, come on in."

And when pip refused to go in that game,

it was like a "twilight zone" moment, like,

"what the hell is going on?"

Scottie's going to sit here.

That's strange, isn't it? Scottie would sit on this.

7.8 left, no time-outs left for the bulls.

Myers tr/ggers the inbounds pass.

K ukoc for the win/

/t goes/ -

Bulls w/l7/ bulls win it/

k ukoc with the lifesa ver/

whoa, man/

what a basket by Toni k ukoc at the buzzer!

Well, I was obviously happy for making a shot,

but the whole situation, even going towards the locker,

you see everybody is, like,

pissed that things are not right.

We don't know how to act,

'cause scottie's one of our favorite teammates,

one of our favorite people in the world, and he quit on us.

And that... We couldn't believe that happened.

It was... it was devastating.

What he did, you know, you just... You don't expect a teammate to do.

So, I go out and just address it to the team.

"This is something that we never thought would ever happen,

that we'd stop playing.

You know, it's affected us as a whole team, scottie, that you did this."

What I remember most, though, is bill Cartwright after the game.

Bill Cartwright gets up and makes this speech...

Saying, "pip, you let us down. I cannot believe."

And he started crying.

Tears coming down his face, and he said,

"scottie, I cannot believe that you quit on us like that."

We had come too far with that team to go out like that.

Scottie was in tears and upset and he realized,

“I made a mistake. I thought I was bigger than the game. I'm not."

And he apologized to us.

I think the worst part was that we knew it was not scottie's character.

We knew that wasn't him.

And we knew it was going to be a stain on his reputation.

The next day, I get a call from Michael.

He said, “I don't know if scottie's ever going to live this down."

It's always going to come back to haunt him at some point,

in some conversation.

Pip knows better than that.

It's one of those incidents where, you know, I wish it never happened,

but if I had a chance to do it over again, I probably wouldn't change it.

The next couple of days were really important.

We had to refocus and get back at it

for the rest of the series.

By Horace Grant,

who leads the team in blocks in the playoffs.

Great passing! Oh, baby!

Scottie had a great series and he turned things around.

Scottie p/ppen just went over to tell spike Lee,

”here's a close-up. ”

We all respected his apology and we moved fon/vard.

We came very close to making a deep playoff run.

But we lost in seven games to the Knicks in the garden.

It has been a wonderful run

for the Chicago Bulls franchise this season,

despite the loss of Michael Jordan.

He wanted solitude from the cameras

to watch his former mates' final moments.

It's no different from a fan, you know?

And it's Jordan, the fan,

who watches a replay of the bulls' futile attempt.

I'd rather just do it privately so it's, you know,

no "well, he's itching to get back into the game,"

or, you know, none of that stuff.

Man, I'm happy to be where I am, but I'm still a fan.

I like being around the game and I like watching the game.

Aah!

Come on, fellas.

And here we are,

game 2 of the New Jersey nets and the Chicago Bulls.

Cra wford's going to toss it up, and we 're going to be under way.

P/ppen back. Finds kerr all alone.

And that's what usually happens.

And a re verse slam by bill wennington!

Bill wennington! Where did that come from?

Well, this is a real shot in the arm for the Chicago Bulls.

Their bench much livelier today, much more aggressive,

looking for their shots.

Chicago is going to take the two games at home,

but it turns out to have been much more difficult than they antic/pated

Coming up, game 3 of our best-of-five series.

And the bulls can pull off the sweep ton/ght with a victory.

And filling the Lane is burrell with the easy la y-in.

Burrell for another three. And he's got it. Scott burrell.

What a game he's having. Holy mackerel.

Burrell, 9 of 77, shooting 23 points.

Finishing touches. Jordan on point.

Time runs out.

And the Chicago Bulls sweep a first-round series.

So, Scott burrell with 23 points ton/ght.

Final score, 776— 707.

The bulls led by that man with 38.

One down and three to go

if the Chicago Bulls are to claim NBA title number six,

the Jersey nets having been disposed of in three stra/ght.

Next up are the Charlotte hornets.

We all know Michael's tenacious on the court.

It was business when it was on the court.

But he was a good guy to be around off court.

You can relax around him off the court.

He's fun. He's enjoyable.

You like that yes or no question? Yes.

And I had a follow-up with him for that too.

Yeah, I know. That's why I answered it "yes."

What's up, partner?

How you doing, Mike?

- Steve? - Nice to meet you.

- You know this guy? What's your name? - Jerry.

Jerry, nice to meet you.

- Can I get an autograph real quick? - Sure.

I got some of your shoes. Appreciate it.

- Oh, you do? - Hell yeah.

Can you sign this real quick?

And he'll pay you too.

- How long you in town? - We don't know.

We might leave tonight, first thing... We drove up from Connecticut, so...

- Oh, yeah? - Yeah, we got about a 14-hour drive.

You know, uconn has a great women's team.

You had to say that, didn't you? So does Carolina though.

No, I mean, that's not a knock.

So does Carolina.

What's up with the men's program?

Off the floor, he was going to be cordial,

he was going to be accepting, he was going to be nice,

but as a teammate, he had certain expectations.

Was he a nice guy?

He couldn't have been nice.

With that kind of mentality he had, you can't be a nice guy.

He would be difficult to be around

if you didn't truly love the game of basketball.

He is difficult.

Well, I mean... I don't know.

I mean...

Winning has a price.

And leadership has a price.

So I pulled people along when they didn't want to be pulled.

I challenged people when they don't want to be challenged.

And I earned that right because my teammates came after me.

They didn't endure all the things that I endured.

Michael Jordan is down in pain.

Michael Jordan got taken out. He's hurt.

And Jordan came down hard and is injured

Well, the pistons have moved on,

but you've really got to feel for this man right there.

I mean, playing his heart out.

Once you join the team,

you live at a certain standard that I play the game,

and I wasn't going to take any less.

Now, if that means I had to go in there and get in your ass a little bit,

then I did that.

You ask all my teammates,

the one thing about Michael Jordan was,

"he never asked me to do something that he didn't fucking do."

When people see this, they're going to say,

"well, he wasn't really a nice guy. He may have been a tyrant."

Oh, well, that's you,

because you never won anything.

I wanted to win,

but I wanted them to win and be a part of that as well.

Look, I don't have to do this.

I'm only doing it because it is who I am.

That's how I played the game.

That was my mentality.

If you don't want to play that way, don't play that way.

Break.