This is just a formality, you guys getting on the court tonight.’”
Washington forward Chris Webber remembers that during the 1997 playoffs against the Bullets, Jordan came into their locker room with a lit cigar and asked, “Who’s going to check me tonight?” Webber said in 2013 that before the third and final game of the Bulls’ series sweep, the young team got off its bus at the arena to find Jordan and Scottie Pippen smoking cigars, hanging around Michael’s Ferrari. Jordan didn’t burn anyone with his stogies - but he did employ them as a show of his strength. It was like he had a concert going on in his own head.” 1 song was ‘Giving You The Best That I Got.’ I remember him singing that to Jerry Stackhouse one day and just putting on a show. “I just remember stories of Jordan singing to guys when he was playing,” NBA forward Roshown McLeod said in 2016. Whether he employed it strategically or unintentionally let his internal soundtrack fly in the moment, his love of Baker came out on the court, unnerving his opponents. After making the “Shot” over Cavaliers guard Craig Ehlo, he credited her “Giving You the Best That I Got” as the pregame song that inspired his ice-in-veins bucket. Mostly, it appears he tended toward R&B and soul, playing D’Angelo’s Brown Sugar on the set of Space Jam and using singer Anita Baker’s tunes as both hype-up and psych-out music. Jordan never associated with hip-hop in the same way the genre loved him. However, I doubt Buzz Peterson would tell this yarn if it had involved his mother and some random dude he met in Anthropology 251 (and if he did, the story would now be about that one time he brought a lunatic home for Thanksgiving break).” And because the character in this anecdote is MJ, the story is charming. This is often used as an example of what made Jordan so awesome he would do absolutely anything to win, regardless of the circumstance. While playing a casual game of cards with Peterson’s mother, Jordan attempted to cheat while the old woman was using the bathroom. “There is a famous story about Michael Jordan visiting the home of North Carolina teammate Buzz Peterson. This tale comes by way of Chuck Klosterman:
He got caught cheating at cards - against a teammate’s mother Here are some of the wildest tales about Jordan - both from unconfirmed sources and related by his friends and foes (as if there was a difference to him) - that exemplify the savagery that makes him even more of a legend than his highlight reels. The intense, pathologic competitiveness, the ability to transcend what seems humanly possible by sheer force of will, the downright meanness that fueled it, the love of making a few bets - it’s all there in spades, which in turn lends credence to some of the more outlandish off-the-court tales about His Airness.
Photo: Dick Raphael/NBAE via Getty ImagesĪs the ESPN documentary The Last Dance proves over and over, Michael Jordan’s life and career are full of stories that would be hard to believe if there weren’t cameras there to capture them. Just assume Jordan was trash-talking other players before, after, or possibly during this shot.