The First Post about The Last Dance

     ESPN hyped it back in 2019 and it was originally supposed to air in June but with Coronavirus ending/pausing live sports events it started on April 19th. Heck, not all of the episodes were finished by the time the first episode aired. Surprised they didn't only air one episode a night to give them time. Hopefully, all episodes should be completed. I know we're as of now only 60 percent into the documentary and I'm sure I'm going to talk about this in another post or several but I am talking about it now especially since I don't think I can fit everything into just one post. I believe it's as good as advertised and it's gotten a 97 percent from Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic gave it a 91 percent. However, it's not without criticism. Legendary Documentarian Ken Burns has been vocality against it because Michael Jordan's production company "Jump 23" was involved with the project and it wasn't good journalism. Hey, Burns is entitled to his opinion and his documentaries are good. MLB Network plays His "Baseball" Doc quite a bit and I recently saw his Vietnam War Doc on Netflix. It was good and amazed he had interviewed people/veterans on the North Vietnam (Communist) side as well those from South Vietnam and the American side. Usually, programs that cover the Vietnam War usually interview American veterans and that's it. Kudos to Ken Burns. Is the Last Dance biased? It is but it is a story about Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman, Phil Jackson, and Chicago Bulls of the 1990s and the beginnings of those four. Including where Phil Jackson was compared to Dennis Rodman during his playing days with the Knicks (when they had a good team in the early 1970s). Also, the talk about the Chicago Bulls being bad before Jordan got there. Prior to Jordan, the start of the Chicago Bulls was a good one to begin with. They went to the playoffs nine times in their first 11 seasons (including their expansion year) and two of those seasons they went to the Conference Finals. After the 1976-77 season, the Bulls went to the playoffs only once in 1980-81 under Bulls legend Jerry Sloan (remember that name) and he was fired midway through the next season. They ended being the laughing stock of the league and just missed out on the number one overall pick in 1979 which would have been Magic Johnson. The Bulls also missed out on getting a Chicago native in Isiah Thomas who in the 30 for 30 about the Bad Boys (Detroit Pistons teams of the 1980s and early 90's) said he was during everything to dropped down to the Bulls (his hometown team) at sixth in the 1981 NBA Draft. The Pistons GM Jack McCloskey saw that he saw doing and told Isiah he was going to draft him anyway which he did and the rest was history. I could see Magic playing with Michael, Isiah not so much. I think Isiah and Michael did play together for a few seasons before one of them would be traded. The Bulls in Jordan's rookie season did have a guy named Johnson who wore 32, it was Steve Johnson. Anyway, the Bulls were the second-worst team only behind the Indiana Pacers (who give their pick to the Portland Trail Blazers). Yet the Houston Rockets (having the worst record in the West) and the Trail Blazers (having the Pacers pick) for the coin-flip for the number one pick in the draft, the last draft before the lottery took place and the Bulls had to settle on the third pick. Rockets won and got Hakeem Olajuwon who had a Hall of Fame Career himself. Then Sam Bowie (had problems with injuries but had some good seasons with the Nets but still remember being drafted ahead of Jordan and Charles Barkley) went number two to the Trail Blazers and Jordan went third to the Bulls. The Bulls actually wanted a center but they also starved for attention. During the down years, the Bulls they're being outdrawn in attendance but the Indoor Soccer (yes that bad). Back in the NBA during those times, the belief you needed to big guy (center) to build around and not many people believed that Jordan could lift the Bulls to new highs even though he had a great career at North Carolina under Dean Smith who actually told Jordan to go into the NBA. If you're college coach tells you to go to the NBA (or to the pros) GO. Also, he was the third overall pick of that draft. That quickly changed, according to Jordan his break out NBA performance was against the two-time Eastern Conference runners-up the Milwaukee Bucks third game of the season where he led the Bulls to victory and from then on the rest was history. He had a great rookie year complete with an All-Star Appearance and of course the Rookie of the Year in the 1984-85 season. Also, he led the Bulls to their first playoffs for the first time in four seasons losing in the First Round to the Bucks (a little revenge from them). Also, Jordan filled up the crowds in Chicago Stadium and it continued from there which I'll get to another some more posts unless I would have one very long post. I will talk about Jordan and Pippen problems with General Manager Jerry Krause, Jordan's first retirement and baseball break which may or may not included with almost being an Oakland A (the GM of the A's at the time when Jordan was giving baseball a try recently said they tried to get him to play for the big league team) probably taking about another 30 for 30 episode.  Maybe Rodman might be talked about (I found it odd yet fitting that on the Last Dance episode four that someone compared Phil Jackson who was a player on the Knicks from 1967-78 to Dennis Rodman). Both were defensive specialists who march to the beat of their own drum.