When Michael Jordan called it a day on the heels of a historic three-peat run in 1993, the NBA world was left stunned. Although MJ’s sudden retirement took many aback, his former Team USA head coach Chuck Daly supported him wholeheartedly. On The Charlie Rose Show, he even narrated a story from their time together in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics to back Jordan’s decision.
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Daly recounted joining Jordan and a few others for a round of golf during their downtime. He vividly remembered no one else being around once they arrived at the course. However, this situation changed shortly after. MJ’s fans rushed onto the course, surrounded him, and abruptly halted the golf game.
This unexpected turn of events prompted Jordan and his group to scramble into their helicopter to escape the scene. This marked Daly’s firsthand experience of MJ’s superstardom on a global scale. He consequently believed that Jordan deserved some time away from the relentless media and fan attention after spending nine grueling years in the NBA. He stated,
“We were in Barcelona… We went up to play golf… We arrived, there was no soul around… We got to the 9th hole and you would have thought it was an anthill. I mean they’re coming out of the hills. They are running across the green… Then I started to get a real sense of how the guy lives… This guy needs time.”
While Daly’s perspective revealed one potential reason behind MJ’s retirement, it failed to portray the whole picture. To put it in context, Jordan lost his father, James, just a month after securing the three-peat. This loss took a heavy toll on ‘The Black Jesus,’ who initially decided to stay close to his family during such difficult times.
He likely also realized that returning to the NBA at that time could have been a dead end for him. Reporters would have continually asked about his late father and reopened his wounds. Former Chicago Tribune columnist Bob Greene noted this exact concern, saying,
“If this year, he were to have gone around the league, sports writers in every town… would say to him, ‘Michael, I’m sorry to bring this up but when you go out on the court every night, do you think about your dad?’… That’s like a little knife into him every time… If he could somehow just arrange to play two and half hours of basketball, I think he would do it for the rest of his life.”
These justifications gave weight to Jordan’s decision. At the same time, his mental readiness prepared him for this moment for quite some time.
MJ was ready to walk away from long before
During a 1992 interview with Playboy Magazine, Jordan spoke about how he had long since stopped caring about the fame. Instead, he prepared for the day he might choose to step away from the NBA and the spotlight that came with it. He said,
“I won’t miss the glare, I won’t miss the aggravations of people waiting for autographs at all times of the night… I won’t miss that [the screams from fans], either… I don’t need the screams and the cheers and I’m not going to wake up in the middle of the night and say, “Why did the screaming stop?” Because I really didn’t need it to keep me going, anyway.”
However, MJ soon contradicted himself out of his love for the game and the fans. Although he retired in 1993, ‘The Black Jesus’ returned to the NBA in March 1995. What followed was another three-peat, and then yet another retirement. Then one more comeback, and ultimately, the final retirement in 2003.
