Michael Jordan is back. It didn’t take a full-page ad in the paper to announce it this time. The Hall of Famer is returning to the world of basketball. He is joining NBC’s NBA coverage as a special contributor, starting with the 2025-26 season. The announcement has understandably shaken up the world of analysts and broadcasting. Shannon Sharpe is the latest to add his opinion on how MJ will fare in the TV world.
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Joined by Chad Johnson and former NBA All-Star Joe Johnson, Sharpe dissected the intricacies that could come with Jordan’s new role. He stated why, in his opinion, the six-time champion might struggle on NBC.
Sharpe explained that the world hadn’t ever seen Jordan talk about basketball in a professional setting, surrounded by tons of cameras and live broadcasts. The five-time MVP has talked about basketball before, but that was more casual when he was among friends or teammates. It’s this lack of experience in the media world that Sharpe thinks might affect MJ for a while.
“I mean we really never heard Mike really talk basketball,” he began. “Not in a professional setting, not in you know, you hang out with him he talk ball like that. But cameras, action, people around, I don’t know, I don’t know what to expect.”
Iso Joe added on that in his analysis, like everything else Jordan did over his career, he’d be blunt, honest, and simply call it like he sees it. Sharpe went on to suggest that the idea to recruit the Bulls legend was a tremendous one, simply because people would tune in to the broadcasts to hear Michael Jordan talk about basketball.
“Outside of it, we never really heard Jordan talk, except in a press conference. Or except after a game, you know?” he said. “We really never heard him in a studio, and he’s asked to give a critique or analyse what happened in a game.”
It certainly looks like Shannon, Ocho, and Iso Joe are excited to see what MJ has to offer in the world of NBA media, as are a lot of other fans and former players. One person who is hesitant about Jordan’s NBC role, however, is his former Wizards teammate Gilbert Arenas.
Gilbert Arenas claims the media will turn into “yes-men” for Michael Jordan
It’s no secret that a lot of NBA media is heavily influenced by Michael Jordan. Be it their own close relationship with him or the idol-worshipping that he received as a player, a lot of NBA discourse starts and ends with Jordan’s name. Gil, who spent a year alongside Jordan in Washington, dreads seeing what the state of the media might turn into if MJ were to make a controversial opinion.
“MJ is not a hater,” added Arenas on his podcast. “So think about all of MJ’s minions that just stans for MJ. He’s gonna talk regular a** basketball. He’s gonna talk about how great Ant-Man, and Shai and all these guys are, and it’s gonna go against the minions, and they [are] gonna have to twerk backwards.”
With the NBA heading into tumultuous times next season, what with LeBron James’ impending retirement hanging in the air, the dropping ratings, and the TV deal shifting it to a new network, Michael Jordan doing analysis and commentary might be a sure-shot way of making sure that the league keeps fans engaged in uncertain times.
