Legendary college basketball coach Bobby Knight passed away on November 1. At the time of retirement in 2008, he had won a total of 902 games in the NCAA Division I, an all-time record, at the time. A career that saw him coach the likes of Indiana Hoosiers, Texas Tech Red Raiders, and Army Black Knights also saw a short-term rendezvous with Michael Jordan, back during the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.
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A 21-year-old Jordan had played for Team USA despite not having made his NBA debut thus far. MJ was widely expected to be one of the top picks and was eventually selected by the Chicago Bulls, where he obviously went on to make history.
However, ESPN’s Jay Bilas, a basketball analyst, recently revealed that the Trail Blazers were in doubt about the 2nd overall pick of the 1984 NBA draft. Then-general manager Stu Inman ended up calling Bobby Knight, due to his albeit limited experience of coaching MJ.
Knight apparently told Unman that Jordan was the best basketball player he had ever seen. However, as the Trail Blazers already had Clyde Drexler in their ranks, they were looking to sign a Center instead. This led to Knight emphatically claiming that they should still choose Jordan, and simply play him wherever they wanted.
“In 1984, after coaching Michael Jordan on the gold-medal-winning U.S. Olympic team, Portland general manager Stu Inman called Knight for advice on the upcoming NBA draft,” Bilas revealed, before giving out a simple piece of advice.
“Knight counseled Inman to take Jordan, calling Jordan the best basketball player he had ever seen. Inman told Knight the Blazers already had Clyde Drexler and needed a center. Knight responded, “Then play [Michael] Jordan at center,” he claimed, outlining the kind of impact MJ had on Knight despite having only played under him at a single tournament.
Team USA returned from the tournament with the gold medal, and Jordan, despite not being a starter, averaged 17.1 points, 2 assists, and 3 rebounds per game, which was enough for Knight to make such proclamations about the player.
Chris Mullin reveals Michael Jordan changed Bob’s coaching methodology
The 1984 Olympics proved to bring about a marked change in the way Knight approached coaching. He was initially angry due to MJ’s tendency to pick out passes after having jumped, according to Chris Mullin (Sports Illustrated).
Knight was concerned that it would lead to turnovers, and ended up making a deal with MJ.
“He would turn, survey the situation and take a dribble or maybe not and raise up. He would hang in the air for so long he’d either find shooters in the corner or find Wayman and Patrick for dunks,” Mullins said.
The deal was such that MJ was expected to stop his habit if he ended up turning the ball over.
“Bobby was like, ‘Fundamentally, you don’t leave your feet to pass.’ But they made a deal, when you turn the ball over you have to stop doing it. He never turned the ball over. Was that good. He actually turned Bobby Knight’s thinking. You have to make exceptions for the great ones.” However, such was a 21-year-old Michael Jordan’s skill level that he never ended up committing a turnover.
Instead of Knight getting his way with the player, he was forced to consider and accept his genius. The coach concluded that he had to make some exceptions for the best players, and seemed to have already concluded that MJ was the best that he had ever seen.
