The Last Dance: Michael Jordan’s baseball career, LaBradford Smith among 5 things we learned in Episodes 7-8

1. Jordan wanted to retire from basketball in the summer of ’92

The idea that the NBA would suspend its brightest star, a global icon who had made basketball popular around the world, is ridiculous when one takes the time to think about it.

“You’re telling me that David Stern, the ultimate capitalist, takes his No. 1 player on his No. 1 franchise and unilaterally decides to lower the value of the rest of the league’s franchises by taking him out and the Bulls out, effectively, for some secret penalty … and no one ever finds out about it?” asked author Mark Vancil.

Beyond that, however, Vancil says Jordan had told him this “abrupt” retirement was coming a year before he actually pulled the trigger.

“It was the summer of ’92 and it’s the Dream Team summer,” Vancil said. “You could tell he was really tired. As tired as he looked and as beat up as he looked, I said, ‘What are you going to do?’ There’s a long pause and he said, ‘I’m going to shock the world. I’m going to quit and go play baseball.'”

According to Vancil, the only reason Jordan didn’t retire in 1992 was the Dream Team competing in the Summer Olympics and the Bulls going for a historic three-peat — something only the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers had ever done — the following season.

If not for the Olympics and the three-peat attempt, Jordan’s baseball sabbatical may have lasted even longer, and we would’ve missed out on one of the greatest NBA Finals ever between the Bulls and Phoenix Suns. Fortunately, he waited until ’93 to walk away, but as he often did on the court, Jordan had called his shot beforehand with his first retirement.