When I was little, I loved two things pretty much above everything else: sports and cartoons. Naturally, when the two were combined, you weren't going to get my eyes unglued from the TV under any circumstance.
I still remember some of my favorite sports-cartoon episodes; Baseball Bugs, practically all of Rocket Power, and of course, the episode of Hey Arnold! were the 4th graders took on the 6th graders in a game of football.
Obviously, above all of those, was Space Jam.
I maintain the assertion that Space Jam is the greatest basketball movie ever made. It had Bugs Bunny and Michael Jordan playing basketball, Wayne Knight attempting to be athletic, and Bill Murray saving the day with the greatest bench performance in the history of the game.
As a youngin' at the time, I can honestly say that Space Jam is something that seriously piqued my interest in the sport, meaning I spent hours imitating Jordan on my hoop just like everyone else did.
Unfortunately, this same movie has also had an terrible side effect on many people my age who were little when they first saw the film: an irrational, god-like praise that's given to MJ every time his name comes up in a conversation.
This shouldn't be too unusual; Jordan's the greatest player of all-time! Of course he is going to be celebrated more than any other basketball player alive! However, I think some of this praise is infringing on the mythical realm, often forgetting the realities of Jordan's career.
For the first six years of MJ's career, he couldn't get over the hump. He was accused of being a selfish, arrogant, son-of-a-bitch, who just hogged the ball in an effort to historically pad his stats. In his seventh year, though, he, Scottie Pippen, and Horace Grant finally swept through the rival Pistons, and delivered the first of six championships to the city of Chicago. Over the course of those six trophies, some of those frowned upon adjectives started to fade away. The time he punched Steve Kerr in the face? No, that was just his determination to win! What about the time he stopped shooting and essentially quit on the time? Of course not, he was just trying to get his teammates involved!! I mean, look, he carried those Bulls teams all those years!
Enter LeBron James. The player who, for the first eight years of his career, failed to capture the crown jewel of all NBA players: a title. Like Jordan, LeBron had to share those same insults (arrogant, stat-padder, etc) that Jordan did before he got his ring. After the Decison, the scorn only became worse. Not only was he now the most arrogant player of all-time somehow, but now he had proven that he couldn't win by himself like Jordan did, and in fact, had become a sidekick! What a loser!!
Wait a minute, Jordan had this guy, though:
And this guy:
Meanwhile, in the city of Doom! (Cleveland)
So, how does all of this relate back to Space Jam?
In the movie, Jordan is essentially treated as a god. Not only is he the greatest in the real world, but he's so good that he can manipulate Looney Tune physics to score the halfcourt, game-winning dunk against a team of mutated aliens. Hell, he even hit a hole-in-one! He's just like Kim Jong-il! No wonder he's so popular in North Korea!
And do you remember that halftime speech? Please, MJ wouldn't have been the affectionate motivator like he's portrayed in the movie; he would have been at his team's throats! He would have screamed at Bugs, punched Daffy right in the beak, and likely would have reduced the Tasmanian Devil to tears.
However, he's the good guy obviously, and is portrayed as such. He saves the Looney Tunes, gets the player's talents back (did Shawn Bradley really have talent?), and returns to basketball in real life. All was well!
You know, except for reality.
Why do I think this is important? Every year, it seems that Jordan's legacy becomes greater and greater, defying the realities of how he actually played. I think Space Jam could be somewhat responsible for this. As I've already said, I think that movie was a huge influence on why I watch basketball today, and I think many others share that opinion. Being too young to witness Jordan's early playing days, we missed all of the pressure he endured before he captured that elusive ring. All we saw was Jordan at his best, all while saving the Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck from a gang of mutant-aliens on the side.
While it is natural for a sports figure to become more revered when he retires from the game, what Jordan's legacy has become isn't natural at all. Not so surprisingly, to me at least, this is also around the same time that those who grew up with Space Jam have started to come of age and get their opinions out in the air. Unfortunately, it seems like some of these people really seem to believe that MJ could have averaged 100 points for his career if it weren't for those pesky teammates and their stupid dog!
Anyways, let's hope that some of us learn that MJ really was human, and not some fictional cartoon character that could play every position at the same time...
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