The untold story behind Michael Jordan, Phil Jackson & ‘The Last Dance’



The Chicago Bulls Basketball team has a long list of former players and coaches whose names have already gone down in history as some of the best there ever were: Phil Jackson, Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, and Dennis Rodman, to name a few.

However, they all left the Bulls and left former college basketball coach — now a former Chicago Bulls head coach — Tim Floyd to make his own magic.

Floyd joined Jason Whitlock to discuss his time as head coach and shares a story that would have forever changed the history of the Bulls’ dynasty and the NBA.

Floyd says that he believes he was hired because they “wanted a college guy to go develop pros because the league was going to get younger.”

However, Bulls head coach was an intimidating seat to fill.

“You’re replacing a legend and a squad that had just won six titles in eight years. And the only two years they didn’t win, Michael was playing baseball,” Whitlock says.

Floyd was apprehensive about taking on the role at first and even told Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf that he wanted to wait to replace Phil Jackson.

Why?

A year before “The Last Dance,” Floyd was flown to Seattle to discuss taking Jackson’s spot with Reinsdorf after the 1995-96 season.

And he wouldn’t do it — yet.

“I think it’s too early,” Floyd said.

“This team is the Beatles,” he continued, “And I think it needs to die its own natural death.”

“So, indirectly,” Floyd jokes, “I take credit for the last two championships.”


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'People want to see sports as non-political': Legendary coach Phil Jackson says he hasn't watched the NBA in years because it's 'too political'



Hall of Fame basketball coach Phil Jackson revealed that he hasn't watched an NBA game in years because the game has gotten "too political."

Jackson made the comments during an appearance on the Tetragrammaton podcast with iconic music producer Rick Rubin.

Rubin asked Jackson if he still watches a lot of basketball. Jackson explained how he was put off by the game that he has loved for his entire life. Jackson first started not being a fan of the NBA during the 2020 bubble postseason experiment, where teams played in a bubble in Orlando during the pandemic.

"They did something that was kind of wanky, they did a bubble down in Orlando, and all the teams that could qualify went down there and stayed down there," Jackson recalled.

Jackson poked fun at the NBA for pushing social justice messages on player jerseys in 2020.

"They had things on their back like 'Justice' and a funny thing happened like, 'Justice went to the basket and Equal Opportunity knocked him down.' Some of my grandkids thought it was pretty funny to play up those names. I couldn’t watch that," Jackson said.

In July 2020, the NBA announced a list of 29 approved jersey names that were focused on social justice. Some of the approved messages that players could wear on their jerseys were Justice, Equal Opportunity, Black Lives Matter, Say Their Names, Vote, I Can't Breathe, Equality, Power to the People, Sí Se Puede (Yes We Can), Anti-Racist, and Group Economics.

"They even had slogans on the floor," Jackson noted, likely referencing when the NBA painted "Black Lives Matter" on the floor of the main basketball court of the bubble playoffs.

\u201cThe #NBA delivered on its promise to print "Black Lives Matter" on the game court for the league's restart in Orlando. The league unveiled the new court. Black Lives Matter is written on the floor in large black print\u203c\ufe0f#uaccessmagazine\u201d
— UAccessOnline (@UAccessOnline) 1595376701

"It was catering, it was trying to cater to an audience or trying to bring a certain audience into play," Jackson said. "And they didn't know it was turning other people off."

"You know, people want to see sports as non-political," the NBA coach stated.

Jackson was talking about the height of the Black Lives Matter movement following the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery.

He pointed out that several NBA players have been politicians, but they keep their politics out of the NBA game.

Jackson retired from coaching basketball in 2016 after winning 11 championships — five with the Los Angeles Lakers, and six with the Chicago Bulls.

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Fearless: Scottie Pippen’s racial assault on Phil Jackson shows we need a war on Twitter crack



Twitter is cocaine. Silicon Valley-manufactured "Black Twitter" is crack cocaine.

Professional sports are experiencing a crack epidemic. The athletes, executives, and leagues are addicted to or live in fear of "Black Twitter," the allegedly informal community of Twitter users and bots who portray themselves as black.

Crack Twitter, my name for Black Twitter, is the online gatekeeper of the degenerate culture Hollywood and music industry executives have defined for black people.

Cocaine damages the brain. The drug, in the worst-case scenario, causes an insatiable dopamine addiction. Lucky cocaine users can handle an occasional powder "bump" at parties. Unlucky users, particularly those who freebase cocaine (crack), develop schizophrenia and paranoia and fall into prolonged depression.

The clearest sign of social media crack addiction is the paranoid user who constantly rants, raves, and tweaks about racism terrorizing every aspect of his life.

Olympic hammer thrower Gwen Berry heard the national anthem playing and screamed that it was a disrespectful, racist setup. ESPN basketball analyst Jay Williams greeted the news of the Celtics hiring their sixth black head coach by hailing it as a historic first for black people.

Not to be outdone, on Monday, Williams' ESPN colleague Jalen Rose taped a rambling, do-rag-wearing, hair-greasing, hair-combing non-apology for racially smearing Kevin Love's selection to the Olympic basketball team. You should hunt down Rose's Instagram live video. It's 45 minutes of unintentional comedy. It's like watching Pookie from the movie "New Jack City" explain quantum physics.

But NBA legend Scottie Pippen was Monday's biggest tweaker. Pip appeared on "The Dan Patrick Radio Show." He accused his former coach, Phil Jackson, of racism for drawing up a game-winning shot for Toni Kukoc in a 1994 playoff game against the Knicks.

That game and that moment form the lone stain on Pippen's exemplary playing career. Pippen refused to re-enter the game because of Jackson's play call. Kukoc sank the shot with Pippen sulking on the bench. Pippen should quit drawing attention to the infamous moment he quit on his teammates.

His social media addiction won't allow it. He's now resorted to racially smearing the coach who helped him win six NBA titles.

I blame Twitter and social media. I'm not joking. Social media apps are driving the racial hysteria plaguing the country. From actor Jussie Smollett's hoax to NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace's garage-door noose to basketball star LeBron James' paranoid tweet about being afraid to walk outside, Crack Twitter is responsible for the race-bait pandemic. Twitter algorithms are constructed to release massive numbers of dopamine likes, retweets, and follows for racial accusations.

Pippen has 660,000 Twitter followers and 1.7 million Instagram followers. He feels pressure to deliver dopamine-friendly content to his 2.3 million social media followers. There's no better product than race bait. It's the coca leaf of cocaine.

Pippen, Rose, and Williams are all good dudes. They're not ill-intentioned. They don't have a legit problem with white people. They certainly don't have a problem with the fruit (women) of the white tree.

Social media hacked their brains.

Twenty years from now, America will be flooded with documentaries explaining how Silicon Valley algorithms promoted and rewarded racial conflict.

I feel sorry for these guys. They're unaware they have an addiction. I have the same addiction. Most public figures suffer from Twitter addiction, and the Crack Twitter addiction is most pronounced among black public figures. The first and most important step toward recovery is admitting you have the problem.

Once you admit the problem, then you can see how it perverts your thoughts and causes you to see every human interaction through the lens of racism. Once you admit the problem, then you can take steps to combat the problem.

Back to Pippen.

Phil Jackson likely drew up the game's final play for Kukoc because he assumed Anthony Mason, arguably the league's top defensive player at the time, would be defending Pippen. Or maybe Jackson had a gut feeling Kukoc would make the shot. Great coaches have great instincts.

I understand Pippen's frustration. The Chicago Bulls took advantage of him in contract negotiations. Pippen was having the best season of his career. It was his first time playing outside Michael Jordan's shadow. Jordan had retired to pursue baseball. And Pippen saw Kukoc as a possible down-the-road threat to his ascension as Chicago's top player.

I get it.

Phil Jackson is as flawed as every other human being. I'm sure he has his biases. But a racist? That allegation is way too damaging to just toss out willy-nilly. What baits us to do that?

Twitter. Racial demonization is the app's lifeblood.

For far too long, we've tolerated a media ecosystem that demands we all snort or freebase Twitter's cocaine. Google, the all-powerful Silicon Valley search engine, defines public figures by their Twitter feeds. Punch a public figure's name into Google, and the first or second thing that pops up is usually his or her Twitter feed.

Researchers say 20 percent of Americans use Twitter. I bet at least 95 percent of the American media use Twitter. The app has an outsized impact on defining public figures and shaping how the media present reality. The app distorts reality. Nothing has done more to create the false reality that police are executing a genocidal plot against black men than Twitter's algorithms.

Cocaine is an auditory hallucinogen. Modern athletes are high on social media. This second-wave crack epidemic is worse than the first.

We need a war on Crack Twitter.