Friday, May 8th, 2020

  The Opening Tip

• Michael Jordan had the last word on the production of “The Last Dance,” which is definitely unethical

• Scottie Pippen’s decision to quit on a 1994 playoff game will be part of Sunday’s “The Last Dance” episodes

• The title-winning 1970 Knicks are 50 years old today 

• Chuck vs. Draymond Green is no comparison

1. The Lead: “The Last Dance” is basically a commercial for Michael Jordan. Should that matter?    

In an interview on the Dan Patrick Show earlier this week, “The Last Dance” director Jason Hehir said this, about episodes seven and eight: 

“And there’s things in there -- there’s language in there that I’m shocked that ESPN let us keep in, and there’s behavior in there that I’m shocked that Michael let us keep in.”

To recap: TLD is a documentary about Michael Jordan. The director of the documentary is “shocked” that the subject allowed him to keep parts of the documentary in the final cut.That’s … not how most documentaries work. In “O.J.: Made in America,” director Ezra Edelman didn’t have to call O.J. and say, “Hey, uh, Juice, you mind if we put the whole Nicole-Ron part in?”This question in ethics has drawn the ire of documentary maven Ken Burns, among others.And it’s easy to see their point-of-view. A few subjects have been noticeably missing from the first six episodes of “The Last Dance,” like:

• MJ's first wife, Juanita, who took $168 million from Jordan during their 2006 divorce. 

• Sonny Vaccaro, the godfather of the American sneaker business, who put his job on the line with Nike to convince them to sign Michael Jordan in 1984. (He later had a falling out with Nike, which explains his absence. Yahoo covers it here.) 

• A true examination of Jordan’s alleged “Republicans buy sneakers, too” comment. He has denied saying it in the past. In TLD, he professed the comment was said “in jest,” but said. 

Does it matter that the thing we’ve all been enjoying for the last three Sundays is more or less a 10-hour advertisement for MJ?It’s a good question, but we, basketball lovers, say no. Why? Because … it’s still interesting.The Players’ Tribune, which had a brief moment a few years ago as an outlet for athletes to write first-person essays, has since faded away. Why?Two reasons: 

1. It was thinly-veiled sponsored content written in a corny tone by a ghost writer. 

2. The vast majority of the articles were uninteresting. 

“The Last Dance” is a thinly-veiled commercial for MJ, sure.But it’s about the most famous athlete in American history; features never-seen footage that’s been crystallized for 22 years; has a well-executed if slightly formulaic structure that keeps you engaged for all two hours every Sunday; and has commentary from some of the most influential people in sports.So, we say: Keep the propaganda coming.

 2. Toni Kucoč’s 1994 buzzer-beater over the Knicks 

GIF’d above is the game-winner Toni Kucoč hit in Game 3 of the 1994 Eastern Conference Semifinals against the Knicks, in the first post-Michael Jordan Bulls season.Not pictured is the more famous backstory: In the huddle before the play, Phil Jackson drew up a play for Kucoč, not Scottie Pippen. Pippen, emotionally fragile and hurt, refused to go in the game for the final play, which is why you don’t see him on the court.This moment will be covered in “The Last Dance” on Sunday.

3. The Grip asks (stupid questions that don’t need to answered edition): Who was better, Draymond Green or Charles Barkley?  

Draymond Green quadrupled down on his beef with Charles Barkley on a recent episode of the podcast All the Smoke, saying: 

“Honestly, it’s jealousy. It’s jealousy that somebody the same as him or smaller can come in the league and have the success I’ve had, made the money I’ve made, win the championships I’ve won. These are all things that Charles Barkley wasn’t able to do. Granted, he made a lot of money for his time ... it’s not my fault I benefited from the money going up.“He scored more points than me, ight cool, but that don’t necessarily mean you had more impact on the game than me.”

First of all, Green is listed at 6-foot-6. Chuck was 6-foot-4.Secondly, Green is right when he says “he scored more points than me.” But that doesn’t begin to tell the story in terms of how vastly superior Chuck’s raw stats are to Green’s...Points/points per game: 

• Chuck: 23,757/22.1 PPG

• Green: 5,170/9 PPG

Rebounds/rebounds per game: 

• Chuck: 12,546/11.7 RPG

• Green: 3,966/6.9 RPG

Assists/assists per game:

• Chuck: 4,215/3.9 APG 

• Green: 2,855/5 APG

Career field goal percentage: 

• Chuck: 54.1 percent

• Green: 43.6 percent

All-Star teams: 

• Chuck: 11

• Green: 3

All-NBA teams: 

• Chuck: 11 (five first, five second and one third-team)

• Green: 2 (one second and third-team)

Top-six MVP finishes:

• Chuck: 8

• Green: 0

Career PER:

• Chuck: 24.6

• Green: 15.1

Basketball Reference nicknames:

• Chuck: Sir Charles, The Round Mound of Rebound, The Chuckster, The Chuck Wagon, The Prince of Pizza, The Incredible Bulk, The Leaning Tower of Pizza, Bread Truck, Boy Gorge.

• Green: Day-Day, The Dancing Bear, Dray.

4. 05/08/1970: The Knicks get their first title 

On this day 50 years ago, the Knicks beat the Lakers in Game 7 of the NBA Finals, 113-99, to clinch their first title in franchise history.A half-century later, their team-above-player style still strikes a chord among basketball's purists in a way that previous champions never did. Writer Rafe Bartholomew, in a 2011 Grantland article, put the aura that surrounds those ‘70s Knicks teams well: 

"If you believe what journalists have written and fans old enough to have seen those teams have said, the ’70s Knicks were basketball’s version of Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. ... Their balance of finesse and brawn, their ball movement, their help defense, their chemistry: It was once-in-a-lifetime; it was perfection."

The Game 7 starting five: Walt Frazier; Dick Barnett; Bill Bradley; Dave Debusschere; and Willis Reed.The star: Frazier had one of the great games in NBA history, compiling 36 points, 19 assists and seven rebounds.The most important moment: When Willis Reed, floating on clouds after his massive cortisone shot, limped out onto the court for pregame warmups after missing all of Game 6 stemming from a torn right thigh muscle in Game 5. Reed hit his first two shots -- he finished with only four points in 27 minutes -- and the Knicks were off and running.[READ: The old Knicks made basketball games the ‘hippest place’ in New York]

5.  Off the press

• Dennis Rodman defends Scottie Pippen from “Last Dance” criticism [ESPN]

• How the Knicks got into this mess, in their own words [ESPN]

• Rick Pitino remembers the Celtics’ glorious night against Michael Jordan and the Bulls [The Boston Herald]