The Michael Jordan Retirement Tour

Michael Jordan has retired to a home for senior living in Greensboro, North Carolina.

Although he may be more than 40 years removed from playing his final game in the NBA in 2003, MJ’s years of competing are far from over.

Jordan has dominated nursing home activities in the greater Greensboro area since he moved in after selling a Charlotte Hornets franchise that won four NBA titles under his ownership.

These are the stories of the residents of these nursing homes. Welcome to The Michael Jordan Retirement Tour.

When asked about Jordan’s participation in her rejuvenated garden therapy group, Charlotte Hennison said he was a “ruthless, cold-blooded horticulturalist.” Jordan took first place in all four categories of the competition, including best sweatsuit.

Marv Barker told The Greensboro Grasshopper, the resident-run nursing home publication, that Jordan was “unstoppable and simply breathtaking” in Thanksgiving Turkey designing.

“I wish he would have DIFM did it for me,” Barker said.

Barker’s rendering of Todd the Turkey, a lifelike bird-human hybrid took last place.

MJ could not be stopped in the kitchen when it came to the design your own pie and name it contest. His “Blues-berry Delight” pie, complemented with an image of blues legend Miles Davis, was to die for. This delectable dessert had residents doing the boogie-woogie like it was the 1920s.

In bingo, Jordan looked like he was playing in the 1998 NBA Finals and the field was Karl Malone. Playing 12 cards at once like only he could, MJ simply controlled the game from start to finish. Barker feels as though Jordan might have won a little too easily.

“Listen to me, that bingo game was rigged,” Barker said. “I know a rigged bingo game when I see it and that one was rigged.”

Barker declined to comment when asked why he felt the game was rigged.

The “Paint Swatch-Palooza,” easily Jordan’s toughest event, is typically run by a motley group of residents known around the home as the “Bad Boys of Paint Swatches.” After three-consecutive defeats in the conference finals of paint swatches, Jordan was finally able to get by the so-called Bad Boys.

“I was living and breathing paint swatches there for a while,” Jordan said.

In the annual “Pretty Pinecone Party,” Jordan played through an immense amount of adversity, as he was suffering from the flu. Having since been dubbed the “Flu Pinecone Party,” Jordan put his team on his back, scoring 38 points in the competition portion just like he did in game five of the 1997 NBA Finals, otherwise known as “The Flu Game.”

When asked about the results of the pinecone party, Baker said they were “certainly rigged.”

When the quilt designing competition came around, Jordan left the quilt community simply astonished. Hennison told the Grasshopper she had “never seen so many patches on a quilt with such an array of colors used.”

Even Barker said that Jordan’s quilt “had a lot of pretty good patches” but added that the quilt designing competition was “probably rigged.”

In the final contest, the one for all the marbles (literally, that’s the prize), the “Yarn Tulip Twirl,” MJ won three-consecutive times before mysteriously retiring from play, only to return to win three more titles.

When the question of why Jordan left the competition when he was at the top of his game came up, rumblings arose around the home about gambling.

MJ has not played basketball competitively in more than four decades, but has found various competitive outlets in the way of Greensboro nursing home activities. It’s called The Michael Jordan Retirement Tour.

More games: friv

LISTEN: Lil Uzi Vert – “Michael Jordan”

22-year-old Philadelphia rapper and 2016 XXL Freshman Lil Uzi Vert continues to pump out music for the next generation of hip-hop heads, and over the weekend he dropped a new party track with a title that should catch the eyes and ears of basketball fans. You can listen to Uzi’s “Michael Jordan” above, and let us know what you think in the comments section below.

Did he do the GOAT justice on this one? Or is putting MJ’s name on a track like this just disrespectful?

If you’re not all that familiar with Lil Uzi Vert, check out his XXL Freshmen freestyle in the video below:

Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o and Danai Gurira Confirmed for Black Panther Movie

During the Marvel panel at San Diego Comic-Con on Saturday, directorRyan Coogler confirmed several actors that had been rumored to have joined the film would indeed join Chadwick Boseman in Black Pantherwhen it hits theaters on June 6, 2018.

Michael B. Jordan, who worked with Coogler on Creed, will play the villain, Erik Killmonger. Lupita Nyong’o and Danai Gurira will play warriors in Black Panther’s homeland of Wakanda named Nakai and Okoye, respectively. Coogler called the women, who are in the Dora Milaje, “the best fighters in the kingdom.”

They all appeared onstage during the panel. Filming for the movie begins in January.

Foxes, Hedgehogs, and Michael Jordan

If you haven’t seen Elizabeth Lehfeldt’s piece in IHE about recruiting future administrators from among the faculty, check it out. She makes a solid case for talent-scouting among rising faculty to find folks with the talent and taste for management.

I’d add that the relative lack of full-time faculty positions has led to a thin bench for future chairs and deans in many areas.  When a college essentially skips a generation of hiring, it sets itself up for trouble when the first large group goes.

We all have different senses of what makes for promising managers. It isn’t really a matter of intellect; college professors are smart people, and have the mental bandwidth for the job. It’s not even about “organization” in the sense that many people use the term; too much detail orientation can be debilitating in a management role, just as too little can be.  

It’s more about temperament, a sense of the big picture, and a tendency to look for answers when confronted with dilemmas.

Star faculty may or may not make the best administrators, simply because the two roles require different skill sets. Having one doesn’t necessarily imply having the other. Michael Jordan may have been one of the best basketball players in the history of the sport, but when he switched to baseball, he washed out of the minors.  He was an undeniably extraordinary athlete, but the skills didn’t translate. Making a jump shot and hitting a curveball are not the same thing.  

Isaiah Berlin wrote a famous essay about the folktale of the fox and the hedgehog. In the tale, the fox knows many things, and the hedgehog knows one big thing. Faculty are hedgehogs; administrators are foxes. To the hedgehog, the fox may look like a dilettante. To the fox, the hedgehog may look like it has tunnel vision. Both are right and both are wrong, but they aren’t interchangeable. The forest needs both.

Deaning isn’t for everyone. A commenter to Lehfeldt’s piece made the valid point that there’s the mentoring that encourages someone to step up, and then there’s the mentoring that encourages someone else to stay away. Both can be valid. For folks who think that administration might be a good path but aren’t sure, short-term assignments can give a low-risk taste of what it’s like: those could be interim roles, or they could be project-based work, like self-studies. (An accreditation self-study was my first exposure to administration.) I’ve seen people get a taste, decide to step up, and do great; I’ve also seen people get a taste, make a face, spit the bit, and happily return to teaching. Both made sense. It can be hard to know if it’s for you until you actually try.

I tend to prefer academic administrators who have actually been faculty. Partly that’s because they understand the reality of the classroom and of faculty culture. But it also shows an uncommon ability to shift between the perspectives of the fox and the hedgehog. That ability to see multiple perspectives at once comes in handy when complicated dilemmas arise, which they do frequently. I need people who both understand why many faculty insist on the language of “crossing over to the dark side,” and yet, who understand why management is necessary and what’s at stake in doing it well.  

As the founding generation of community college leaders retires, the need for the next group to step up is becoming more pronounced. That means the need for talent scouting is growing. I hope those of us lucky enough to be in roles from which we can scout take the task seriously; if not, we’ll have a lot of Michael Jordans swinging wildly in the dirt.

What Michael, Tiger and LeBron are really like

NIKE founder Phil Knight helped build his estimated $25 billion fortune by marketing his sneakers with some of the most famous athletes in history.

Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, LeBron James and Kobe Bryant are just some of the superstars from the Nike stable who helped drive the company to unprecedented heights.

Knight recently published his memoir Shoe Dog, which includes fascinating anecdotes about his relationships with Nike’s favourite sons.

Knight knew from the early stages of his company the importance of athlete endorsements.

“If we were going to compete with Adidas — not to mention Puma and Gola, and Diadora and Head, and Wilson and Spalding, and Karhu and Etonic and New Balance and all the other brands popping up in the 1970s — we’d need top athletes wearing and talking up our brand,” Knight wrote.

The first of these was colourful Romanian tennis player Ilie Nastase, who actually started wearing a pair of Nike Match Points before he was sponsored by Knight.

Knight got word of it and signed Nastase for $10,000 at a steakhouse in Omaha. “After I got him to sign on the dotted line, after I locked the papers in my briefcase, we ordered a celebratory dinner,” Knight wrote.

“A bottle of wine, another bottle of wine. At some point, for some reason, I started speaking with a Romanian accent, and for some reason Nasty started calling meNasty, and for no reason I could think of his supermodel wife started making goo-goo eyes at everyone, including me, and by night’s end, stumbling up to my room, I felt like a tennis champion, and a tycoon, and a kingmaker.”

But without doubt the most mutually beneficial relationship Knight had with an athlete was with Jordan. In his book, Knight recalls the night he spent staying at Jordan’s house in Chicago.

“I pick up the phone next to the bed in the guestroom and discover that there’s a voice on the line,” he wrote. “’May I help you?’ It’s room service. Genuine, round-the-clock, whatever-your-heart desires room service. I set down the phone, my mouth hanging open.”

Knight is congratulated by Jordan after being inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame.Source:Getty Images

Another memorable moment came in July 2005, when Knight was approached by James — who had just completed his second season with the Cleveland Cavaliers — in the middle of an event.

“Phil, can I see you a moment?” James asked.

“Of course.”

“When I first signed with you,” James said, “I didn’t know all that much about the history of Nike. So I’ve been studying up.”

“Oh?”

“You’re the founder.”

“Well. Co-founder. Yes. It surprises a lot of people.”

“And Nike was born in 1972.”

“Well. Born? Yes. I suppose.”

“Right. So I went to my jeweller and had them find a Rolex watch from 1972.”

The watch was engraved: “With thanks for taking a chance on me.”

“It wasn’t much of a chance,” Knight wrote. “He was pretty close to a sure thing. But taking a chance on people — he’s right. You could argue that’s what it’s all been about.”

“They’re all like sons, and brothers — family,” Knight adds. “No less. When Tiger’s father, Earl, dies, the church in Kansas holds fewer than 100, and I’m honoured to be included. When Jordan’s father is murdered, I fly to North Carolina for the funeral and discover with a shock that a seat is reserved for me in the front row.”

LeBron James has a lifetime deal with Nike.Source:Getty Images

After first travelling to Asia in 1962 to convince Japanese shoe executives to allow him to sell their sneakers in America, Knight continued on a round-the-world trip.

“I think often of that momentous trip when I was 24,” he writes. “I think of myself standing high above Athens, gazing at the Parthenon, and I never fail to experience the sensation of time folding in on itself.

“Amid the (Nike) campus buildings (in Oregon), along the campus walkways, there are enormous banners: action photos of the super athletes, the legends and giants and titans who’ve elevated Nike to something more than a brand. Jordan. Kobe. Tiger.

“Again, I can’t help but think of my trip around the world.

“The River Jordan.

“Mystical Kobe, Japan.

“That first meeting at Onitsuka, pleading with the executives for the right to sellTigers ... Can this all be a coincidence?”.

Virginia gets the crying Michael Jordan face after loss

Nobody is free from the Michael Jordan crying face after a loss. Especially not teams that blew double-digit leads and choked late to lose a Final Four spot like Virginia.

After the Cavaliers blew a lead late against Syracuse in the Elite Eight Sunday, the internet went to work giving them the crying faces.

Boxing legend lives on

Rocky Balboa acts as mentor to his former rival’s son and spares no punches.

CREED (2015)
Certified: 15
Duration: 133 minutes
Directed by: Ryan Coogler
Starring: Michael Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Phylicia Rashad, Tony Bellew, Graham McTavish, Wood Harris, Andre Ward, Gabriel Rosado, Ritchie Coster, Jacob ‘Stitch’ Duran
KRS Releasing Ltd

When I heard that the Rocky franchise was about to have its seventh entry, I was not particularly enthused as I could not imagine how Sylvester Stallone was going to continue to milk the Italian Stallion’s cinematic fame, especially after 2006’s Rocky Balboa, which had been such a sincere and heartfelt closing off.

However, against all odds, Creed is a success story. It’s a movie with a heart that capitalises on the franchise’s myth to develop its own personality.

Ryan Coogler, who had directed the acclaimed Fruitvale Station (2013), deserves a very good slice of the merit as the picture resonates with a sense of both human and street awareness, adding more facets to it than just being another boxing popcorn entertainment picture.

Michael Jordan is Adonis Johnson who was always getting into trouble, getting into fights as he progressed through a life of juvenile detention.

When Mary Anne Creed (Phylicia Rashad), the widow of Apollo Creed who had been the world heavyweight champ, takes him in to raise him as her son, he gets to know that his fighting skills may be an inherited trait.

There is vibrant energy, cheering for the underdog and, most of all, a sense of sincerity

Adonis was the fruit of an illegitimate affair that Apollo Creed had.

The young man is successful in his job in the financial services but he is fixated on boxing. He tries to experiment by going into non-legally-sanctioned fights but he wants more. Thus he goes off to Philadelphia to find Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone), who had been his father’s opponent, a heavyweight champ who then became his father’s friend. Rocky is now a widower, running a restaurant named after his wife. However, Adonis manages to convince him to take him on.

Meanwhile, the young boxer meets Bianca (Tessa Thompson), a girl who lives downstairs and wants to become a singer, and the two get close to each other. Rocky’s health is not all that good. However, he will soon have to give Adonis all his support as young man ends up confronting Ricky Conlan (Tony Bellew), the light heavyweight champion who is going through some rather unusual circumstances of his own.

In this film, Coogler includes all the elements which had made the best Rocky movies so resonant with their audience: vibrant energy, cheering for the underdog and, most of all, a sense of sincerity.

Creed has an emotional core to it that is very tangible. Stallone and Jordan share a connection that is developed on screen. The two characters are both missing a father and a son and they find a sort of replacement in each other.

It’s in such moments, when these hard characters seem so vulnerable, that they appear more believable.

Stallone has received an Oscar nomination for best supporting actor for his role in this film.

Coogler also gives the supporting cast enough screen time. He does this by developing the roles of Bianca and Mary Anne who both care for Adonis on different levels.

The director also knows that his audience want a good and scrappy fight. So, when the film moves into the ring, that is what they get.

Coogler uses all the cinematic tricks in the book in order to deliver a ring fight that is delightfully Hollywoodian in its sense of style and manipulation but he also spares no punches.

In the end, the audience – like Adonis, Rocky and the franchise itself – will come out of the movie smiling.