Now Batting, Michael Jordan

The logical thing for me to write about at this stage would of course be the actual baseball season that just concluded, specifically the New York Mets’ performance therein…but I’m in a fairly good mood right now and I don’t want to spoil it by thinking about that. Instead, with the NBA season upon us, I’d prefer to retell one of the stranger stories in the history of basketball or baseball.

By the start of the 1993-94 season, 30-year-old Michael Jordan had played in the NBA for nine years and was well on his way to earning the status of legend. Jordan had been an All-Star in all but his first year, a three-time MVP and a seven-time NBA scoring champion, and he had just led his Chicago Bulls to an unprecedented third straight NBA title as well as leading the league in more categories than I can count. So it’s hard to overstate the shock he caused by first retiring from the NBA the day before the start of training camp and later announcing that he had signed a minor league contract with the Chicago White Sox. A possible equivalent might be if Barack Obama left the presidential race to pursue his dream of becoming a movie star.

Affected by the recent murder of his father, who had always dreamed of his son playing professional baseball, Jordan set out to prove that his talent transcended basketball, beginning the story of perhaps the most famous career minor league ballplayer of all time as he reported for training camp in March of 1994. (The Bulls and White Sox, then as now, were both owned by Jerry Reinsdorf, who continued to honor Jordan’s Bulls contract during his time in baseball.) After starting at right field for the White Sox in the Windy City Classic exhibition game against the Cubs (Jordan, batting sixth, went 2 for 5 with 2 RBIs), Jordan joined the Birmingham Barons of the AA Southern League.

Jordan (play) fights with a teammate.
http://siphotos.tumblr.com/post/20970727853/scottsdale-scorpions-outfielder-michael-jordan

Jordan’s presence focused the sports world’s attention on Birmingham as the Barons consistently played to sold-out crowds. Despite lacking any other notable players (probably the best-known Baron that year besides Jordan was manager Terry Francona, who would go on to manage at the major league level), the Barons were frequently featured on shows like “SportsCenter” and were the center of attention in Birmingham as well as other Southern League towns like Greenville and Huntsville, the latter the eventual champion of the division in which Birmingham finished last. The Barons may have been the most talked-about minor league team in history. Francona and his players, none of whom became particularly successful in the majors (with the sole exception of Steve Sax, who at 34 was winding down a lengthy and mildly impressive major league career), seem to have mostly been bemused by the whole spectacle. “We couldn't just go somewhere with him because it would be a mob scene,” shortstop Glenn DiSarcinia (who never made it higher than AAA Nashville) later recalled. "The whole place would just be staring at him, like he was a rare zoo animal."

Besides becoming involved in a real, live media circus, DiSarcinia and the rest of the Barons also had the opportunity to see a sporting legend brought down to the level of mere mortals. As it turned out, despite his powerful height and build and his tremendous athletic ability, Jordan was a fairly awful baseball player. In 436 at-bats for the Barons, Jordan hit a mere .202 with an OBP of .289 and a slugging percentage of .266. While committing 11 errors in the field and striking out 114 times, Jordan hit just three home runs. His impressive total of 30 stolen bases was more than balanced out by the 18 times he was caught stealing. All told he boasted the lowest OPS (on-base + slugging) of any player on the Barons with more than 15 at bats and in the league as a whole, Jordan's .556 mark did not even breach the top 100. Even on a team lacking all distinction Jordan stood out as a man lacking more distinction than all the rest, and people who showed up to watch him were always impressed by how unimpressive he was (props to Joseph Heller). “Michael Jordan has no more business patrolling right field in Comiskey Park than Minnie Minoso has bringing the ball upcourt for the Chicago Bulls,” concluded Sports Illustrated (albeit before the Barons’ season officially began).

Jordan’s year with the Barons wasn’t all bad. His teammates, who were initially shocked by how bad he was, noted his steady improvement over the course of the year and marveled at the work ethic and competitive drive that had fueled his rise to the top of the NBA. For the Barons, the most impressive part of Jordan’s time with the team was how well he integrated himself into the clubhouse. While the trappings of fame followed him wherever he went, Jordan seems to have genuinely wanted to become a big league ballplayer on his own merits and took great pains to avoid letting his celebrity affect his role on the team. Jordan befriended several of the players, showing particular interest in those from the Chicago area, and participated in team bonding activities including the occasional pick-up basketball game (one can only imagine how that must have gone).

“Even though he wasn’t a great baseball player, he was a great role model,” DiSarcinia concluded. "If he came out as an 18-year-old I didn't have any question that he would make the big leagues -- the work ethic, the hand-eye coordination. It was just a little too late for him."

Perhaps recognizing this, Jordan eventually concluded that continuing in the minors was the wrong move for him. After a stint with the Scottsdale Scorpions of the Arizona Fall League, where he batted .252, Jordan announced his return to the NBA on March 18, 1995 with a two-word press release: “I’m back.” He took the court the next day for the Bulls (wearing jersey number 45, his number with the Barons—the iconic number 23 had been retired in his absence), and the rest is history. (Of course, this being Jordan, said history includes two more retirements.) It should be noted that Jordan’s baseball career did form the background to the plot of Space Jam, so at least it wasn’t a total loss.

Michael Jordan is far from the only athlete to show interest in multiple sports. For example, in 1995 the Montreal Expos picked a high-school catcher from California, Tom Brady, in the 18^th round of the draft. However, Brady wisely chose to become a star quarterback instead, first with the Michigan Wolverines and later with the New England Patriots. There are athletes who have played multiple sports at the highest level, but most of these tend to be historical footnotes (much like the USFL or the California Golden Seals). Two exceptions stand out in baseball. Jackie Robinson’s stellar and historic baseball career has tended to overshadow his tremendous athletic achievements; at UCLA, he lettered in four sports (baseball, basketball, football and track), a feat unparalleled in UCLA history before or since. And Jim Thorpe, who played six seasons in the 1910s for the Giants, Reds and Braves, has become known as one of the greatest athletes in the history of American sports. In addition to baseball, he received two gold medals in track and field at the 1912 Olympics, enjoyed a long and successful career in collegiate and professional football and even briefly dabbled in basketball. However, rather than opening a chain of steakhouses and watching the money roll in from his Air Thorpe sneakers, Thorpe had his medals revoked (for playing baseball for money at a time when all Olympians were amateurs) and died in poverty. Sometimes life isn’t fair.