The Last Dance, a Lost Opportunity

The Last Dance was a mammoth undertaking. Spanning ten hours, the only docuseries in ESPN's fold that rivals The Last Dance's runtime is OJ: Made in America, which provides a searing and kaleidoscopic view of the United States through the life of O. J. Simpson. The Last Dance falls well short of that masterpiece. Compared to other ESPN basketball documentaries, such as Winning Time and Once Brothers, this docuseries still underwhelms. Winning Time centers basketball as a celebratory foreground exploring the emotional intensity of competition. Meanwhile, Once Brothers has basketball as a heartbreaking background to the Yugoslav Wars that created misery and regret. The Last Dance subjugates basketball—and critical analysis—to ten hours of Michael Jordan mythology that celebrates his winning and excuses his abusive leadership style.

There are moments in the series when the viewer gains useful insight, and the lionization is momentarily stripped away. This is particularly true in the exploration of "Mike" Jordan, a kid from Wilmington, North Carolina, who attended the University of North Carolina. However, these moments are respites, and the series has problem after problem when dealing with the historical forces at play in Jordan's life and career. In the interest of space, this review focuses on three subject areas that The Last Dance woefully shortchanges: first, the internationalization of the National Basketball Association (NBA); second, the NBA's changing economic and labor landscape; third, the political power of an athlete. Keep in mind that there are certainly other themes worthy of exploration and that no one should expect any documentary to cover all possible subjects. However, this series fails to satisfactorily explore any subject, even Jordan's nearly pathological desire to win.

In addressing basketball's increasing global popularity, Jordan and the 1992 Dream Team are falsely presented as pioneers of a globalized NBA. It is true that the Dream Team certainly increased the NBA's popularity globally. It blazed through the 1992 Summer Olympics, as opponents sought their autographs after games. Jordan and his compatriots reasserted American basketball supremacy at a time when the United States was positioned as the unchallenged global hegemon in the wake of the Soviet Union's demise and the success of the Gulf War. Of course, The Last Dance does not dip its toes into these diplomatic waters.

Instead of digging into this symbolism, the documentary delves into Jordan's initially petulant attitude toward Toni Kukoć. Along with Scottie Pippen, Jordan was determined to embarrass the Croatian star. Why? Because Chicago Bulls general manager Jerry Krause had attempted to sign Kukoć to a contract with the Bulls since 1990. This peeved Jordan and Pippen in 1992. Indeed, it distracted filmmakers in 2020 from exploring a vexing truth for the Jordan–Dream Team narrative. The NBA's defending champions were in hot pursuit of an international star before the Dream Team even existed—let alone influenced the world. Indeed, before the Bulls had even won their first NBA championship in 1991, the team had already acquired Kukoć's NBA playing rights in the 1990 draft. The globalizing NBA had hooks even further back in Jordan's career, independent of the Dream Team. Without global networks, the Bulls would not have acquired Pippen in 1987. The Seattle SuperSonics traded Pippen to Chicago in exchange for Olden Polynice, the first Haitian-born player in the NBA. The international feel continued when Canadian-born Bill Wennington and Australian-born Luc Longley both played center for the Bulls. Wennington's NBA career began in 1985. Before joining the Chicago Bulls in 1993, Wennington had also spent two years playing pro ball in Italy. As a participant in the documentary, and a thoughtful man generally, Wennington's opinion on international basketball would have been astute. Meanwhile, Longley was a first-round draft choice of the Minnesota Timberwolves in 1991 before joining Chicago via trade in the 1994 season. Clearly, basketball was already global to a significant extent.

Again, this is not to deny that the Dream Team and Jordan played a critical role in enhancing and creating new connections, but there was a global basketball network working...