masterjedidarkcaster wrote:Pharzeone wrote:Not for nothing but a lot of well to do New Yorkers eventually find their way to South Beach. Nice weather year round and a better night life from my point of view. And a much better place to raise a family as well. The opportunity to cruise to the arena vs. fighting traffic could have played in it too. We shouldn't act like we never heard this before. Shaq (too much snow) and Jordan (too much traffic and family displacement) used the same excuse in 1996 but didn't get beat up by the media for it. If someone says family lifestyle plays a big part of it, I have to respect it.
Anyone have tape of this?
Tape of Shaq? He went on line radio on Hot 97 to address why come he wouldn't be bringing his talent to NY and cited snow as the excuse. I remember he got killed for like a week on the radio. MJ was close to agreeing with NY to play with Ewing but at came up with family and traffic excuse. The truth was that Phoenix fail to trade Barkley to NY. MJ, Ewing and Barkley all wanted to play together. I give Ewing credit because he didn't want to leave NY, he wanted to bring those guys to him. Both all 3 discuss their plan with each other and I don't recall anyone in NY complaining about collusion or tampering.
It remains one of the most delicious rarely told stories in the NBA, and an object lesson for those teams, the Bulls included, who have dreams of stealing away one or more of the great free agents of 2010.
It was the time Michael Jordan was a free agent and almost signed with the New York Knicks.
Well, perhaps not almost, and Jordan's agent, David Falk, still denies it ever was serious or under discussion. But it's part of NBA lore, and Knicks and Bulls insiders at the time remember it as what was portrayed then by Falk as a strong possibility.
In the end, Jordan signed a one-year $30 million contract with the Bulls, and then in 1997-98, a one-year $33 million deal for his final Bulls contract. But there were some at the time who believed Jordan, like LeBron James now, wanted the Madison Square Garden/New York City spotlight to conclude his glorious career. Though it's also a function of the players there at the time, and the Knicks of 1996-97 were a good team with Patrick Ewing, a healthy Allan Houston and Jordan's best buddy, Charles Oakley. With Jordan, they likely would have been champions. They seemed a lot better prepared to guarantee Jordan a title than they would now with James in two years.
