The Once and Future King

US team had to qualify for the Olympics. Portland was the capital of the basketball world in the summer of their beloved Blazers took the Jordan's Bulls to six games. The NBA Draft that produced Shaquille O'Neal and Christian Latner, the two college stars who were the only players considered to join the Dream Team from college, was held there ten days after the finals ended, and then the Dream Team arrived for their first official public demonstration of well

worldwide dominance. I would venture to say that all of us who were around for the weeks of action in Portland had a great time in that great city. It was an excellent series. It included the famous Jordan's shrug game in Chicago, when he hit six first half three pointers, the majority of them on Clyde Drexler, and at one point just shrugged the Magic Johnson, who was courtside on the broadcast team, as if to say, hell, I can't

explain it either. The draft was pretty interesting too. After the Minnesota Timberwolves selected late number three, there was a chorus of booze, which prompted Laterner's mother, Bonnie, a sometimes outspoken woman who like so many moms, loved her son and wanted to protect him, blurted out to the press, huh that was the fifty family and friends Shakiel took with him to Portland. Christian wasn't happy with her. Hey,

we've all been there at one time or another. All other things about Portland's It had one of the great all time bookstores, Pals and the peaceful Willamet River, and one of the all time great bars, the veritable Quandre hang out for the media who had covered the NBA Finals and hung around to cover the Dream Team. You went into the VQ, you ordered a craft beer, and the bartenders would put on anything you asked. For one night, it was Stevie Ray Vaughan. One of the overlooked blues immortals.

Stevie Ray has gone now a helicopter crash in Wisconsin in n hours after he and his band had opened a show for Eric Clapton and a loss. So is the veritable quandary, a victim of market forces. Nihil st at tarranum, nothing last forever. I'm not sure what a Latin accent should sound like, but that was probably not

a good one. So why were we in Portland? Well, as I said earlier, the Americans had to qualify since they had finished third in and the qualifier been scheduled for March in Brazil, in other words, at a time when the NBA season was still going on. So the NBA and USA Basketball arm twisted FIBA into a schedule change and bought the broadcast rights for somewhere around four million dollars from a Brazilian who owned them and re

christened the thing the Tournament of the Americas. Now. The money for the broadcast was put up by the United States Olympic Committee, which had a surplus from the Olympics in Los Angeles, which was quite possibly the last games that made economic sense for a host country. The U

s O c resented it. They were not accustomed to putting up money for millionaire professional athletes, and that resentment would prove to be a subplot in Portland's that would continue through Barcelona because initially, all I say that, you know, I don't want to be a part of this whole business. You know, I played a game for the game, for the batch you had that was totally against profession basketball to was playing because I knew the business despect there

was coming around. Yeah, and it is hard to get the true deliberic experience and you're sitting there were about everybody's making money and you gotta you know, you gotta please this guy, you know, please his company. Yet it

may not be the same line to what a contract. Okay, irony alert here Jordan, who at that time was earning about thirty five million dollars in endorsements and is still, by the way, earning about a hundred and forty five million dollars even though he hasn't played since two thousand and three, talking about the unpleasantness of mixing business and basketball.

But Jordan's and most of the other Dream teamers felt for the first time in Portland's how many fingers were reaching into the pie, and Jordan's didn't really need the Olympics for exposure the way other players might have. It's not like his profile wasn't amplified by the Dream Team experience,

but it wasn't a major consideration. Here's David Falk, Jordan's Asian at the time, and the and largely responsible for creating the Jordan's marketing monster back in you know, gave him a broader stage and probably set the tone maybe for moving into other markets, you know, brand Jordan's later on down the road. But he didn't do it for marketing reasons. I think they've even enter to the egration. I knew that it would have a you know, positive impact,

but not a not a major impact. For months, there had been pitched, behind the scenes battles among sponsors and retailers trying to make official deals with the NBA to make money off these guys. And these weren't exactly junior varsity companies. They were companies like A T and T, Coca Cola, McDonald's, and Visa. The stakes were enormously high. The real battles took place over whose likeness could be

put on what product. Remember that all these guys, but Jordan's, Magic, Barkley and Bird in particular, had all kinds of endorsement deals and contracts themselves. What would they be violating by wearing or endorsed s a uso C sanctioned product that was in competition with one of their personal sponsors? To wit, what Jordan's Mr Nike tacitly endorsed reebak Ah. Jordan and his agent David Falk thought they had a deal worked

out that would take care of it. But the deal, in the immortal words of William Goldman, the great Hollywood screenwriter, was apparently set, just not set set. We'll see how that plays out. In Barcelona, the players were astounded at what their responsibilities were, particularly in the area of signing basketballs.

A couple of them told me they signed literally thousands of balls because each deal seemed to come accompanied by signing basketballs, which always struck me as crazy because if you've seen a pro athletes sign at least most of them, you can't make out their signature from ancient sanskript. Here is Steve Mills on how bad the situation actually was. At that time. He was working for the league and was in charge of special events for the Dream Team and was a close confident of many of the players.

The biggest that actually remember that I think almost blew up the team was the issue was sort of the literal actual with the usc UM and was the first time when there's same there as a woman I believe who who was an act was an actuate but at a different sport. It was one of the U s C at the time, and came in and talked to the players their marketing obligations and the things they couldn't do and the thing they could do. And here's Barkley on the same subject. Was they got angry at h Hey,

we came here, We're not getting any money. And you know, Clil Michael is the man at that point as far as endorth a Golden night, and we have a meeting and a couple of representative like coming him like, hey, don't be an asshole, like you know how Michael, excuse me. See, the Dream teamers were supposed to get some kind of share of all the revenue pie and a playing salary, something that added up to around seventy five dollars to the best of anyone's memory. In other words, pocket change,

but hey, pocket change his pocket change. I tore my car apart the other day looking for seventy eight cents. But in step the ultimate diplomat, Dave Gabbett, who himself had been armed twisted to get the players to give up that money for the good of the country and the coffers of USA basketball. Here's Larry Bird. Dave came to me with the idea and get out of here, you're crazy. Just more Bertie, and went through the whole fame, and he talked to Magic. Of course Magic Sill's Larry

doing it. And he went to Michael, Michael, I'm in, and he went the other guys, and Day came to me today, we're okay, enough enough, let's it away from business and talk about what else was going on in Portland. A great introductory party by Nike for one thing. I brought along my wife and two sons who were fifteen and twelve, a great fan age, and introduced them around to the point that I wasn't being an ass and

as usual, got the best response from Charles Barkley. You seem like nice boys, Barkley said, putting his arm around him. So with a father like you have, I would run away right now. One of the subplots was how nice this was for Clyde Drexler, who was among the last two Dream teamers picked and was only a couple of weeks removed from getting tortured by Jordan in the finals.

No matter how much he hated it, and he hated it, Clyde could never quite get passed being the poor man's Michael Jordan's and his team could never quite get past being talented but not a closer. It had started in the ninets against the Pistons and was solidified by the six game lost to the Bulls in ninety two, and direct Or took endless amounts of crap from his fellow Dream teamers. Here's Bird, I feel sorry for him some days in the basket sort of telling played on the

Dumas team. Still, the team was tight. Relationships were starting to build, the most unlikely being a friendship between Bird and Patrick Ewing. They were together so much that the team started calling Ewing Harry so they could brand them Harry and Larry. In every single interview I did for the Dream Team. Somebody brought this up. The players got

such a kick out of it. It was in Portland, also that the real Alpha Dog started a late night ritual of a card game called Tunk, which Barkley described as an old Negro game from the South. The main players were Barkley, Jordan's Magic, and Pipping. So if there's any Tonk fans out there, just think how great it would have been to get in that game. Then again, you would have needed to bring money, lots of money.

In the dream Team second game, in the Tournament of the America's Stockton and Michael Jordan collided on a defensive sequence, and though not many people saw it, Stockton came away with an undisplaced fracture of the right fibula. Most everybody else thought, well, so what, Stockton's great, but the Dream Team hardly needs him. But Chuck Daily, the Prince of Pessimism, who was already imagining if he would have to appear before Congress the Dream Team lost a game, was worried

about the point guard position. Chuck honestly wasn't sure that Magic could handle the load alone, particularly defensively ridiculous in retrospective course, But and more, much more than was made public, Chuck really thought that Stockton should be replaced. Just got the actually down to eating us. He brought baplace. Daily was even a little pissed at Stockton because he clung to his spot. So Chuck convened a meeting. Okay, at

dinner meeting at a great Italian restaurant in Portland. Matt Dobek, his trusted public relations man, was there, and so was assistant p J. Car Lessimo, who was in charge of restaurants. P J was still is one of basketball's great restaurant guys. You gotta have guys that know every great restaurant, No, every owner and major d at every great restaurant. Anyway, the subject of the meeting was should we replace Stockton? And if we decide we should, who are you going

to call? Here's the late Matt Dobek can make it work. We're going to call Joe. How in case you didn't get it, that Joe was Joe Dumars. So there it was the specter of Isaiah Thomas all over again. Daily could not get out from under it. And the best guest from Matt, and he told me this before he died, was that Chuck would have given the call to Joe Dumars, not Isaiah Thomas Jordan for one was watching these developments with interest and some degree of ankst. When doctor now,

I'm already committed ship. You know, I checked into the saying anything to you know, idea, you're gonna keep it the way it wants to take. But he came to do so, he had to leave it. He had to keep stocking on the team even when it broke legs to the place. Eventually, Chuck decided to let it go, take the time until Barcelona for Stockton to get better, And I was glad. I love Dumars as a player, as a person too, but I'm glad it didn't happen.

That would have just been too cruel. Isaiah passed over not once, but twice, and for a teammate who really wasn't even a point guard. And for Chuck it was actually better from a playing time standpoint. Since Bird's back was hurting so bad and there were always other assorted injuries, not having stocked and available at all made it easier on daily to slide players in and out. One more thing about Isaiah, we never got along all that great. He was one of the few people who turned down

an interview requests for the Dream Team book. He told me not long ago at a Hall of Fame gathering that he thought I had never treated him or the Pistons fairly in print, but then he shook my hand. I respected him for that, and I respected the way he handled the Dream Team snub. One of the things he did around the time of the selection process was called John Stockton's father. Here is Stockton talking about it. I think I should have been and I was the

clear artt I guess you know what people thought. He knit And in case you didn't get it, at the end, there John said, and he called my dad. That means Isaiah Thomas called up John Stockton's father. And when Stockton was inducted into the Hall of Fame, incidentally, the player he chose to walk up with him to the stage was one Isaiah Thomas. Okay, is there anything else I've forgotten about Portland'? Oh? Yes. There were actually other teams there,

and there were basketball games. For the record, these were the other competitors, in order of how they finished behind the US were Venezuela, Brazil, Puerto Rico, Canada, Argentina, Mexico, Panama, Cuba, and Uruguay. It was a gas interacting with the players on the other teams from the beginning. They just seemed to get it. They just understood that they were fodder for the Dream Team stand ins, second bananas, and they

were fine with it. They embraced it. They understood that when the US played, it was less like a traditional athletic competition and more like free form theater with a set ending. You were going to get your ass kicked, but let's do some improv along the way that we know why we're here. Attitude was best exemplified by Oscar Schmidt of Brazil. You have to understand this, Oscar was

a legit player. He was the best player in the tournament not on the Dream Team, and at one point in his career several years earlier, many scouts believe that he was a legit NBA prospect. And here was Oscar talking before the game, and well, let's called his goals for the Tournament of the Americas. For Larry Party is my idold Michael Jordan, Jason Solder, I would like to have all their age. What a rallying cry. Let's go get their autographs. But look, we got it, we got

it back then. You weren't going to beat the Dream Team, So go with the flow, enjoy the experience. I know I did. The one moment that I remember more than all others in that summer was the first time the Dream Team ran out together before the first game. It was hard to explain then, it's kind of hard to explain now, but everybody I talked to says the same thing. Dick Ever Saw, the president of NBC Sports back then, was sitting in the stay ends with David Stern, and

he told me years later that he had chills. I remember looking in the stands and locating my sons and thinking, well, whatever they will later hold against me, and let's not go there. At least I got them to this. We were all curious who would come out first, who would carry the flag, who would be in that first starting lineup, And don't think the players didn't think about it. Also, here's Larry Bird, Scotty's will start. You know, it didn't

matter Mary started that first game. Yeah, that matter doesn't matter. And as probably the Vegas line would have had it, Magic came out first carrying the flag. Bird was second in line, and when they hit the floor, the Cuban team stopped practicing and lined up to stare and take photos. As with Oscar Schmidt, their goal was not so much to play the game, but to say that they were there. And so the next step for the Dream Team was

a trip to Monte Carlo before the Olympics. Hey, that's where everyone goes to get in some grunt work, right Monte Carlo. See you next time, when I'll give you the deets behind the Immortal inter Squad Scrimmage, the greatest game nobody ever saw. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed The Dream Team Tapes, please follow, rate, and review wherever you get your podcasts. The Dream Team Tapes is written

and hosted by Jack McCallum. Executive producers Mark Francis and Scott Waxman, Executive producer for I Heart Media, is shown to turn. The Dream Team Tapes is a Diversion Podcasts original series in association with I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen into your favorite shows.