NBA: How Michael Jordan Killed Basketball

LeBron James creates a Twitter account and the whole world comes to a screeching halt. It won’t be long until @KingJames is using his new account for marketing purposes.

Heck, Twitter might as well put a multimillion dollar contract together and officially endorse James.

Odds are, it wouldn’t even put a dent in the sum of James’ annual intake from his various endorsements.

In what has become one of the most historic summer free agency periods of all time, money has been sharing the spotlight with success in the three-ring circus of free agents’ interests.

The game of basketball didn’t always revolve around max-contracts and million-dollar endorsements. In fact, once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away, there was an NBA filled with players who focused more on winning than earning.

So while some say money ruined basketball, and players aren’t focused enough on winning, but rather monetary success, I say it was Michael Jordan.

They say Michael Jordan was the best basketball player ever, and that’s probably true. But what never gets mentioned is how, in 1985, he killed the purity of basketball forever.

The Early Years

The Transition Years

The Decisive Years

The Present

The Summer of Self-Promotion