The Washington Wizards had hoped that Michael Jordan would come in with a champion mentality when he joined the team as a player and an executive in January of 2000. However, former Wizards owner Abe Pollin’s son Robert revealed that this was never the case.
According to Pollin, Jordan’s front office run with the Wizards was the complete opposite of his legendary playing career. In fact, Polling didn’t shy away from saying MJ was a terrible executive.
“You look at what he’s done in Charlotte,” Pollin said of Jordan in an episode of “Hang Up and Listen” in 2020. “I mean, he is not a good team president or owner. He doesn’t know how to build a champion that doesn’t include him. It’s just a fact.”
Pollin on why Jordan was bitter
Jordan was 38 years old when he made his final NBA return. He was confident about making things happen for the Wizards on the court, which was also what the front office held onto when he became a minority owner and was appointed as President of Basketball Operations.
Unfortunately for the Wizards, Jordan failed to meet their expectations not only as a player but also as an executive. Despite MJ’s underwhelming performance in both fields, Pollin said the six-time champion was still expecting to retain his job in the team’s front office after he retired as a player.
However, Pollin revealed that his father never gave Jordan that impression. This conflict marked the beginning of the end of Jordan’s tenure as an executive. At the same time, it was also the reason why MJ had ill will toward the Wizards.
“Michael felt like he had been promised something,” Pollin further disclosed. “And my father said you never were promised your job back. In fact, it would have been against the league rules to have done that. So, yeah Michael Jordan getting fired is not something that Michael Jordan was used to. So naturally, he was very bitter.”
Jordan’s side of the story
As far as being a player goes, Jordan didn’t really live up to the expectations of the Wizards front office and the fans. Under his leadership, the Wizards didn’t make the playoffs in two consecutive seasons and they haven’t done a great job in acquiring key players throughout that stretch.
However, failing to make the Wizards a playoff team wasn’t the only reason Jordan got fired. Reports stated that “player dissension, a franchise faltering after the years of Jordan in charge, and deteriorating relationships throughout the organization” ultimately prompted the Wizards front office to finally pull the plug on MJ.
From Jordan’s point of view, that wasn’t how things played out. For MJ, he went out of his way just to help the franchise only to be let go when they figured they didn’t need him anymore.
“I didn’t have to do it, you know, but I did it with the benefit of trying to help an organization get back on its feet,” Jordan once opened up. “And the gratitude that I was being given was, ‘Your services are no longer wanted or needed.’ So I felt like I was used, in a sense.”
Today, fans are still divided about Jordan’s stint with the Wizards. Some believed it wasn’t a failure as MJ brought excitement and life to a losing franchise at the time. Others, meanwhile, argued that Jordan was a shell of himself as a player and also didn’t do well as an executive.