The bronze statue in front of Chicago's United Center came to life Friday night. Before his name was announced, before his signature was lasered onto the floor, the Bulls' new shooting guard, No. 45, Michael Jordan, was greeted by a roar of joy that filled every inch of the new arena and lasted a coincidental 45 seconds. Even the members of the Orlando Magic, the best team in the N.B.A., looked awestruck as Jordan took the floor in Chicago for the first time in almost two years. A crowd of 24,247 and a media contingent of 450 were on hand to witness the historic game, and some seats went for as much as $2,000. Everyone was eager to see how the 32-year-old legend would play against the likes of Penny Hardaway and Shaquille O'Neal. Was Jordan the same player whose statue reads, "The best there ever was"?
Some 10 hours later and 200 miles south of Chicago, at least 300 journalists tried to stay warm under a crescent moon as they waited outside the Indiana Youth Center in Plainfield. They came from as far away as Brazil and Germany to watch prisoner No. 922335 emerge after three years of incarceration for rape. The prisoner was Mike Tyson, once the No. 1 heavyweight in the world and a fighter some thought could be the best there ever was. Although everyone there knew he would get out at around 6 a.m., they were eager for a sign that Tyson either was back in the fold of promoter Don King or had embraced Islam through the teaching of a local junior-high school teacher named Muhammad Siddeeq. To borrow two Oscar-nominated titles, it was the Lyin' King vs. the Plainfield Redemption. To a man, the journalists decided that if Tyson's limousine turned left out of the prison, he was headed for the mosque in Plainfield. If it turned right, he was on his way to the airport, a Lear jet and King's clutches.
These two coming-out parties had more in common than just time and place and the first names of the celebrants. Jordan and Tyson carry with them a charisma that can't be explained simply by their abilities. Ruth, Tilden, Palmer, Jim Brown, Ali: those would be their tablemates.
The two champs are very different, of course. Jordan belongs on a pedestal, and Tyson belonged behind bars. But they're not as simple as good guy and bad guy. We tend to overlook Jordan's foibles, e.g. his gambling habits, just as we forget that Tyson was once capable of compassion and erudition. There is little doubt that basketball and boxing can use them, but as a society we may need them even more, as hero and antihero, Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader, Air and Iron.
In Chicago, Jordan's return has been positively biblical. He has been mentioned in the same breath as Moses (leading the Bulls out of the wilderness), Jesus (second coming) and the prodigal son. In the days before he announced, "I'm back," mothers and fathers would bring their infants to the Berto Center in suburban Deerfield, Illinois, where the Bulls practice, just to see Jordan's red Corvette. And it wasn't just Chicago that was devoted to Michael. When the news of the return of Qiao Dan (pronounced tshoo dun) was announced over loudspeakers at an army basketball game in Beijing on March 19, players and fans alike cheered wildly.