One of Michael Jordan's Olympic teammates says Bob Knight made him cry
The popular image of Michael Jordan is one of a ruthless competitor with a near-pathological need to win. As such, the emotions Jordan brings to mind mostly have to do with his on-court intensity — passion, anger, and desire. He is not a person many would expect to react poorly to a challenge. If anything, it would likely focus his energies even more.
So it’s more than a little surprise to hear one of his first Olympic teammates say that Bob Knight, NCAA legend and coach of the gold-medalist Team USA at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, is responsible for perhaps the first Crying Jordan on record. According to fellow North Carolina and national team member Sam Perkins, Knight did not react well to a tough win over Detlef Schrempf and West Germany in the quarterfinals.
Here’s what Perkins had to say in an interview on Sirius XM’s NBA Radio on Monday (via PBT):
“Bobby Knight, he got after us. One story real quick. He told Michael that’s the worst he ever played. Now, Michael’s going to deny this but he cried, he cried after the game because of the fact that Bobby Knight told him, ‘You should apologize to everybody in here.’ … Leon Wood was his boy at the time so Leon Wood went over there to pat him on his back and say, ‘It’ll be alright, it’ll be alright.’
But the thing about it, Bobby Knight was just trying to instill some, you know, even though we didn’t play that bad, it’s the fact that he just wanted us to wake up for the next game because anything could happen. But that’s the way Bobby Knight coached.”
As Tim Legler notes in the interview, Jordan committed six of the Americans’ 14 turnovers in the game to help keep the Germans close. MJ did put up 14 points to help offset his errors, but it certainly wasn’t his most efficient night.
Naturally, Jordan committed just one turnover in each of Team USA’s next two games. His 20 points in the gold-medal game against Spain led all scorers, and there was no real doubt that he was the best player in the tournament. If Jordan did cry, he certainly didn’t let that disappointment hurt his play or the illustrious NBA career that started a few months later.
For what it’s worth, Knight has always been extremely complimentary of Jordan since that summer. In fact, he told a very different story of a time he chewed out his star player during an interview with David Letterman in 1993. Jump to the 3:45 mark of this not-embeddable clip to see it
Knight greatly exaggerates Jordan’s stats in that matchup with Spain — he finished the game with only two assists and one rebound, not a near-triple-double at halftime — but his point still lands. Even when he tried to criticize Jordan’s play, Knight only had so much to go on. If he cried after the Germany game, maybe it’s because he was most mad at himself.
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Eric Freeman is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
