SI’s vault: Jordan’s spring training follies

March 25th, 2008 | Posted by PostmanR

All things told: Sports Illustrated’s Vault is freaking awesome. In a Web market so obsessed with throwing extra content and archives behind a paid wall, SI has given the masses their archives for free. Embrace the free flow of information, baby. Besides the gem FanIQ dug up on football in the year 2000 — there will be women quarterbacks! — there’s a ton of real cool stuff. It’s always pleasantly amusing reading features from yesterday.

Today, the Vault highlights Michael Jordan’s spring training run with the White Sox back in March of ‘94.  Turns out, no one in MLB wanted him around.

While the White Sox try to rationalize Jordan’s audition, baseball’s other uniformed personnel are almost irrational about it. “He had better tie his Air Jordans  real tight if I pitch to him,” said Seattle Mariner  fireballer Randy Johnson. “I’d like to see how much air time he’d get on one of my inside pitches.”

“Be like Mike?” scoffed one Houston Astro. “Hell, Mike right now only wishes he could be like Frank.”

Said Pittsburgh Pirate centerfielder Andy Van Slyke, “I can just sec the American League catchers now. ‘Sorry about that third strike, Michael. Can I have your autograph?’ ”

As George Brett , a baseball executive with the Kansas City Royals , says, “I know a lot of players don’t want to see him make it, because it will be a slap in the face to them.”

[ … ]

The huffing and puffing over Jordan’s supposed sacrilege is so intense you almost want to root for the guy, just to prove all these baseball snobs wrong. But they are right about one thing: He will never, ever hit. “It’s called bat speed,” says one American League  scout, “and he ain’t got it.”

He ain’t got experience, either. Next to his name and vital statistics on the official list of 1994 White Sox , where his ‘93 batting stats should be, it reads DID NOT PLAY. It should read HASN’T PLAYED IN 15 YEARS! Says one American League Central manager, “What’d he hit in high school, .280? Pathetic. I’ve got players in my clubhouse who are only now starting to hit after living and breathing baseball for 15 years, and this guy thinks he can become a hitter in a couple of months. It’s a disgrace to the game. All I know is that I wouldn’t want to be [ White Sox manager] Gene Lamont, having to tell a Mike Huff or a Warren Newson that they didn’t make the team because Michael bleeping Jordan did.”

These reactions are certainly understandable;  this is akin to working at a company for 10 years and then hiring the new guy out of college for the promotion. But think of this: what if Jordan had made it? What if Mike proved the detractors wrong and actually made it to the Bigs? What if he actually had talent?  Would he have been loved by fans, (yes) but  hated by opposing players who wouldn’t flinch at throwing at him every chance they got? (Yes.) Can you imagine seeing footage of Michael Jordan entangled in a brawl with Randy Johnson? That would have been fantastic.

SI’s Vault, it surely makes the imagination wonder.