For sports fans, there’s nothing that could truly replace the suspense of competition, excitement in seeing your favorite team win, or amazement of watching athletic feats most of us could only dream of doing. Sadly, fans have had to find other outlets since all leagues suspended their activities among the pandemic.
Thankfully, some relief is coming for basketball fans as ESPN announced they’re moving up the premiere date of their highly anticipated series, The Last Dance. The 10-part documentary follows Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls during the 1997-98 season, the last time Jordan won an NBA championship. It was originally set to air in June, after the NBA Finals, but has been moved up to April 19.
Widely regarded as the greatest player of all time, Michael Jordan’s popularity persists to this day, and for many basketball fans, the league hasn’t been the same since he left. To younger fans, this will be an opportunity to watch one of the greats before their time and to older fans, this should be a nice trip down memory lane and a chance to be in awe all over again.
The series has essentially been in development since 1997 when Bulls owner, Jerry Reinsdorf, and head coach, Phil Jackson, decided to let a film crew follow the team. With exclusive interviews from various players and staff, this promises to provide a look at the team that’s more in-depth than anything before, giving fans a new experience in a way re-watching highlights just can’t.
Sports fans don’t want their favorite athletes to wake up and instantly be great. They love hearing stories of the 4 am workouts and wanting to show up everyone who doubted you. The amount of work and dedication put into their craft is what makes them inspirational to everyone, and this series can provide a deeper look into the struggles the team faced on their way to glory, adding to Jordan’s legacy.
There’s also a mix of emotions knowing that season marks the end of an era for the league. After the title run, the NBA had a lockout that led to Jordan’s second retirement, while other franchise cornerstones for the Bulls also left soon after. Re-watching with hindsight will probably be like watching the finale for one of your favorite shows; you’re sad it’s ending but happy with how it turned out. Anything involving Michael Jordan is bound to be a huge nostalgia trip, but this will offer more insights about the man as he closes out a significant era of his career and basketball as a whole.
The Last Dance will have the daunting task of building up to both parts of this bittersweet ending. The '90s continues to be the decade of basketball every season and team after gets compared to. To this day, fans continue to argue which current stars would’ve had the same success in that era. With a never-before-seen look at the league at the time, many will surely look for more answers as to how it ended. Insight into the league they normally wouldn’t get could be what fans need to hold them over until regular play picks back up.
The move is also smart for ESPN as they’re low on content at the moment. When your job is sports coverage, all sports ending is a worst-case scenario. The network has been filling much of their airtime replaying old games, so they know how important reliving the experience can be to a lot of people.
Fans expect great things from the series especially considering the success of ESPN’s 30 for 30 documentaries. The film series has earned much acclaim and profiled many subjects from the wide world of sports, including the Bad Boy Detroit Pistons that offered tough NBA competition from the late '80s to the early '90s. Not much can fill the sports shaped void in many people’s lives, but ESPN recognized this series is needed now more than ever.