Grant paints different picture of Jordan in doc
Former teammate says NBA superstar told lies about him in The Last Dance
Michael Jordan had the last word in The Last Dance. Now Horace Grant is having his say — and then some.
In lengthy comments Tuesday on ESPN Radio in Chicago, Grant painted a very unflattering portrait of his former Bulls teammate. Grant called Jordan a liar for accusing the ex-power forward of being the source for a 1993 tellall book, The Jordan Rules, and claimed that if anyone deserved the “damn snitch” label, it was Jordan himself.
Asked if he enjoyed watching The Last Dance, Grant said he would describe it as “entertaining,” and added he and other Chicago players during the Jordan era knew that “about 90 per cent” of the highly popular series was “B.S. in terms of the realness of it.”
That assessment was largely based on Grant’s claim that for as much as Jordan would bark at teammates who he felt weren’t playing or practising to his standards, many of those Bulls players “went back at him.”
“But all of that was kind of edited out of the documentary, if you want to call it a documentary,” said Grant, who was drafted by the Bulls in 1987 and stayed with the team through its first three championships and a 1993-94 season during which Jordan was playing baseball while retired from the NBA.
Grant joined the Orlando Magic as a free agent in 1994, helping Orlando reach the NBA Finals, and also played for the Los Angeles Lakers — winning a fourth title in 2001 — and the Seattle Supersonics in a 17-year career.
The publication of The Jordan Rules, which tarnished a mostly squeaky-clean image for the NBA’S most marketable player, as well as increased scrutiny of his gambling habits were depicted in The Last Dance as having significant roles in Jordan’s stunning 1993 decision to retire.
“I didn’t contribute to that. That was Horace,” Jordan said in the docuseries, referring to the best-selling book written by former Chicago Tribune reporter Sam Smith. “He was telling everything that was happening within the group.”
Grant was shown in The Last Dance denying Jordan’s accusation, but on Tuesday he had a platform on which to offer a much sharper defence.
“Lie, lie, lie,” Grant said on the radio station. “If MJ had a grudge with me, let’s settle this like men. Let’s talk about it. Or we can settle it another way.
“But yet and still, he goes out and puts this lie out that I was the source behind (the book). Sam and I have always been great friends. We’re still great friends. But the sanctity of that locker-room, I would never put anything personal out there.”
Grant went on to note that if there was one thing the ESPN series “proved,” it was that Jordan had a tendency to hold “a grudge.”
Grant added that if anyone said something at all negative about Jordan, the five-time NBA most valuable player would “cut you off ” and “try to destroy your character.”
Grant brought up a scene from the first episode of The Last Dance, when Jordan recalled walking into a hotel room as a rookie and seeing Chicago teammates engaging in substance abuse.
“Practically the whole team was in there,” Jordan said, explaining why he was “more or less on my own” in his early Bulls days. “It was things I’ve never seen in my life as a young kid. You’ve got your lines over here, your weed smokers over here, your women over here.”
Grant said Tuesday, “My point is that (Jordan) said that I was the snitch, but yet and still after 35 years he brings up his rookie year going into one of his teammate’s rooms and seeing coke, and weed and women. My point is: Why the hell did he want to bring that up? What’s that got to do with anything? I mean, if you want to call somebody a snitch, that’s a damn snitch right there.”
Of the treatment he received from Jordan while they were on the Bulls, Grant declared, “He felt that he could dominate me, but that was sadly mistaken.”
He added it was “heartbreaking” to watch footage in the series of Jordan picking on other teammates, in particular Scott Burrell.
Asked on ESPN Radio about an anecdote Smith, The Jordan Rules author, recently told of hearing that Jordan once ordered a flight attendant not to serve Grant a meal “because Horace had a bad game,” Grant agreed it happened but said the full story also illustrated how he stood up to the superstar’s bullying ways.
“Anybody who knows me, as a rookie, if anybody comes up and tries to snatch my food away, I’m going to do my best to beat their a--,” Grant said. “And believe me, back then, I could have took MJ in a heartbeat.
“Yes, it’s true that he told the flight attendant, ‘Don’t give him anything because he played like crap.’ And I went right back at him. I said some choice words that I won’t repeat on here. But I said some choice words and stood up: ‘If you want it, you come and get it.’ And of course, (Jordan) didn’t move. He was just barking.
“But anybody who knows me, where I come from and what I stand for,” Grant continued, “come on, man — there’s nobody on this Earth would ever come and try to take food off my plate and not get their rear ends beaten.”
The Washington Post