Product Description

As one of the greatest, most celebrated athletes in history, Michael Jordan conquered professional basketball as no one had before. Powered by a potent mix of charisma, nearly superhuman abilities, and a ferocious need to dominate the game, he won six NBA championships with the Chicago Bulls and captured every basketball award and accolade conceivable before retiring and taking a top executive post with the Washington Wizards. But retirement didn't suit the man who was once king, and at the advanced age of thirty-eight Michael Jordan set out to reclaim the court that had been his dominion. When Nothing Else Matters is the definitive account of Jordan's equally spectacular and disastrous return to basketball. Washington Post writer Michael Leahy reveals the striking contrast between the public Jordan and the man whose personal style alienated teammates and the Washington owner who ousted him.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #205926 in Books
• Published on: 2005-11-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

From Publishers Weekly
After serving as president and part owner of the Washington Wizards for two years, Jordan, bored by his executive duties and frustrated by the team's poor play, returned to the court in 2001 in a bid to revitalize the struggling basketball franchise. But the aging superstar's attempt to resurrect the team flopped as the Wizards failed to make the playoffs in either of Jordan's two playing seasons. While the highs and lows of Jordan's comeback are known to most basketball fans, Leahy, a Washington Post feature writer who covered Jordan's return, offers an in-depth look at the inner turmoil that plagued the Jordan-led Wizards. In a smartly written, often angry work that is as much a sports story as a psychology study and condemnation of the media that built up the Jordan myth, Leahy not only documents Jordan's performance on the floor, but examines what motivated him to play despite serious knee problems. Leahy also deals with the role sportswriters (he makes it clear he isn't one) play in building America's athletes into godlike characters, a practice he abhors. Leahy has no use for idol worship and casts all three of the book's main figures—Jordan, coach Doug Collins and majority owner Abe Pollin—in unfavorable lights. This engaging read is marred by one flaw: Leahy's tendency to insert himself into the story.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Michael Jordan may have been the greatest basketball player ever to lace 'em up, but he has not always been a likable man. At 38, three years retired from his championship run in Chicago, Jordan was serving as president of the Washington Wizards when he decided to join the team as a player. Washington Post staffer Leahy observed it all, from the triumphs--now and then MJ did seem to be an ageless wonder--to the very ugly moments of humiliated coaches and teammates who did not measure up to Jordan's personal standard of excellence and acquiescence. This is not a pretty portrayal of Jordan, but it is consistent with the assessment of his strengths and weaknesses offered by Sam Smith in The Jordan Rules (1991). If anything, this account is tinged with melancholy in its portrayal of the alpha male finally being exiled from the herd. This is an intelligent, persuasively written account of an athlete who remains one of our most recognizable celebrities. Expect the phone lines to be buzzing on the sports talk shows. Wes Lukowsky
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
"The best sports book of the year...easily the most fully formed portrait of Jordan ever written."

-- GQ

"Riveting, myth-shattering."

-- Dan McGrath, Chicago Tribune

"Michael Leahy has written a heck of a book....Mr. Leahy combines an unrelenting eye for detail with extraordinary big-picture analysis."

-- Jon Ward, The Washington Times

"A gripping behind-the-scenes book...an important corrective to our current celebrity culture."

-- John Marshall, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"When Nothing Else Matters gives us the best look we are likely to have of Jordan in decline...The result is a richly detailed, anecdote-driven account of one of the most famous men in the world approaching the end of his rope."

-- Ron Rapoport, Chicago Sun-Times

Customer Reviews

When Nothing Else Matters: The REAL Michael Jordon
I wanted to tell everyone how much this book rocked. This is so revealing about what Michael Jordon thought, did, and wished he could of done, over the 2 seasons that he came back into the NBA. This is a quick read, and it tells an amazing story. This is a 100x what you get from any other sports book, and especially from anything you could ever see on NBC. Michael Leahy is an amazing writer who has a nack for getting the stuff that people really want to read. You want to know the real Michael Jordon? Then read "When Nothing Else Matters", by the acclaimed Wasington Post writer, Michael Leahy.

Well written but too negative for me.
I really enjoy sports books, but I found this to be just too negative. I actually stopped reading it halfway through. Leahy reports only the negative aspects in Jordan's comeback. His view is one of contempt. Maybe it's inevitable when you're around a bunch of spoiled millionaire athletes? I don't know. But as a basketball fan, I casually watched the comeback when it happened. It seemed a little sad sometimes, as MJ wasn't the player he once was. But at other times it was amazing - just to see him back, see the fans enjoying his performance, and seeing him rise to the occasion against the NBA's new stars. Leahy doesn't seem to see the magic that occurred here, and after each session reading I was left feeling depressed. Why would someone write so negatively about another human being? There is really no positives in the book at all. If Jordan scored 50 points one night, Leahy would find a reason why that was a horrible thing. That's not cool, and not for me.

Honest and absorbing
The Michael Jordan story always seems to be told in extremes. Either he is heralded as an icon so mindlessly that the storytelling appears uninteresting or he is vilified, as previous writers knew the value of tearing down an icon.

When Nothing Else Matters is a portrait of a man that feels honest, Jordan is neither vilified nor overly praised; instead Micheal Leahy has given us a view of a man experiencing his only real failure in his career as a professional basketball player. A failure that is proven by the simple fact the Washington Wizards, with Jordan in a powerful position off, then on the court, never ascended the heights of the National Basketball Association's (NBA) Eastern Conference. It is a fascinating look at the world's most famous basketball player, during a time period where he seemed unable to transition his on the court reputation and success, to a career in management.

Jordan, the man, had grown comfortable being an icon and as his skills faded and his team missed the playoffs, Leahy reveals someone whose disconnect from the world around him made him unable to finesse his way to off the court success. Therefore his last games for the Wizards are revealed to have been one last chance to court the spotlight as a prime-time player, as the chances to move forward off the court didn't exist, Leahy lays out these realities, and Jordan's apparent blindness to them, that shows Jordan as a very accomplished yet out-of-the-loop figure who couldn't overcome his last challenge in the N.B.A. It also makes clear what Micheal Jordan was to the Washington Wizards management, a cash infusion.

Leahy's even handed treatment may prevent When Nothing Else Matters from being extreme in its presentation, but it doesn't prevent it from being an extreme success as it stands as a historical document for basketball fans to turn to when looking at a honest portrait of life in the N.B.A.