It is shortly before game time. Michael Jordan will not play this shiny day, so he is relaxed in the Scottsdale Scorpions’ dugout. He is also starved.
“Where’s the food?” Jordan asks to no one in particular.
“Where’s the cash?” replies Michael Tucker, a fellow outfielder and a hot propsect for the Kansas City Royals. “We sent out for grub, but where’s your money?”
Jordan utters an unkind remark that sends everybody within earshot into fits of laughter. Everybody but Tucker.
“Anytime you want to go one-on-one, I’m ready,” challenges Tucker, talking basketball now instead of breakfast.
“Listen, you,” Jordan says. “Did you think that was a movie of me in the NBA you saw on TV? If I take you on, you ain’t gonna be able to change the channel. When I get in your face, that’s the real thing.”
Tucker just stares, smiling.
“Don’t do it!!” warns Chris Snopek, an infielder in the White Sox chain. “I tried Michael in Birmingham this summer. Free throws. I sink 7 of 10. Then it’s his turn. He makes the first seven. Then he says he’s gonna give me a chance. He closes his eyes, shoots the next three left-handed, 10 for 10.”
Tucker walks away in disgust just as reinforcements arrive. Jordan exercises his boardinghouse reach.
“Now,” he says. “Where else can you eat a hot dog a half-hour before a game? Not in the NBA, not on the bench. I love it here. No hassles. Where’s the mustard?”
Through four games in the Arizona Fall League, Jordan is 4 for 11, a .364 average. His next assignment will be Tuesday, the Scorpions’ home opener at Scottsdale Stadium, spring training headquarters for the San Francisco Giants.
Jordan didn’t play Sunday at Peoria, much to the disappointment of the crowd. Terry Francona, the Scorpions’ manager, has six outfielders on his roster. He doesn’t manage according to turnstiles. Francona, in fact, interrupts Jordan’s feast by tugging on his left ear.
“No earrings while in uniform,” says Jordan, removing the jewelry. “That’s good. The rules are the same for everybody. Terry gave me no special privileges in Birmingham, either. I don’t want any. I just want to play and have fun. And as long as I see progress, I’ll keep playing.”
Wherever Jordan moves, security follows. When he’s in left field, an officer in civilian clothes stands down the line, just inside the fence. But no gendarme could protect Michael from baseball’s law of the jungle. The other night, when the Scorpions were introduced individually, he waved to fans, then reached out for traditional handslaps with teammates already assembled on the field. They kept arms at their sides, freezing out the world’s greatest athlete.
“The guys love him,” Francona says. “He fits right in here, he fit right in at Birmingham and with the White Sox at Sarasota last March. Michael doesn’t big league anybody. He doesn’t show his rings.”
The mustard still hasn’t arrived, and Jordan’s hot dog is history.
“So, what’s the talk in Chicago?” he asks. “Am I still desecrating baseball? Am I still coming back to the Bulls? If they can figure out a way for me to skip the 82 regular-season games and then just show up for the playoffs … but then it’ll be baseball season. I’m enjoying this too much. Look at these guys. Just basic, good people. No egos, no selfishness. That’s another thing I don’t miss.”
While Jordan sits there in stocking feet, players from the Sun Cities Solar Sox meander over, cameras in tow, seeking pictures. The only Mr. October left in baseball obliges.
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Tucker returns, to make peace or start another fire, whichever comes first.
“You know, Jordan,” he says. “You ain’t got no money for lunch, but I bought your book.”
“At $50 a pop?” says Jordan, grinning and rubbing together his thumb and index finger. “Thank you for the contribution.”
Tucker leaves again, a beaten man.