ESPN's 'The Last Dance' really just proves that Michael Jordan is the GOAT of image management

There's more to the legend of Michael Jordan than the '90s nostalgia so beloved by Generation Z. In the early '90s, basketball was something a bit more than a game in an America newly triumphant in the Cold War.

This was never more apparent than in 1992, when Jordan led the first group of professionals to represent the US in the summer Olympic Games, the so-called "Dream Team" of Barcelona. Their appearance followed a gold medal win by the Soviet Union in 1988, and basketball had been just one of the many sports that east and west employed as cultural proxies in their long twilight struggle from the mid-1940s until the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

In 1992, Jordan was the best player on the best team of all time as the US stepped into its role as the world's only superpower. It was the end of history and the American system had emerged victorious, Francis Fukuyama argued in a book published the same exact year.

Jordan himself was the ultimate winner in an era when America itself had won the ultimate challenge. He had already started making history in the late 1980s as a blockbuster commercial presence, and he would go on to dominate the '90s not just athletically, taking the model of athlete-as-pitchman to never-surpassed heights.

To say nothing of Jordan's greatest gift to the world: "Space Jam."

None of this is to deny Jordan's greatness, but it is to point out that Jordan's critics, like Mason, Strauss, Jones, and myself, frankly, would prefer some nuance gets added to the narrative of Jordan as all-conquering, galaxy-saving American sports hero. But maybe that's not possible, because he represents an era when America was all-conquering, too. Certainly the appetite for it isn't present in the America of 2020, which has been conquered by an entirely new kind of enemy.

Just like in his playing career, Jordan is winning the narrative, and it appears that all of these criticisms will soon be forgotten as "The Last Dance" re-cements his legacy as the greatest of all time. It's one more reason he's also the greatest of all time at managing Michael Jordan's brand.

Jumpman, Jumpman, Jumpman: He's always up to something.

Ethan Strauss agreed with Mason's criticisms, but he said he still enjoys watching the series, because he's interested in seeing "propaganda curated by Michael Jordan." He's also interested in the lack of subtlety that accompanies that propaganda, he added.

Strauss and Mason seemed to define the message that propaganda was trying to spread as an examination of the human impulse to "dominate" and "win," which some have and others simply don't. But in reality, domination doesn't equate to Gary Payton holding down your field goal percentage in the Finals.

And the nature of Jordan's greatness or "GOATness" has also been debated on less quantitative and more qualitative terms, too, as his on-court dominance extended to his massive impact in the commercial realm but didn't translate to engagement with social issues, unlike his GOAT counterparts Muhammad Ali and LeBron James.

For what it's worth, as Business Insider reported, Jordan has finally confirmed in "The Last Dance" that he did utter the famous phrase "Republicans buy sneakers, too," while adding that he "never thought" of himself "as an activist."

People don't want to look at this documentary critically, Strauss added, because "it feels good." Maybe that's because it hearkens back to an era when Americans had more confidence, a better economy, and weren't "locked in [their] houses," he added.

Certainly the fact that a documentary series lionizing leadership and victory at a time when a pandemic is leading to so much loss cannot be overlooked. But it also shouldn't be overlooked that Jordan, for all his greatness as a player, really did have a tougher time with, say, Gary Payton than the legend now would have it.

The theory that "The Last Dance" was intended as image management was floated before the series aired, by Bill Simmons, the former longtime ESPN columnist and current Editor in Chief of sports and pop culture website The Ringer.

As the 10-part series has advanced, criticism has grown that it neglects certain aspects of the story that are less flattering to the legend of Jordan as the greatest-ever basketball player.

For instance, on the May 14 episode of the "House of Strauss" podcast, hosted by The Athletic's NBA reporter Ethan Strauss, guest star Beckley Mason from Bleacher Report said there's a certain "lack of truth in how this story is being told." Instead of an objective piece of sports journalism, he said it's more like the "best telling of the fairy tales you grew up with."

Mason noted that Jordan's role as a producer for the series goes unmentioned in its credits and that, as Insider has reported, the scenes of Jordan only appear to be filmed in his home but he actually refused to grant the filmmaker that access. Also, the series' director, Jason Hehir, told Insider that it was agreed upon that Jordan would have a chance to respond to things said in the other 105 interviews conducted for the documentary.

(Although Jordan does not have a producing credit, the series was produced in association with his company, Jump 23, and some of his business associates are listed as executive producers, namely, Estee Portnoy and Curtis Polk. ESPN confirmed that Jordan is not a producer on the project.)

There is an admission of bias by Mason, a fan of the now-defunct Seattle Supersonics, who the series depicted losing to Jordan's Bulls in the 1996 Finals. But still, Mason maintained, important facts about that year's playoffs that challenge Jordan's dominance were "completely elided" from the documentary, including several key injuries to members of the Orlando Magic and the actual statistics about how effective Sonics Point Guard Gary Payton was in defending Jordan.

The documentary famously shows Jordan laughing at a clip of Payton saying he defended him well, but the statistics from that series show Jordan only shooting 36% and averaging about 23 points per game when Payton was guarding him, compared to shooting 46% and averaging about 31 in the other three games.

ESPN's Bomani Jones said in the May 12 episode of his own podcast that "Gary Payton was right" and that viewers shouldn't let Jordan "fool" them. "Notice that he put no video up" to support his laughter in the face of Payton's remarks, Jones added. Jones wasn't otherwise as critical as Mason, but he seemed to concede the documentary emphasizing a certain narrative over what actually happened nearly 25 years ago.

The selectivity isn't limited to Jordan's opponents. The series also tackles the famous incident when he punched then-teammate Steve Kerr during practice. In interviews, both Jordan and Kerr, now an NBA legend in his own right as championship-winning coach of the Golden State Warriors, portray their fight as something that brought them closer together, something about winning. But Jordan gave Kerr a black eye.