Reddit reviews When Nothing Else Matters: Michael Jordan's Last Comeback

His Washington years get made fun of but he was pretty damn good. Reading the book on those years illuminated the fact that Jordan's knee had severe tendinitis basically his entire first season as a Wizard, due to being older and training heavily out of nowhere (he announced his comeback very late in the offseason prior), and had to be drained multiple times. He was such a maniac about playing that he refused to let it rest until he just couldn't play anymore. Because of this, his stats don't really look very good in comparison to the rest of his career. His second season his percentages are up across the board and, most impressively, he played all 82 games as he was turning 40 years old averaging 37 minutes a game. That's incredible.

The efficiency isn't great, particularly that first year, but the entire league was not very efficient at that time. It was a tough era to watch basketball if you were a fan of offense. Lots of isos, particularly by Jordan.

Another thing: He took the veterans exception to play as a Wizard, which was only like $1 million a year, and he donated his salary for those two years to charity. I want to say it was a 9/11 victims charity but I'm not 100% on that. I'm going by memory on this. The way I remember it is that he announced his comeback pretty soon after 9/11, almost like it was a response to the event

He could not have gone on for even another half season. His knees required continual draining, which left the joints with no protection, but if he didn't drain them, he could not play if there was too much inflammation, a vicious cycle that could only be prevented by rest, a luxury the NBA regular season does not afford.

Michael Leahy's When Nothing Else Matters is a great chronicle of MJ's last season with the Wizards.

I know Playing for Keeps is widely considered the best-written basketball book, but it's a bit outdated and more of a hagiography. However, David Halberstam is known as the best sports-biographer for a reason.

On the other end, Michael Leahry's When Nothing Else Matters details his failed efforts in Washington in terrific detail, but it's not particularly fun to read, and has been accused of twisting information to suit its narrative that Jordan is a psychopath. Bill Simmons says the book should be avoided.

It came out in a book written about his time with the Wizards

http://www.amazon.com/When-Nothing-Else-Matters-Comeback/dp/0743254279

It wasn't very interesting overall. The Kwame story was by far the best part.

I will counter that Jordan turned on Brown later on. Jordan went from being a supporter to being ruthless to him later on. The perception was Kwame Brown wasn't putting in the work and he's lazy, disengaged, etc. In my opinion I think Jordan still helped ruin him. Jordan went from his best supporter to one of his worst enemies later on. What you quoted here seems to be in between.
At the end of the day the truth is probably somewhere in the middle. Kwame isn't the first teammate Jordan was ruthless against - he's an alpha male that tests everybody, including Robert Parish.

My source: https://www.amazon.com/When-Nothing-Else-Matters-Comeback/dp/0743254279