Old SI Article: Air Jordan Meets Air Bubka (7/22/92)

[achtungpv]

July 22, 1992
Air Jordan Meets Air Bubka
When Michael Jordan and Sergei Bubka, two Olympic biggies, got together, international goodwill reached new heights
Jack McCallum

Jordan and Bubka play a similarly dichotomous role?half-hero, half-rebel?within their respective athletic universes. Bubka has always been an outsider. Even before most Americans realized that the Soviet Union simmered with nationalist divisiveness, Bubka was emphatic about declaring himself a Ukrainian; he will be competing in Barcelona as a member of the Unified Team of Former Soviet Republics, but, should he win, his thoughts will be with the people of Ukraine and not with Mother Russia .

Then, too, Bubka's practice of accepting bonus money for each new record he sets has drawn the ire of some track and field purists who feel he is money hungry. The same charge has been leveled against Jordan, whose protracted battles over licensing agreements with the NBA and USA Basketball, the organization overseeing Olympic basketball affairs, were bitter. For years Jordan has been the NBA 's designated superstar, but he has grown increasingly uncomfortable in the role, and the league has grown increasingly uncomfortable in casting him in it.

But the establishment would never let them stray far, for both are too valuable. Bubka is the pole vault, to at least as great a degree as Carl Lewis was once the long jump. Bubka has set 30 world records (16 indoors, 14 outdoors), surpassing distance runner Paavo Nurmi 's achievement of the most world records by a track and field athlete. No one will be surprised if another pole vault record falls in Barcelona , for a computer analysis of one of Bubka's clearances last year suggested he could have cleared 20' 8". (His current world records are 20'1½" indoors, 20'1½" outdoors.) Bubka is clearly in the pantheon of alltime track and field heroes with the likes of Nurmi , Lewis , Jesse Owens , Al Oerter and Peter Snell .

Jordan occupies as lofty a position in his sport. After only a couple of seasons in the NBA he was considered by some to be the game's greatest all-around talent, and after leading the Bulls to back-to-back titles, he has convinced many that he is no less than the greatest player in history. Both superstars have worked long and hard to get where they are, but there is something utterly natural about them too, in the ease with which they have made it to the top. Asked recently why he was so successful, Bubka said, "I have all the things together. It's speed. It's technique. It's coordination. It's psychology. All these things are easy for me." That could have been Jordan talking too. It is not enough to say that athletes like Bubka and Jordan come along only once a decade?they come along about once a century.

Their bodies are ideally suited for what they do. At 6'6", 198 pounds, Jordan has a long, lean musculature; only lately has he begun a serious weightlifting program, which he says has helped him better endure the nightly pounding of the NBA . At 6 feet, 176 pounds, Bubka is powerfully built and muscular yet lithe. Had he been raised in the U.S. , he could have been a bruising running back or cornerback. Though Jordan wouldn't agree, the odds would favor Bubka were they to square off in a Superstars decathlon. Bubka has high-jumped about 6'7", long-jumped about 26 feet, and run a hand-timed 10.2 in the 100 meters, and his strength would give him an obvious advantage in the throwing events. Bubka sometimes shoots baskets to warm up before a workout, but he rarely played the sport as a youngster?basketball is not big in Ukraine , as it is in, say, Lithuania .

Which raises the question of the day: Can Sergei Bubka , pole vaulting's prince of midair, dunk a basketball?

The word is explained to him with the help of his manager, Andrzej Kulikowski. "I have never tried," says Bubka. That is a cultural marking, of course; any American schoolboy with Bubka's springs would surely have spent hours slam-dunking. But Bubka doesn't seem particularly interested in the question and he is somewhat bewildered by the fact that others are.

Jordan, for his part, has most assuredly never tried to pole-vault. As he and Bubka chatted, Kulikowski pointed to a partition that was set up in the Multiplex in suburban Deerfield , where he and Jordan met for a photo shoot. "There, that's about 20 feet," he said. "That's how high Sergei is when he starts coming down." Jordan whistled softly. "No way I'd try that," he said. "You won't catch me killing myself." Competitive soul that he is, however, Jordan was unwilling to leave the track and field arena solely to Bubka. He says that while fooling around one day in high school he cleared 6'5" in the high jump, which seems reasonable, and as a ninth-grader did 23'¼" in the long jump, which does not; such a distance would be almost national class. But who is going to argue with a guy whose nickname is Air?

As Bubka toyed playfully with a basketball, there were several telltale signs of his unfamiliarity with the game: the way he held the ball with elbows out (no basketball skill is performed with elbows out except rebounding), the high, hard, two-handed dribble, the awkward release when he aimed at an imaginary basket. But as Jordan said, "I bet it wouldn't take him long to learn." Indeed, one could imagine Bubka as one of those rough-hewn yet instinctively proficient defenders and rebounders on the playground, an ideal teammate for a finesse player. (And don't say this white man can't jump.) Someone asked Bubka if he could spin the ball on his finger, and after it was explained to him, he did not have much success. "So what's the big deal?" said Jordan. "I can't spin a ball, either. Never could." Just then an errant pass thrown by Bubka whistled over Jordan's head. "Damn, Sergei, you want to tear up the place?" said Jordan, smiling. "You should go play for Detroit ."

As the session drew to a close, there was an exchange of gifts, and the two promised to get together in Barcelona . Jordan leaves, Bubka lingers. His plane to Berlin (he divides his time among his hometown of Donetsk in Ukraine , various European training centers and an apartment in Berlin ) does not depart for several hours, and he plans to do some interval work on the Multiplex track. He is asked if he would mind participating in a dunking experiment on a nearby court. Bubka is still uncertain as to why this holds so much fascination for Americans, but he agrees. He grabs the ball and takes a running start. No dunk. He does it again. No dunk.

[AR01]

Wow great article. I didn't know Sergei was able to high jump 6'7"!