Jumpman, Johnny Smith
Jumpman, Johnny Smith
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Jumpman
The Making and Meaning of Michael Jordan

Author: Johnny Smith

Narrator: Gregory Jones

Unabridged: 9 hr 11 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Basic Books

Published: 11/07/2023

Includes: Bonus Material Bonus Material Included

Synopsis

How Michael Jordan’s path to greatness was shaped by race, politics, and the consequences of fame

To become the most revered basketball player in America, it wasn’t enough for Michael Jordan to merely excel on the court. He also had to become something he never intended: a hero.
 
Reconstructing the defining moment of Jordan’s career—winning his first NBA championship during the 1990-1991 season—sports historian Johnny Smith examines Jordan’s ubiquitous rise in American culture and the burden he carried as a national symbol of racial progress. Jumpman reveals how Jordan maintained a “mystique” that allowed him to seem more likable to Americans who wanted to believe race no longer mattered. In the process of achieving greatness, he remade himself into a paradox: universally known, yet distant and unknowable.
 
Blending dramatic game action with grand evocations of the social forces sweeping the early nineties, Jumpman demonstrates how the man and the myth together created the legend we remember today. 

About Johnny Smith

Johnny Smith is an assistant professor of American history at Georgia Tech. He is the author of The Sons of Westwood: John Wooden, UCLA, and the Dynasty that Changed College Basketball. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Jesse on October 23, 2023

Solid mix of recapping the 1990-91 season, when Jordan got over the hump, and thinking about him in the longer context of American cultural/social/racial history. We get a new sense of the notorious "Republicans buy shoes too" comment, at least to me, and some sense of how little Jordan was interest......more

Goodreads review by DeWayne on May 27, 2024

Few athletes are loved by all, but "Be Like Mike" Jordan is an exception. He entered the picture at a time the country needed a hero, a good guy, who would be a winner on and off the court. The college-winning shot is still shown and without his name being mentioned, all recognize the image, Michael......more

Goodreads review by Jeff on May 01, 2024

Good enough book. I always love Michael Jordan content so it’s hard in my mind to screw it up. Nothing really new in this book, though. It just regurgitates what is in Sam Smith’s book, McCallum’s Dream Team book, and the Last Dance doc. I’d probably give it 2 stars but I do love any and all Jordan......more

Goodreads review by Kara on January 03, 2025

I found this book while browsing the sports section of Barnes and Noble in December. I was surprised to see so few reviews and rating on Goodreads for a book about a sports legend. This is a well written, well researched thoughtful analysis of the myth making of Michael Jordan. Wisely, Smith builds......more

Goodreads review by Jessica on February 16, 2024

I was a just a born when Michael Jordan won his first NBA championship. So I grew up watching him win and become the legend he is now. I really got into this book and it definitely made me want to read more about Jordan and honestly sports books in general. This was a little different then a normal bo......more

Quotes

“Other Michael Jordan books have shown the whats and wheres and whys. Now Jumpman, an essential addition to the canon, explains what it all cost.”—Wright Thompson, senior writer, ESPN.com

“In Jumpman, author Johnny Smith distills the mythology of a sports legend and gives us a story not only about His Airness, but, more broadly, about America.” —Gary M. Pomerantz, author of The Last Pass

“Jumpman is a thought-provoking portrait of the 1990s culture that shaped Michael Jordan into one of the most talked-about athletes the world has ever known. Thanks to Smith for shedding new light on the man, the myth, the legend—the GOAT.”—Timothy Bella, author of Barkley

“Through careful research and rich storytelling, Jumpman does more than just unpack the mystique of Michael Jordan; it paints a lively and unvarnished portrait of the players and personalities who defined that era of professional basketball. By centering questions of race and examining the shifting business of sport, Smith also provides us with a provocative parable about US culture and politics in the late-twentieth century: a time when colorblindness, conservativism, and neoliberal global capitalism came to reshape the American Dream.”—Theresa Runstedtler, author of Black Ball

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