M.J. Retirement Stops The World

Michael Jordan's retirement did the unthinkable: it eclipsed soccer in the world's media.

From Warsaw to Rome, Sydney to Santiago, Jordan was given the kind of page one coverage Wednesday that American sports seldom receive outside North America.

In a world in which soccer dwarfs the NBA, Jordan received the highest possible accolade: he was likened to the legendary soccer star Pele.

For a comparable retirement, you "have to go a long time back to when Pele was the god of soccer," said Australian National Basketball League general manager Bill Palmer.

Some papers likened the news of his retirement to the death of a close family member. One suggested Americans would rather keep Jordan and see President Clinton leave.

"America would willingly take Clinton's retirement in exchange for Jordan's," said Rome's La Repubblica newspaper.

London's tabloid The Sun was even more to the point.

"The shattering retirement announcement will even drive Bill Clinton's sex scandals off America's front pages. If you thought boxer Mike Tyson, football legend Pele or racing driver Ayrton Senna were the most recognized names in the world -- forget it."

In countries like britain where the NBA has a tiny following, much of the coverage was about the millions Jordan has earned. Swiss papers took a similar approach and said he deserved every penny.

In an era "when stock market coups and mergers allow the oddest of fellows to shamelessly amass fistfuls of dollars, ... we don't begrudge the fact that Jordan has earned enough to buy a basketball stadium every day until the end of time," said the Lausanne daily Le Matin.

Several papers compared Jordan to other universally known American exports like Coca-Cola or Mickey Mouse and noted his popularit -- particularly in places where the sport is hardly followed -- had nothing to do with basketball.

"His popularity is unprecedented and without limit," said Italy's Gazzetta dello Sport in a front-page editorial. "He's way better known than basketball itself because he goes beyond its limits: Jordan is myth, poetry."

Alfonso Reyes, a Spanish international and the center for the Spanish club Estudiantes, described playing against Jordan a year ago in the McDonald's Classic in Paris as something "to tell my grandchildren about."

"He is the best of all time," Reyes told the Madrid daily Diario 16. "As the years go by, we will realize what he was and he will become a myth. There's nobody about to replace him -- neither on the court nor in charisma."

Another Spanish daily, La Razon added, "His mere presence guaranteed entertainment just as great actors take over the screen with a gesture or a look."

Jordan's retirement made waves in China, where the NBA (known as "Gongniu") and Jordan (known as "Qiaodan'') have a large following among China's sports-crazy fans.

A survey of 1,000 people in nine Chinese cities conducted in May named Jordan as the second-most widely known American after Thomas Edison. Similar polls in France and Australia have found him better known than local sports stars.

"Flying Man Jordan is Coming Back to Earth" the state-run Beijing Morning Post said in a front-page story that likened reports of his retirement to hearing of a close relative's death.

In Chile, Santiago's Las Ultimas Noticias offered a huge, front-page photo of a smiling Jordan, with the caption: "Jordan, the moment of goodbye."

One German paper honed in on Jordan's apolitical nature and his ability to cross racial divides.

He was "winsome, friendly and so non-controversial that Americans forgot that he was black, and that means something," wrote the Frankfurt daily Frankfurter Rundshau.

The story was also covered on German TV, unusual in a country where biathlon gets more exposure than basketball.

France's most prestigious daily Le Monde wrote, "The status of American blacks doesn't bother him. ... Simply, M.J. is a professional basketball player with an acute sense of business and an oversized ego."

Jordan's retirement was followed in the Middle East -- although basketball seldom is. Most Arab satellite TV networks such as Egypt's Channel 2, Nile TV, and Al-Gazeera carried the retirement on main news bulletins.

"The basketball legend announces his retirement," said a headline in Egypt's Al-Ahrar daily, describing him as "the greatest player the world had ever seen."

In Russia, one daily was cautious and recalled that Jordan retired five years ago, only to return.

"Unlike America, our eyes are not misted with tears, so we won't rush to join he farewell," the daily Segodnya wrote. "Maybe it's premature."

Jordan got big treatment in Britain, probably Europe's least basketball-savvy country. His retirement even made the front page of the Daily Telegraph.

But the Daily Mail buried the retirement in a six-line note in agate type alongside darts and squash results.

A headline in the Polish paper Gazeta Wyborcza probably said it best.

"NBA without Jordan?"

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