I think it would be stupid to retire a number for the whole league. Yes Jordan was one of the best if not the best player ever, but retiring a number for the whole league just seems wrong. I think the only Team that should retire his number is Chicago. Ya he was a Wizard, but what he did there was nothing spetacular due to his age and supporting cast.
I remember rumours of lebron heading to chicago in 07 but lebron would need to change his number because chicago retired it.
If the league retired number 23, then if I was Magic or Larry or Wilt or Bill Russell, I would be offended. This isn't a situation like hockey where Gretzky is so much bigger than anyone else to ever play the game and the guy to put hockey on the map. We're talking about a sport where there have been so many legends, and choosing one out of the history of the league would be offensive to so many others. Bill Russell won eleven titles, Wilt averaged 50ppg in a single season, Oscar Robertson averaged a triple double, Magic and Bird represented probably the greatest ever era of basketball in the 80s, while Kareem is the all-time leading scorer in NBA history. What makes MJ more worthy to the extent the league retires his jersey number over all these other legends?
Ok .. then why not retire numbers 13, 32, and 33 as well if you're retiring Jordan's? Just the fact that we're still able to argue that Wilt or Magic could be better than Jordan shows that the gap between MJ and the rest isn't as big as people may proclaim it to be to retire his number league wide.
