On Valentine’s Day in 1990, Michael Jordan took 43 shots in a regular season game in Orlando against the Magic, the second-most of his career, and scored 49 points in 47 minutes.
He was not wearing the famous No. 23 jersey, but No. 12.
Why? This is a story that has long been shrouded in mystery. An investigation by Sports Illustrated’s Chris Johnson on the 25th anniversary of the game found that the most plausible outcome was that the jersey was shipped from Amway sometime between the morning shootaround and the Bulls’ pregame arrival. The visiting team’s locker room in the arena was robbed. According to Johnson, prior to the tip, the entire arena was looking for the jersey — including announcements over the public address system — and fans were requesting a red Jordan Bulls jersey that might fit him. Finding nothing, Jordan ended up having to play the game as an unknown number 12 thread. Further details are unclear.
But the Magic may have just screwed up the story (no pun intended):
“That morning, after their shootaround, their locker room was set up — every player’s jersey, shorts, warm-ups, everything was set up,” Magic director of operations Rodney Powell said in the video. “The locker room door is deadbolted and locked, and then we put a separate lock on the door with a hasp. So only one person has the key.”
Sounds airtight enough. But when the Bulls arrived at the game at 4:30 p.m., Jordan’s No. 23 jersey was missing.
All of the above we already know or can deduce. But Powell then peeled back another layer.
“They found out a few days later from security that one of their people had hatched a plan to get the jersey and actually go through another locker room, crawl through the ceiling, go through the ceiling, grab the jersey, put the jersey on It goes back to the ceiling,” Powell continued. “I thought, after considering that no one could figure it out, I wanted to come back and get it in a few days.”
High level stuff. Still, it appears the unnamed Magic employee didn’t keep his stolen memorabilia.
The jersey swap didn’t seem to have much of an impact on Jordan personally, but the Magic had the last laugh that day, winning the game 135-129.
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