Kblaze8855
01-17-2025, 07:48 AM
Those who weren’t around I mean. Magic having HIV is something most fans these days just grew up knowing but for the sports world at the time?
Takes like this from Bill Simmons get laughed at now but it’s exactly what damn near everybody thought at the time
https://www.hostpic.org/images/2501171659300343.png
so I can’t even criticize him. Maybe for writing it that way, but my family damn sure thought he was gonna die sometime that year at best.
People took sides. You had guys like Karl Malone saying they wouldn’t want to play with him and people like Charles Absolutely cussing out fans who criticized him for wanting to switch to magic number as a tribute
https://youtu.be/-K2tTP-v5O4?si=mGEAFKCG_YDit2M7
notice the reporter saying magic isn’t dead yet? It was just a given he was about to die.
we didn’t know what the **** was happening. I don’t think any story has touched it in a long time. The closest you come is Kobe’s death, but it wasn’t so drawn out. Magic basically had what felt to us like a goodbye tour. He was on shows, and still showing up at sporting events talking trying to educate people and every time we heard his name we thought the sentence was gonna end with “Died today”.
I legitimately got choked up at the 1992 All-Star game Where he came out of retirement to play one more time because the fans voted him in despite not playing. And then he goes out there and puts on that crazy performance?
https://youtu.be/ZTsEA74OyYk?si=KMENle7VaI_6Td_u
he came back, hit that three and walked off the MVP and they didn’t even complete the game. It was too perfect and ending. We thought that man was Gonna walk off into the sunset and die.
He’s walking around today at 65-year-old billionaire still smiling.
I can’t imagine what odds you would’ve gotten on that in 1991.
I’m wondering how the world would handle such a thing today. It would be a big story no doubt if it were some star. And I bet there would be a modern version of Karl Malone hesitant to play against them but I bet they would still have a normal career.
I don’t wanna put a name on the hypothetical player, but let’s just say some superstar announced it tomorrow. More than 30 years later can you imagine society even allowing much backlash if you still wanted to play?
He came back and played in 96. Can you imagine 2026 even letting it be an issue?
Now that I think about it…..would it even be announced? A whole the league could do is continue the protocols that already cover what happens if somebody is bleeding.
A player of magics status might not even bring it up. He wouldn’t feel the same responsibility to educate that magic felt. And he would expect to lead along outwardly normal life.
I never really thought about it. There might be a couple players with HIV in the league right now. What reporter would have the balls to announce it even if he got the story?
Magic didn’t quite normalize it, but he has made people see it can be beaten. As Kanye said “You can live through anything if magic made it.”
I saw him say himself years ago that him doing so well might actually have harmed the movement because people stopped taking it as seriously.
I’m not sure about all that, but it was a really ****ed up time and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to convey just how seriously everyone took it.
Takes like this from Bill Simmons get laughed at now but it’s exactly what damn near everybody thought at the time
https://www.hostpic.org/images/2501171659300343.png
so I can’t even criticize him. Maybe for writing it that way, but my family damn sure thought he was gonna die sometime that year at best.
People took sides. You had guys like Karl Malone saying they wouldn’t want to play with him and people like Charles Absolutely cussing out fans who criticized him for wanting to switch to magic number as a tribute
https://youtu.be/-K2tTP-v5O4?si=mGEAFKCG_YDit2M7
notice the reporter saying magic isn’t dead yet? It was just a given he was about to die.
we didn’t know what the **** was happening. I don’t think any story has touched it in a long time. The closest you come is Kobe’s death, but it wasn’t so drawn out. Magic basically had what felt to us like a goodbye tour. He was on shows, and still showing up at sporting events talking trying to educate people and every time we heard his name we thought the sentence was gonna end with “Died today”.
I legitimately got choked up at the 1992 All-Star game Where he came out of retirement to play one more time because the fans voted him in despite not playing. And then he goes out there and puts on that crazy performance?
https://youtu.be/ZTsEA74OyYk?si=KMENle7VaI_6Td_u
he came back, hit that three and walked off the MVP and they didn’t even complete the game. It was too perfect and ending. We thought that man was Gonna walk off into the sunset and die.
He’s walking around today at 65-year-old billionaire still smiling.
I can’t imagine what odds you would’ve gotten on that in 1991.
I’m wondering how the world would handle such a thing today. It would be a big story no doubt if it were some star. And I bet there would be a modern version of Karl Malone hesitant to play against them but I bet they would still have a normal career.
I don’t wanna put a name on the hypothetical player, but let’s just say some superstar announced it tomorrow. More than 30 years later can you imagine society even allowing much backlash if you still wanted to play?
He came back and played in 96. Can you imagine 2026 even letting it be an issue?
Now that I think about it…..would it even be announced? A whole the league could do is continue the protocols that already cover what happens if somebody is bleeding.
A player of magics status might not even bring it up. He wouldn’t feel the same responsibility to educate that magic felt. And he would expect to lead along outwardly normal life.
I never really thought about it. There might be a couple players with HIV in the league right now. What reporter would have the balls to announce it even if he got the story?
Magic didn’t quite normalize it, but he has made people see it can be beaten. As Kanye said “You can live through anything if magic made it.”
I saw him say himself years ago that him doing so well might actually have harmed the movement because people stopped taking it as seriously.
I’m not sure about all that, but it was a really ****ed up time and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to convey just how seriously everyone took it.