Former KU guard Rex Walters recalls strategy vs. Jordan: ‘Don’t say anything to him’
Rex Walters, who wore jersey No. 23 at the University of Kansas as a tribute to his favorite player, Michael Jordan, remembers the moments leading up to his first NBA game against the Chicago Bulls phenom.
“It was my second year in the league. I was starting for the Nets,” Walters said of the New Jersey Nets, who played host to Jordan’s Bulls on April 5, 1995. “Michael had just dropped 55 on the (New York) Knicks. The reporters asked me, ‘Do you feel like the lamb before the slaughter?’’’
Walters recalled how pundits at the time were skeptical that the 6-foot-4 Walters could guard the 6-6 future Hall of Famer, whose legacy is being re-examined over 10 weeks via ESPN’s “The Last Dance.” The docu-series airs Sunday nights, with just two shows remaining.
“I said, ‘No. I’m going to play basketball tonight,’” Walters recollected last week to The Star.
Now 50, Walters, who spent the past season as associate head coach on Danny Manning’s Wake Forest staff, had no problems recalling details of that first head-to-head matchup against Jordan.
Walters, whose teams went 1-9 versus Jordan’s Bulls during Walter’s seven-year NBA career, scored 17 points on 8-of-14 shooting in New Jersey’s 108-101 home loss to the Bulls. Jordan, who was seven years older than Walters at the time and in his 11th year in the league, awoke from a slow start to score 37 points on 13-of-31 shooting with 11 rebounds.
“I played well for a half. I always say that I outscored him 13-7 the first half. I don’t remember what happened the second half,” Walters said with a laugh.
“I obviously had a lot of respect for Michael going into that game. He was my guy. He was the reason I wore 23. Coach Williams (Roy who coached Jordan as an assistant at North Carolina and Walters as head coach at KU) mentioned him all the time. He was the standard you wanted to try to live up to.”
Walters said the game plan in going against Jordan, who was still a bit rusty after returning at the All-Star break from a year-and-a-half-hiatus from basketball, was “pretty simple: ‘Don’t say anything to him. Every time he shoots, try to get your hand as close to his follow through as possible. You’re not going to block it, but try to put your hand right next to his elbow, try to get him out of rhythm.’’’
“That worked for a half. The second half he kind of took off.”
Walters played 41 minutes that game to Jordan’s 43.
“I remember I shot a three and he got a hand on it. I thought he was way too far back to get it. I was like, ‘Wow that was pretty impressive.’ Very rarely do you get a three-point shot blocked,” Walters said, adding, “In the second half, I was driving. Steve Kerr (Bulls guard) was back on defense. I had a little bit of a 1-on-1 situation. I knew Michael was trailing the play. I knew he was going to try to make a play at the rim. I was going to attack Steve, get to my right hand, then get back to my left one for a reverse, try to take it on one side of the backboard and get to another.
“Right when I started to take off,” Walters continued, “I gave a quick glance back to see where he was at. I was like, ‘I think I’ve got him.’ I saw him jump. As I shot the ball, I saw one hand on one side of the backboard on the rim. I saw another hand on the other side of the rim. I said, ‘OK, he’s got this one figured out.’ He blocked it, goes the length of the floor, dunks it and they made a serious run.”
Walters has other memories from that game, too.
“I remember one time I drove it baseline and I slipped on contact. The referee put his hand up like he was going to call a foul. Michael looked at him and said, ‘No it wasn’t.’ The referee said, ‘Red ball going that way,’’’ Walters added, laughing, referring to the Bulls getting that call.
One last story from a night Walters will never forget:
“There was an out-of-bounds play. He was standing two feet off the front rim. He took one step toward the sideline and grabbed my arm. There was a picture in the paper the next day. He literally was dunking the ball with me right under him. He almost jumped over me. I was kind of curled up. He was pretty good.”
How good?
“The best (he’s played against),” Walters said. “There were guys just as athletic. There were guys who were very skilled. None of them had the competitiveness, the fundamentally sound technique. They didn’t have all of it. They always were missing something. There were no defects in his game. Nobody could find a weak link in his game.”
Walters said Jordan “never got rid of a coach. He never complained about the coach; he complained about the GM, but not the coach. He respected coaching at a high, high level and wanted to be coached at a high level.”
Walters said he’s thoroughly enjoyed the ongoing ESPN documentary.
“It brings back a lot of memories,” Walters said. “He was definitely the guy I looked at a lot and rooted for. I wanted to have his mentality, it’s win at all costs.”
Not winning enough games ended Walters’ short stay as an assistant coach at Wake Forest, where former Jayhawks phenom Manning went 78-111 in six seasons, 13-18 this past campaign. Manning was fired on April 25.
“Obviously we always knew Danny was a great player. People don’t understand he’s actually a better person (than player). He generally cares and loves his players,” Walters said.
“It makes me sad I couldn’t help him more because I know he’s about all the right things when it comes to college basketball. He sets such a great example for the players on how to conduct yourself as a man and basketball player. He’s a true gentleman.”
Before joining Manning, Walters spent one season as an assistant on Eric Musselman’s coaching staff at Nevada. Before that, he was an assistant coach for the Detroit Pistons, head coach of the G-League’s Grand Rapids Drive and head coach at University of San Francisco and Florida Atlantic.
He hopes to remain in basketball in some capacity.
“I’ve started up the podcast again,” Walters said of “Real Talk Basketball With Rex Walters.”
“My family is all here in Winston-Salem. We’re trying to figure what the next move is. There’s not a lot going on right now in the world (because of COVID-19 coronavirus). “We’re pretty blessed to have a roof over our head. I’m going to reach out to people I know (like his college coach Williams, who has already checked in with Walters). I love the NBA. .I loved working here for Danny, quite honestly.
“I really enjoyed all of our guys and the coaches. Our players were fun to be around and coach Manning is really a special guy. I’d be interested in doing something like that again, maybe scouting or media stuff too. I was working on that (podcast) really hard before I went to Nevada.”
