Basketball legend Michael Jordan worked with author Ronald Lazenby to tell his life story in new book, Michael Jordan: The Life. 

In the book, Jordan talks about racism and what he learned  from watching the critically acclaimed film, Roots.  Lazenby spoke with Sports Illustrated about his research when writing the book.

“As I started looking at newspapers back in this era, when I was putting together Dawson Jordan’s [Michael’s great-grandfather] life, the Klan was like a chamber of commerce. It bought the uniforms for ball teams, it put Bibles in all the schools. It may well have ended up being a chamber of commerce if not for all the violence it was perpetrating, too,” Lazenby said. “A lot of the context just wasn’t possible to put it in a basketball book. A lot of it ended up being cut.”

Jordan also revealed that at one point in his life he thought he was a racist after he was suspended from school for throwing a soda at a white girl who called him the N-Word.

“I threw a soda at her,” Jordan said in the book. “I was really rebelling. I considered myself a racist at the time. Basically, I was against all white people.”

Lazenby said that Jordan’s story is a “black power story.” Lazenby added that his story looks at how racism played a major role in Jordan becoming an exceptional athlete.

To read the entire SI story click here.

Darryl Robertson (darryl_robertson)