CHICAGO –

This is the third installment from Hall of Fame writer Sam Smith's new book "There Is No Next: NBA Legends on the Legacy of Michael Jordan."

The story of Michael Jordan also is Jordan, Inc., which is the American experience, free enterprise, the ability to sell your product. The product was Michael Jordan. And that he was a black man so readily accepted into American homes and beloved was a breakthrough.

It began, as the commercials went, with the shoes. Those were the famous commercials Nike produced with struggling filmmsaaker Spike Lee, who had made a low budget film, "She's Gotta Have It," with a Knicks fan, a bike messenger, Mars Blackmon.

Converse was the sneaker of NBA choice at the time and what Jordan had worn at North Carolina. Jordan's representatives and Nike had this plan to name a sneaker for Jordan at a time when it seemed ludicrous.

Bill Walton, the Hall of Famer who was a star in Portland, where Nike is headquartered, likes to tell the story of the time he had met Phil Knight. Nike was successful, but still not the behemoth it would become.

Knight said he had this idea of a sneaker named for an athlete and marketed and endorsed. Bill said he told him it was a ridiculous idea and no one would purchase sneakers because of an athlete's name.

Bill Walton: "Michael changed the world. And not so much in how he played, which was brilliant, but with how he lived and he acted and drove the business of sport. With David Falk, with Nike, with ESPN, and with David Stern and the entertainment aspect.

"Michael, he was right at the transition of when it went from substance to hype. Michael represented substance, but ever since Michael started to play, now everybody wants to be first. Now when a guy makes a basket, they say, oh well, he's the greatest player ever. That was not the case for Michael.

"What I love about Michael is that he was not the best at anything. He was not the biggest, he was not the strongest, he was not the highest jumper. But he was incredibly, incredibly smart. And incredibly disciplined and focused and driven. All the things that I admire and respect.

"He's one of those guys that I have these vivid memories and experiences in my life of raising four young boys who are growing up and I've made them breakfast and have to get them to go to school and I've got the stereo going full blast with the Grateful Dead and Bob Dylan and I'm trying to rouse out these four adolescent teenaged boys and the whole morning as they're getting ready I'm telling them, 'Five-thirty tonight, no matter what, be home tonight because Michael Jordan is going to be on the TV and you don't want to miss this.' To where you had to be there before the tipoff, to plan your lives and play your schedule around his games, his performances."

In the 1984 preseason, Jordan and Nike unveiled Jordan's red and black first Air Jordans, the sneaker that, effectively, revolutionized the sports shoe industry. They were laughed at early on as no one had seen anything quite like that.

Plus, it was against the rules. Players were supposed to wear sneakers of the team colors. The Bulls' colors were red and white while Jordan's sneakers were mostly red and black. The NBA warned Jordan against wearing them, and the team would on occasion be fined.

Rod Thorn: "Scotty Stirling (NBA vice president of operations) called me and said, 'The guy can't wear the shoes.' I tell Michael, 'You can't wear the shoes.' The next thing I know I get a call from David Falk: 'What are you talking about, can't wear the shoes?'

"The next thing they have these ads, 'The Shoe Banned by the NBA.' It was a hideous looking shoe in three different colors, hideous looking at the time."

It's also one of the secrets of the NBA business, the parallel universe for the stars. The games are played and the fans and coaches analyze and count statistics and records and bestow awards. But, particularly for the stars, the colors matter. And what's classic fashion: Black and red.

When you see women in evening clothes, how often is it a red dress or black dress?

How about a classic male look. Black goes with anything.

And so you can most easily sell shoes that way. Jordan in red and black. The Bulls' colors were ideal. Portland also is red and black. So is Houston's. So Jordan was set, as far as Nike was concerned, in that 1984 draft.

Remember, in many cases the players make even more money from the shoe companies than they do from their teams.

And the Miami Heat just happened to have red and black as well. They sell sneakers, and it's likely no small reason that LeBron James ended up with the Heat with his second choice that summer of 2010 being the Bulls.

The Carmelo Anthony recruitment by the Bulls in the summer of 2014 was in many ways behind the scenes about Nike trying to guide Anthony to Chicago, needing a black and red shoe to sell for one of their big stars and to reclaim some of Chicago, where the principal Bulls players, Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah, were endorsing Adidas. Black is beautiful. But so is red.

A multimedia movement was brewing as well. With Jordan's fame, he was appearing on the late night TV shows, crossing over, as it were. He was a star with the smile, the look, the talent.

There was a classic bit when Jordan made an appearance on the David Letterman show. He was asked about the shoes and the NBA's ban.

There's no white in them," Jordan explained. "Just like the NBA," Letterman retorted.

With Jordan trying to explain the ban, Letterman deadpanned that it wasn't because they were so ugly, right?

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and all that, and kids were yearning for something different. Style was becoming prominent and color was integral.

Michael was black, but the world was seeing a rainbow, and it was being reflected as well in the shoes. Sneakers made the jump to fashion, thanks to Michael and Nike. For a nation that needed desperately to begin to look past color.

Regular season Game 1, for the record, was in the old Chicago Stadium, Oct. 26, 1984, against the Washington Bullets. Jordan scored 16 points on 5 of 16 shooting. The Bulls won 109-93 as Orlando Woolridge scored 28 points and Quintin Dailey 25.

Jordan was the story, but Chicago, having endured too much Bulls misery since 1966, wasn't yet convinced. It wasn't close to a sellout with 13,913, and in three of the Bulls next five home games they failed to draw 10,000. The two games they did draw were in that stretch against Boston with Bird, and Philadelphia with Dr. J. Fans still were coming to see the other guys. But the other guys were seeing something in Jordan.

The Bulls lost Jordan's Game 2 in Milwaukee, and there was symbolism in that one as well. Remember Kobe Bryant hurling up those series of air balls in Utah in the 1997 playoffs?

Many said it would break him to fail like that as a rookie. But Bryant was only doing what Jordan did, showing that you can fail because you tried.

There's this quote Jordan is famous for which summarizes the situation: "I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

So there it is, Game 2 of his pro career, the Bucks leading 108-106 and Jordan shooting for the tie. Air ball! Game over. No miracles yet.

Two nights later, the Bucks played the Bulls in Chicago. Jordan scored 37 points on 13 of 24 shooting with five assists and six steals. He scored 20 of the Bulls' last 26 points in the victory.

Thorn: "Milwaukee, they had the defensive player of the year, Sidney Moncrief. They double-teamed him in the second half from the midcourt line in and couldn't stop him.

"They had Moncrief, Paul Pressey, Junior Bridgeman, and Don Nelson was a defensive guru at the time, believe it or not. He didn't play anything like he played when he got to Golden State. Whatever they did, he scored.

"In the fourth quarter, he must have scored 15, 16, 17 points, just won the game by himself, and I was thinking, 'Wow, we've really got ourselves a player here.' "

Sam Smith covered the Chicago Bulls for 25 years with the Chicago Tribune. He is the author of the best-selling book "The Jordan Rules."