NO BREAKFAST CLUB IS MORE exclusive. Early most mornings, Scottie Pippen and Ron Harper pull into the driveway of Michael Jordan's mansion in the posh Chicago suburb of Highland Park. His chef offers eggs, bacon and juice. Next on the menu is a brutal workout in Jordan's capacious gym: basketball, free weights, the works. Around 9:30, it's off to the Bulls' Deerfield practice center, where coach Phil Jackson calls their shots. After this season, though, each of the Three Basketeers--they all wear identical earrings, platinum hoops encrusted with diamonds--may be dining alone. ""I'd like to stay here if my friends were going to be here,'' Harper says. ""But they're not.''
This is it, the last running of these great Chicago Bulls. Jackson, who's coached them to five NBA championships in seven years, declared last October that it would take wild horses to keep him in his testy relationship with Bulls management after this season ends. Though Jordan may be wavering about retiring, he has said repeatedly that he will play only for Jackson. All but three of the Bulls are free agents, and Pippen, grossly underpaid throughout his career, may jump to the Phoenix Suns or anyone else who'll fatten his wallet. ""After 12 years, I should be able to stay here,'' he says. ""But I can't imagine this situation working out.''
The breakup couldn't come at a worse time for the National Basketball Association. While the league may simply be reaching the natural end of a phenomenal growth spurt, it also faces real questions about keeping its fans when the Jordan era ends. Some younger players have created image problems; no one wants the next enduring icon of the NBA to be Latrell Sprewell choking his coach. And now a major labor dispute threatens next season.
Most of this hasn't yet intruded on the court, where the Bulls have been battling with the hyper-hungry Indiana Pacers. Except for Jordan, the Bulls have looked workmanlike, sometimes brilliant, but never very happy. Maybe, like ""Seinfeld,'' the show has worn thin. For the Bulls, the final days are a media circus they could live without. Jordan, who now has four bodyguards, spends most of his public time politely saying no to the various hounds who want a piece of him. Reporters' frantic requests for face time with Mike spill over onto other players, coaches, even the team's helpless trainers.
If Jordan does split, it won't be because his game has gone south. Beyond his 10th league scoring title and fifth MVP trophy lies a more telling statistic: Jordan is one of only 14 NBA players who started every regular-season game. He is 35, but since he took almost two seasons off, his legs are only 33. What's weighing on Jordan more than age, friends say, is his increasingly dysfunctional relationship with Bulls management. The two Jerrys--Reinsdorf, the team's owner, and Krause, the general manager--won't talk about it, but they seem eager to overhaul one of the league's oldest rosters. ""I can see treating a team like this that's won nothing,'' Jordan told NEWSWEEK, ""but we're on our way to a sixth championship, and this is what we get?''
Jackson's departure is a virtual lock; his attorney, Todd Musburger, already has several other teams on call waiting. Close friends of Jordan's like Charles Oakley of the New York Knicks say he may love the game too much to quit now. One Bulls source agrees, confiding that Jordan has asked his bosses to acquire rebounder Jayson Williams of the New Jersey Nets and Jerry Stackhouse of the Detroit Pistons. But Harper insists it's over. ""Michael isn't coming back,'' he says. ""There's too much bad blood here for anybody to want to do this again.''
An implosion of its most popular team is just one signal that the NBA's golden age is in peril. That surge began with the electrifying arrivals of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson two decades ago. The Bulls, an unusually integrated team that sends off almost no racial vibes, have only enhanced the mostly African-American league's tremendous crossover appeal. The gap they'll leave behind is more generational than racial. Even before this season's widely publicized arrests, surly 'tudes and the infamous coach-choking incident, some of the older players were openly criticizing the league's kids for their immature skills, poor work ethics and me-first sassiness. Can an aging, affluent national audience continue to relate? Fans may also feel growing discomfort over NBA fights and increasingly violent play, such as this year's second annual playoff brawl between the Knicks and the Miami Heat. There's a reason boxing doesn't get good TV ratings.
Some of these fears may be overdrawn. Attendance is still strong, and fat TV contracts are in place. The Los Angeles Lakers' Kobe Bryant, touted as Jordan's heir, says fans just have to get used to the NBA's young hip-hoppers like Allen Iverson, J. R. Rider and Kevin Garnett. As for replacing MJ, ""there probably won't be another Jordan,'' Bryant says, ""but there will be great players and the league will go on.'' That's the line issued by NBA Commissioner David Stern--when he isn't talking to his labor lawyers. While you've been watching games, the league's owners have unilaterally canceled their contract with the players' union. That means a likely lockout of the players on July 1. What the owners want--a tougher salary cap and restraints on free agency--the players vehemently don't. Stern says the owners mean business. ""You hope you can deal with this in a painless way,'' he told NEWSWEEK, ""but it has to be dealt with.'' Translation: Michael Jordan could decide to return for a season that doesn't exist.
Back in 1984 the calculations were simpler. That's when Jordan joined a team that sold just 2,047 season tickets the prior year and finished 27-55. The team practiced in the gloomy gym of an old German orphanage. Michael was skinnier, he still had hair and he could not stop smiling. One November day, the bright-eyed rookie stood on a sideline and reflected on his NBA career, then nine games old. ""I'd like to think I bring both versatility and enthusiasm to the team,'' he offered. An unforgettable epoch later, who can argue?
MARK STARR