Twichael

Michael cried, media chastised, fans collided.

When the perhaps-best-basketball-player-in-NBA-history was about to give his 2009 Hall of Fame induction speech, tears was already flooding his face. Michael reflected his glorious days, reminiscing on his accomplishments fueled by his competitive fire. Michael recalled his former rivals. Michael thanked his coaches, friends.

But that's just no pleasing the media. Both Paula Duffy, the National Sports Examiner, and John Jackson, the Chicago Sun-Times staff, used somewhat satirical words to report about the speech. The brouhaha over Michael Jordans' allegedly pompous speech broke out immediately after the publishing of the articles blaming Jordan's speech. An interesting point, there were no articles had a positive opinion toward the speech on that day. This might be a cause of the debate on Twitter.

Michael Jordan becomes emotional as he take the stage during his enshrinement ceremony into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. (AP)

Ever since the day of Michael Jordan's speech, a huge crowd have been tweeting about Michael Jordan's Hall of Fame Induction speech. Some of the tweeters just shared a link of video and didn't suggest their personal opinions, some just tweeted about their doubts about the commentator's criticism toward the speech and Michael's behavior. But mostly, those who did comment tended to have distinct reactions. In the twitterverse, fans fall into two polars in reaction to Michael Jordan's solemn and sweet-less speech.

One group insisted that Michael Jordan's speech is a fantastic one, saying Michael is still the same "smart, cocky and funny" man. While the other group strictly described him as "bitter", "classless" and "self-centered".

Those Pro-Michaels cannot accept a word from those Anti-Michaels.

The Pros shouted out "What was so bad about the Michael Jordan speech? It was heartfelt and funny at the same time. People really need to loosen up!" 

As for the Cons, they even aggravated the tense by tweeting "Michael Jordan's selfish HOF induction speech should help put Kobe in a more positive light". When more people, especially those in spotlight, are involved in a debate, the debate can be upgraded.

So far, there are no tweets with negative attitude ": (" toward Michael Jordan's speech. Meanwhile, there are 14 tweets about the speech added with a positive attitude, ": )"

Among all the 14 positive tweets, seven were from women, four from men, and three whose genders remain unknown. All the women tweeted that their love and support for him. The three men tweeted more impartially by simply putting up the link of the video and offered no comment at all.

One reason could account for the tiny number of tweeters using attitude symbols is that most basketball fans on twitters are not likely to express their feelings in a fancy way. Athletic people seldom use such symbols as a smiling or a crying face, they tend to express their feelings, cheer or sorrow, directly though words or actions, not signs. The fact that women are more sensitive than men could explain why more female twitters eulogized the speech, or at least preferred to spend nice words on the speech than men.

Considered the time and the context in which this event took place, it is not surprising that more tweeters who criticized Michael for his impolite speech were inclined to use a satirical tone to relate Michael's issue to the other trouble makers of that week: Kanye West, Joe Wilson and Serena Williams.

This is also an interesting phenomenon to indicate that the online world, currently, are no longer just satisfied with tweeting about separate events. They have developed a new hobby, to cross tweet!

The theme of the Week of Sept. 6 to 13 was about outburst of the celebrities. In contrary, more men tend to criticize Jordan's speech by humorously (or maliciously) comparing him to the latest trouble man Kanye West, Joe Wilson and the trouble woman Serena Williams.

A delectable thing is that, 128 people tweeted quotation from Michael's speech, "Limits, like fears, are often just an illusion". And ten times more tweeters quoted another of his wise saying during speech, "There no 'I' in win, but there is an 'I' in win!"

These are the things should be tweeted and remembered instead of the rebuked part of his speech on his former rivals.

That's how it should end in twitter verse, to carve in stone the great sayings from Michael Jordan's historical speech, not to embed in mind the debatable parts or his miners. After decades, who will remember only this "disappointing" or "great" speech when they have tons of more amazing MJ moments to remember from videos of NBA Finals.