Director: Michael Jordan pulled Dennis Rodman from Chicago apartment, not Las Vegas hotel

The Bulls allowed Dennis Rodman to take a 48-hour “vacation” during the 1997-98 season. He remained away from the team even longer.

As chronicled in “The Last Dance,” Rodman flew to Las Vegas and partied. In the next scene of the ESPN documentary, Michael Jordan – corroborated by Rodman’s then-girlfriend, Carmen Electra – detailed retrieving Rodman.

Jordan:

We had to go get his ass out of bed. And I’m not going to say what’s in his bed and where he was and blah, blah, blah.

Electra:

There’s a knock on the door. It’s Michael Jordan, and I hid. I don’t want him to see me like that. So, I’m just hiding behind the couch with covers over me. “C’mon. We’ve got to get to practice.”

It was easy to get the impression Jordan went to Las Vegas. But Rodman had already returned to Chicago. He just hadn’t reported to the team.

ESPN (hat tip: Rob Schaefer of NBC Sports Chicago):

Director @jasonmhehir tells the hilarious story of MJ saying he took Dennis Rodman by his nose ring and led him out of his apartment 😂 #TheLastDance pic.twitter.com/LXpzAvItAf

— ESPN (@espn) April 27, 2020

“The Last Dance” director Jason Hehir:

I think that’s misconstrued, because I’ve seen it written a couple places that he got him out of a hotel room. He got him out of his his apartment.

He lived across the street from the United Center. He got back. His vacation – part of it happened in Vegas, of course. But he got back and still felt like he was going to do a staycation for a little bit in Chicago. So, that’s when Michael said, “Alright, I’m going to walk across the street.” It literally was across the street. So he went with the athletic trainer. They banged on his door. And Michael, I think he said off camera, grabbed him by his nose ring and just took him out.

That’s not quite as entertaining as Jordan running a covert operation in Las Vegas.

But Jordan dragging Rodman out of bed by his nose ring is still fun to imagine.