An iconic figure for a dad. With six NBA Championships under his belt and several MVP titles, Michael Jordan’s kids are looking up to their father.
Though he’s the greatest basketball player of all time, he still looks at himself as human. “Each and every day is a learning experience about fatherhood,” he told Larry King in 1999 on Larry King Live. “No one is a perfect father. My kids are great. They have a lot of my personality and a lot of my wife’s personality. At the end of the day, it is about teaching them how to make decisions.”
So who are Michael Jordan’s kids? Read more to find out.
Jeffrey Michael Jordan
Born: November 18, 1988
Jeffrey Jordan is Michael Jordan’s first child with his first wife Juanita Vanoy. Before they married, Michael didn’t believe that he was his son. “She told me she was pregnant, unwed, and that the father of the child was Michael Jordan,” Vanoy’s attorney Michael Minton said to The Washington Post about meeting with her in July 1988. “She felt she could not get Michael’s attention or cooperation or response without the retention of a legal representative.” Jordan later “admitted paternity within a few months.” Michael later married Juanita on September 2, 1989 in A Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas, Nevada where Jeffrey was in attendance.
Like his father, he followed in his footsteps to play basketball. He played in high school and played college basketball at the University of Illinois and UCF. He started his first internship with Nike in the summer of 2009 and worked multiple roles in digital brand marketing, sports marketing, and performance basketball apparel. Now he leads brand digital innovation for his father’s brand.
In an interview with Forbes, Jeffrey explained that his family dynamic was “extremely competitive.” All of us are naturally competitive, including my mom. However, she did her best to make sure we did not compete ALL the time,” he recalled. “She pretty much banned the males from playing basketball one-on-one because the games would get too competitive. Anything from trivia to Monopoly, or shooting trash in a trash bin. We were competitive in everything we did—which made spending time together entertaining.”
Marcus James Jordan
Born: December 24, 1990
Marcus Jordan is the middle child of Michael Jordan and Juanita Vanoy. He played basketball in high school and college at the University of Central Florida.
In an interview with TMZ, he talked about being raised by a famous dad. “The best thing, honestly, there’s just a lot of perks,” he told the gossip site. “We were raised relatively normal. I say ‘relative’ because I didn’t take my first commercial flight until I was a junior in high school. I grew up playing Playstation on a private jet. So it’s not normal. But my mom, she’s from the South Side of Chicago, and so she made sure we stayed grounded and visited my cousins on the South Side a lot. We had a somewhat normal upbringing, going to public middle school, et cetera, et cetera.”
As for the downsides, he said, “The negative, or the worst thing, would just be having to operate under the assumption that people are always wanting something from you,” he said. “Whether it was a Jordan shoe, or a connection of some sort. You have to operate under the assumption that people are coming around with their hands out. That’s probably the only downfall
He currently runs THE TROPHY ROOM in Orlando, Florida, an elevated retail boutique that was inspired by his father’s trophy room in their family residence. He is also in a relationship with The Real Housewives of Miami star Larsa Pippen who was married to his father’s teammate Scottie Pippen. In an interview with Tamron Hall, she opened up about how she met MJ’s son “We have a lot of mutual friends, and so we’re kind of in the same circle,” she explained, noting that the duo have not known each other as long as some people believe.
The Real Housewives star added that she has been spending time with Marcus’ family, including his dad, Michael. “I’ve recently been hanging out with them, but I don’t really want to talk about them,” she said. “I feel like it’s not about, you know, my parents or his parents — they’re all happy; our whole family’s fine.”
Born: December 7, 1992
Jasmine Mickael Jordan is Michael Jordan and Juanita Vanoy’s third child and only daughter. She studied sports management at Syracuse University and met Rakeem Christmas who she eventually married and had a child, Rakeem Michael Christmas—who is Michael’s first grandchild. She also works for Nike Jordan helping to schedule appearances, photoshoots and media coverage for her father’s team that he owns the Charlotte Hornets.
In an interview with NBA.com she explained how she about their beloved father-daughter relationship. “I was definitely a daddy’s girl growing up. And, you know, he still calls me ‘Princess’ to this day and I’m almost 30. … He definitely wanted to coddle and protect and nurture and baby me as much as he can. But you also knew the harsh reality of the burden that I was going to have to endure the older I got. So he wanted to make sure I had tough skin. And I understood that, hey, there’s going to be a target on my back.”
She also recalled how his basketball retirement affected their dynamic. “When he was playing, he did his best to be as involved as he could be while I was growing up. He made sure to take me to school when he could or go to my recitals and dance and things like that that I was a part of. So once he retired, it definitely was a change in gears, and it was something that he and I really had a conversation about. It’s like, “OK, you’re done. So how do we work on the relationship? How do we even make it stronger than what it was like?” So we definitely really worked hard and put forth that effort because obviously once you take something you love away from somebody, it’s that hole — it’s a void. So do you fill it or do you just adjust? He definitely adjusted versus trying to find something else to fill it, and that’s something I appreciated. … That’s how we’re so close today.”
Victoria & Ysabel Jordan
Born: February 9, 2014
Victoria and Ysabel Jordan are Michael Jordan and Yvette Prieto’s identical twin daughters. Yvette and Michael married in 2013 after meeting at a nightclub in Miami in 2007. “Yvette and the babies are doing well and the family is overjoyed at their arrival,” spokeswoman Estee Portnoy said in a statement at the time.
Driven From Within by Michael Jordan
In Driven from Within, Michael makes it clear that the basis for his phenomenal success came from the inside out, thanks in part to those who guided him along the way. His skill, work ethic, philosophy, personal style, competitiveness and presence have flowed from the basketball court into every facet of his life.
Nearly three years removed from his last turn as an athlete, Michael’s twentieth Air Jordan shoe has helped push Nike’s Brand Jordan division to almost $500 million in sales.
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