Get ready for return of Dream Team; NBA TV documentary debuts tonight

Given our love for anniversaries with round numbers, the 20-year mark for the legendary 1992 Olympics powerhouse will be front and center this summer. It begins with an NBA TV documentary simply titled, The Dream Team. It debuts Wednesday at 9 p.m. (ET) and will be replayed about a million times.

Then coming in July, Jack McCallum, who covered that bunch for Sports Illustrated, will be out with a new book, Dream Team: How Michael, Magic, Larry, Charles, and the Greatest Team of All Time Conquered the World and Changed the Game of Basketball Forever.

Quite a mouthful, Jack.

Both the documentary and the book are excellent. I’m planning an interview with Jack soon.

Then again, how could they miss given the subjects?

It was an unprecedented, and never duplicated, array of transcendent superstars playing for the same team; 11 of the 12 players are in the Hall of Fame. The Dreamers featured Michael Jordan, fresh off a second NBA championship with the Bulls, trying to grab the torch away from Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, two aging stars who saved the NBA in the 80s.

The documentary details the over-the-top rock star adoration that greeted the team at every stop. And for contrast, there’s great footage of John Stockton, the short white guard, going unrecognized as he walked through the streets of Barcelona with his family.

Indeed, the best part of the documentary is the behind-the-scenes accounts of the team. It includes never-before-seen footage of an intense scrimmage in Monte Carlo in which respective team captains Jordan and Johnson played as if it was the Chicago Stadium for the NBA Finals.

There’s much more. You come away from the documentary feeling the same way as the players. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for everyone.

Said Jordan: “What we did will go down in history as one of the biggest, biggest things that ever happened. And it won’t ever be duplicated.”