Dennis Rodman Shares A Unique Relation With A North Korean Leader

Dennis Rodman is one of the craziest players the world has ever seen.

Dennis Rodman Shares A Unique Relation With A North Korean Leader

“The Worm” was one of the greatest rebounders in NBA history and, with a little assistance from Michael Jordan, was essential to the Bulls’ second three-peat victory in the 1990s.

Anyone who had the good fortune to watch him play in his peak, however, is well aware of the fact that he frequently made news for events unrelated to basketball.

On the third day of his incredible adventure with VICE to Pyongyang, former NBA player Dennis Rodman hung out with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, watching the Harlem Globetrotters with him and afterwards eating sushi and drinking with him in his palace.

According to Alex Detrick, a spokesperson for the New York-based VICE media business, Rodman told Kim in front of a crowd of thousands at the gym where they sat side by side and chatted while watching players from North Korea and the U.S. play. “You have a friend for life,” Rodman said.

Since the youthful North Korean leader assumed power in December 2011, Rodman has been the most well-known American to visit Kim. The odd meeting also takes place against the backdrop of heightened animosity between Washington and Pyongyang. Just two weeks ago, North Korea conducted an underground nuclear test, making it plain that the provocative act was a message to the US to renounce what it views as its “hostile” policy against the North.

According to Shane Smith, creator of VICE, Kim, a devoted basketball enthusiast, told the former Chicago Bulls player that he believed the meeting would help to improve relations between the US and North Korea.

During Kim Jong-il’s rule, it is thought that the American administration considered sending an NBA player to North Korea many times in an effort to engage in “basketball diplomacy” with the dictator, who was known to be a fan of the Chicago Bulls.

Whether or not that was the case, it is certain that Rodman collaborated with the Vice team on a documentary in 2013 that followed a group of athletes.

Since his father’s death in 2011 and the subsequent appointment of Kim Jong Un as the nation’s Supreme Leader, no Americans have been given an official audience with Kim Jong Un until that moment. As a result, plenty of people were surprised to discover Rodman was the person to earn that very honour  after spending some time with the man he’d describe as “his friend for life.”

Smith claimed after speaking to the VICE team in Pyongyang that although Kim and Rodman conversed in English, Kim largely talked via a translator in Korean.

https://twitter.com/pcd2009/status/1636913591226888193?s=20

After chatting with the crew, Smith stated over the phone from New York that “they bonded during the game.” “The Harlem Globetrotters were putting on quite a show, and they were both enjoying the crazy shots.”

He sent a letter to Kim Jong-un shortly after arriving back in the US, pleading for the release of Kenneth Bae, an American of South Korean descent who is a member of a Christian ministry and has been imprisoned in North Korea since 2012 on charges of “hostile acts against the republic.”

Regardless of his formal position, it’s difficult to argue that he has more impact in world events than most people possibly could have imagined when he was a member of the NBA.

 

 

FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE- 

Who Can Yankees And Mets Trade In To Strengthen Their Game