I think there is a misunderstanding here. The NBA decided to commission a film crew to film Michael Jordan's, at the time, potential final season. Jordan only agreed to this if he had legal rights to approve/disapprove the usage of any and all of the footage. He owns the rights to the overwhelming amount of footage used in the doc. This doc literally could not be made without him. It is not like Jason Hehir/Michael Tollin has some unique idea for a doc on MJ. They wanted to make this specific doc with this footage, that's the whole point... This footage has been the crown jewell in the eyes of any sports documentarian for years. Tollin was just able to convince Jordan to make the doc as of 2016 (after many others had failed to do so.) I understand Ken Burns point but this doc exists in a different set of circumstances.
I think there is a misunderstanding here. The NBA decided to commission a film crew to film Michael Jordan's, at the time, potential final season. Jordan only agreed to this if he had legal rights to approve/disapprove the usage of any and all of the footage. He owns the rights to the overwhelming amount of footage used in the doc. This doc literally could not be made without him. It is not like Jason Hehir/Michael Tollin has some unique idea for a doc on MJ. They wanted to make this specific doc with this footage, that's the whole point... This footage has been the crown jewell in the eyes of any sports documentarian for years. Tollin was just able to convince Jordan to make the doc as of 2016 (after many others had failed to do so.) I understand Ken Burns point but this doc exists in a different set of circumstances.