What are the odds?
Special Edition Rate Report
Friday Rate Report X
Michael hadn't left his villa all weekend. We had this on good authority.
Lizzie, our cocktail server at the Four Seasons Anguilla, confirmed it as we motioned toward the whitewashed villas that crowned the hillside above the beach. It was sunset on Memorial Day, just twelve days ago. At first, she smiled - the kind of smile trained to uphold the privacy of VIP guests, a core pillar of the Four Seasons brand. But when we started pointing, going villa by villa like amateur paparazzi playing Guess Who?, she cracked. Giggled. Told us he hadn't shown face once.
We placed our drink order and let it go. Small talk bubbled up, and the beauty of our surroundings pulled focus from our little Seal Team Six mission.
Maybe that's why the memory replays in slow motion. The moment felt longer than ten minutes, but that's all it was, ten minutes from being seated to the moment it happened.
I saw my friends see him first. Their smiles went slack. Cheeks fell. Eyes widened. Then I whipped my head around. And there he was.
In a moment that can only be described as a scene from a movie, Michael Jordan strode across the bar in a triple-XL plain white Hanes T, with his entire family - and three deep security - in tow.
The six of us exchanged glances like the Bulls' triangle offense; sharp, instinctive, perfectly timed. We'd spent the whole day manifesting this exact dream scenario. And now, it was real.
I looked past my friends, out over the table toward the ocean. Then turned my head, just slightly, maybe thirty degrees to the left. He was now seated at his private table. His back was to me, but I could see him clearly. Head of the table. Locked in conversation with who looked to be his friend. And if there was any doubt whatsoever that this was his Airness, there it was; the signature gold hoop earring, glinting in the last light of the Memorial Day sun.
The game was afoot. It was time for action.
Group consensus was that our best chance of contact was a handwritten note - from yours truly.
So I began to write the most important note of my life. To Michael Jordan.
HOW WE GOT HERE
Dan and Emily's wedding invitation is still pinned to the whiteboard in our New York apartment. Floral print, watercolored sea turtles, a picture-perfect preview of their delightful destination: Anguilla.
When Mollie and I checked out the all in one hotel/venue recommended for the wedding weekend, we fell into a hushed silence. The room rates had a comma.
"But all our friends will be there," we tried to justify aloud.
"But RateGame," we reminded ourselves.
"But Malliouhana is part of the Boutique Luxury Hotels of the World collection - a once-in-a-lifetime affair!"
"...But RateGame," again.
Okay then. We'd find a nearby hotel. Meads Bay seemed promising, lined with what appeared to be plenty of charming alternatives. Nearly two hours and fifty browser tabs later, every single property within a four-mile radius of Malliouhana had that same pesky comma.
So: Airbnb it was. For RateGame, it had to be. And not just down the road - we ended up on the complete opposite side of the island. Susanne's place. A charming home, twenty-five minutes from the wedding venue. No commas. Spirits high. Sacrifice justified. We were making the most of it.
In hindsight, we probably should've known we were in trouble when three separate cab drivers declined before one accepted the drive to our Airbnb. Our eventual driver was a gem; an Anguillan historian in his own right, narrating the journey as we wound through half-paved roads and past storm-worn homes.
Fun facts; Anguilla is 16 miles long and shaped like an eel.
Our cab finally dropped us off at Susanne's Airbnb, a tidy little spot tucked down a gravel enclave, far from the luxury of Meads Bay, but full of character. Susanne greeted us warmly, and within moments of our arrival, she stopped mid-sentence, tilted her head, and asked in a rapid-fire German-English accent:
"You don't have a car, do you?"
We shook our heads. Suz didn't hesitate.
"No, no, no. That won't work. Taxis on this island will bleed you dry, and they never come when you need them."
She picked up her phone, made a couple of calls, and before we knew it, we were in her car. She was personally driving us right back to the port we had just come from in the cab.
We pulled into Andy's, a sun-baked lot with a lineup of slightly-battered vehicles that had clearly seen a few island monsoons. My eyes locked on a beat-up gray Jeep Wrangler with faded trim and cracked headlights.
"What's the deal with that one?" I said with a smile and a point.
The "deal" was 30 extra bucks a day. In the rental car world they call this a no brainer.
I scribbled the details of my license onto a mint green slip titled ANGUILLA TEMPORARY DRIVER'S LICENSE. A bold, all-caps command stared back at me from the inside, more warning than legal notice: DRIVE ON THE LEFT.
Jeep secured, we began our drive back toward Suz's. And that's when I first saw it.
We passed the private airport, a blink-and-you-miss-it landing strip tucked between brush and fence, and in a flash, I caught it. The snakeskin paint job. The Jumpman logo. Tail number N236MJ. It was his plane.
I turned to Mollie, half-laughing, half-shouting:
"I only recognize one private plane. And that's Michael Jordan's!"
We hadn't even unpacked yet and this was turning into a Memorial Day weekend for the ages.
Later that evening, at the wedding welcome dinner, we mentioned it to the groom to be. He leaned in, dropped his voice a notch, and all but confirmed it.
"He's here. Word is, he's staying at the Four Seasons."
MANIFEST > MATH
I'm not a mathematician, but in the Age of AI you best believe I be promptin' like Pythagoras.
So let's take a closer look - right before the Four Seasons bar, before the triangle offense of eye contact, before the note. Let's pause and do the math.
What are the odds?
Seriously. What are the actual, quantifiable odds that I would see the one private jet I know - Air Jumpman - on a landing strip in Anguilla, on Memorial Day weekend, only to end up twenty feet from him days later at the only moment he left his villa?
Let's let ChatGPT cook:
There are around 25,000 private planes in the world.
I recognize exactly one of them. One. That's 0.004%.
Michael Jordan travels frequently, but Anguilla? On Memorial Day? Let's be generous and say there's a 5% chance he's there any given year.
Mollie and I weren't even staying near the wedding venue, let alone near MJ. We booked an Airbnb across the island to save money. That's a low-probability input, let's call it 1%.
We wouldn't have passed the private airport at all if Susanne hadn't insisted we get a rental car. That entire detour was unscripted.
And even if we were both on the island, and I had seen the plane - what are the odds I show up at the same resort bar at the only moment MJ appears publicly that weekend? According to our cocktail server, Lizzie, he hadn't stepped out once. Except at sunset. On Memorial Day. Which is exactly when we walked in. Ten minutes later, he was sitting behind us.
All of that? Compound it. Multiply each micro-chance by the next. The odds aren't just low - they're practically inverted. By the time you crunch the numbies, you're hovering somewhere around 1 in a billion.
These are the odds. The math. So then...what about the manifest?
Floating in the serenity of the ocean at Cap Juluca earlier that afternoon, Mollie casually and confidently blurted aloud the precise events that would transpire just hours later:
"We're going to see Michael today. I know it. At the Four Seasons. We should go for sunset."
At the time, I remember thinking how blissfully naive she sounded. Speaking impossibilities into the ocean, believing they would somehow come true.
Welp. Seems I should take a page out of her book going forward.
Because manifesting is just another term for belief right? Perhaps it's belief to the point of delusion, but delusional belief is all that's left some days. Especially on this day, our last in Anguilla.
We didn't pull any strings to get to the Four Seasons. We couldn't afford to stay at the hotel where the wedding was. We weren't invited to any exclusive afterparty. We just bet on proximity. On showing up. On being ready when a fickle thing called opportunity shows up too.
And here's the thing about showing up: it doesn't guarantee success. It doesn't remove the need for luck. But it juuust keeps you in the game long enough for opportunity to find you.
So yes. One in a billion.
And when the light hits just right, and you've put yourself in the path of the storm, that's all it takes.
One shot.
One note.
One lightning-in-a-bottle moment.
THE NOTE
Turns out that having a direct line of sight to the back of Michael Jordan's head while he's eating dinner with his family is... extremely nerve-racking.
Perhaps if I were like the other blissfully unaware patrons of the Four Seasons — things would've been more... chill. But I'm not. I built a sports app that needs to be seen. Deserves to be used. And Michael Jordan? He could certainly help with that.
One single Rated Game from number 23 could change everything. Forever.
So... how do I get his attention?
The six of us batted ideas around as I kept one eye on Michael's perfectly bald noggin.
I could bum-rush past his trio of plainclothes security and fever-pitch him RateGame before I'm tackled and hog-tied like a sacrificial pig at the nightly beach bonfire. No - that won't work.
Ooh! Ooo! I could wait until he gets up to use the bathroom, trail him like a secret agent, casually pull up next to him at the urinal, and go for the super awkward - and minimally effective - bathroom pitch. Yeah... no dice.
Or maybe we could task our server Lizzie with finding out what he's sipping on and send a drink his way. Compliments of RateGame. Meh - too many favors to call in, with not enough certainty that the drink wouldn't be taste-tested by the Task Force Trifecta first.
So where did that leave us?
A handwritten note?
Yes. A handwritten note.
Old school. Black and white. Pen to paper. Simple yet sophisticated. We had to get this right. If there's one thing you learn building a startup, it's this: you get one chance with the big shot. The pitch has to land. No fluff. No filler. No wasted motion.
So I pulled out my phone and opened Notes.
V1 came out fast - too fast. Rambling. Earnest. and way too long. The Seal Team took one look and gave me the look - the "you know better" look. They were right. I knew it too. But I had to get the words out before I could sharpen them. Less is, in fact, more.
Meanwhile, Mollie vanished.
She returned minutes later, holding a crisp piece of Four Seasons stationery like a trophy. Heavyweight. Gold embossed. The kind of paper that says: someone cared about this message.
For the next hour - maybe longer - we workshopped that note like it was a closing argument.
Line by line. Word by word. Six of us hunched over a coffee table, debating phrasing as if we were on the sidelines in our final timeout of Game 7, down a bucket. A two for the tie, a three to win.
Should I make it playful? No - respect the moment.
Should I pitch the app? No - just spark curiosity.
Should I ask for a meeting? Absolutely not.
Should I end with Shooters shoot? A unanimous yes.
I transcribed it onto the card in my cleanest handwriting - the most deliberate penmanship of my life.
Then came the hard part.
With a steady hand and sweaty brow, I slid the note to Mollie. A baton pass of epic proportions. With MJ's security positioned perfectly at the corner of the bar, our chances of getting the note to Michael directly were slim to none. We'd decided that the best path in was through security themselves. We also concluded that these three male security guards would be far more likely to receive a note from an unassuming female fan of Michael's — as opposed to the nervous New York gorilla in the Knicks hat.
I locked eyes with Mollie and gently nodded my head. An unspoken green light between us. It was go time. As she stood and made her way toward the bar, the slow-motion effect kicked in again. Quotes from Jordan's own maxims echoed through my head as I looked back at my friends, unable to watch the interaction myself.
"You have to expect things of yourself before you can do them."
My friends were locked in — their expressions akin to watching a game-winning shot hang in the air.
"Never say never, because limits, like fears, are often just an illusion."
She had made contact. Conversation commenced. Eye contact and head nods soon followed.
"Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, others make it happen."
And then it was over.
The note had reached its intended destination. For now. The head honcho took it carefully and placed it inside the small black backpack he'd been carrying all evening. It seemed like only important things were kept in that little black bag.
And now somewhere in there, alongside passports and Mike's favorite cigars, was my note. My shot. And it read like this:
Mr. Jordan,
Which game is better; your Game 6 or Game 7 of the 2016 Finals?
I built an app to answer this.
It's called RateGame. You rate sports games you watch.
(back)
Because watching The Last Shot or hearing "Blocked by James!" are cinematic masterpieces.
RateGame is for the sports purists. It's for the ones that love the game. That's you.
If you ever want in, just say the word.
Shooters shoot.
Nick Goerg
Nick@rategame.io
2015629262
SO NOW WHAT
Sadly, the story doesn't end with a picture of me and MJ shaking hands like Michael Scott on the first day of his Dunder Mifflin internship. There's no screenshot of an email from MJ23@gmail.com. No missed call from a mystery number marked simply: Unknown.
Within minutes of the handoff, Michael rose from his seat and strolled out the way he came in - his arm around his mother. The same arm responsible for 28 game-winning shots.
We watched in awe as the entire entourage, immersed in post-dinner conversation, security forming a subtle perimeter between them and us, sauntered around the corner and disappeared. Back to their lives of luxury, as exclusive members of MJ's inner circle.
How fitting, then, that we were back to our lives as observers outside that circle. But how fulfilling that, with them, they carried a dream of ours.
At the end of the day, we don't control the outcomes. We can't script the moments. We can't force the reply or the big break.
All we control is whether we show up. Whether we're ready when the improbable arrives. And whether we take our shot.
That's what I'll always remember.
For most of my adult life, I was on the sidelines. The guy who didn't want the ball with the game on the line.
But building RateGame has changed that. It's given me reps. It's gotten me back in the gym. My confidence grows with each passing day.
What's crazy is that MJ was the only person for whom I could have written that note. I feel The Last Shot the way others feel The Godfather.
That's what RateGame is for me.
It isn't just a journal of the games I watch. It's remembering who I was when watching them. How it made me feel.
It's a love letter to these moments in time that last forever. The euphoria of #KnicksIn6, the heartbreak of Haliburton's Game 1 shot at MSG, and everything in between.
It's the sports community I've been searching for my whole life.
It's where I belong. Where the sports purists are.
Like you.
Like Mike.
Shooters shoot.
Sincerely a Sports Fan,
Nick
nick@rategame.io