MJ is now part owner of Bobcats

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Michael Jordan is back in the NBA, resuming his basketball career in the state where it started.

Jordan became part-owner of the Charlotte Bobcats on Thursday in a deal that gives him a stake in most of majority partner Robert Johnson's ventures. Jordan's investment makes him second only to Johnson as the largest individual owner of the Bobcats. Johnson, who spent $300 million on the expansion Bobcats in 2002, said Jordan will be the managing member of basketball operations.

The founder of BET has financial interests in several media, entertainment and financial services, and became the first black owner in the NBA when he beat out a Larry Bird-backed group for Charlotte's new team.

DIRK RECORD: On the day when Michael Jordan got a new job, he lost one of his NBA records. Dallas forward Dirk Nowitzki's two free throws 30 seconds into Thursday's Game 4 of the finals gave him 184 makes from the line in this postseason, one more than Jordan's total for the Chicago Bulls in the 1988-89 playoffs.

WORD WAR: Heat coach Pat Riley said he wasn't aware of comments Mavericks owner Mark Cuban made Wednesday on CBS' "Late Show with David Letterman."

Cuban told Letterman that he was trying to make the game more fun, including some rule changes to rid the game of "that old Knicks ball, the old Pat Riley stuff, where they'd just beat up on people."

Riley was read the quote Thursday morning.

"I've been taught if you don't have anything good to say, don't say anything," Riley said. "But, you know, Mark's Mark."

COVER GIRLS: For the women who have everything, how about a magazine cover?

Five wives of Miami Heat players — Shaunie O'Neal, Siohvaughn Wade, Monique Payton, Tracy Mourning and Denika Williams — posed for the cover of Ocean Drive magazine earlier this week, a gift their husbands successfully bid for in an auction at the Heat Family Festival earlier in March. The auction raised $1.5 million to benefit charities like Jackson Memorial Hospital, Safespace and The Miami Coalition for a Safe & Drug-Free Community.

DESHAWN OPTS OUT: Ex-Jazz guard DeShawn Stevenson of the Orlando Magic has opted out of his contract and become an unrestricted free agent, ESPN.com reported Thursday. Stevenson, Utah's 2000 first-round draft pick, would have earned $3 million had he stayed with Orlando next season.

MISC: Jason McElwain, the autistic basketball manager from Rochester, N.Y., who earned national acclaim for scoring 20 points in four minutes of Greece Athena High's final home game this season, was in attendance ... Dallas has allowed an opposing player to score 30 or more points in nine of its last 16 games entering Thursday ... Not only was Game 4 sold out in Miami, the "watch party" at Dallas' American Airlines Center also was a sellout.