In August 2024, amid her success at the 2024 Paris Olympics, a video described by users on X as showing Olympic swimmer Katie Ledecky as a two-year-old ignoring basketball superstar Micheal Jordan reemerged on social media:
The video, originally shared by Ledecky in 2020, authentically showed both sports superstars in 2000, when Jordan was a part owner of the NBA’s Washington Wizards. Ledecky’s uncle was also an owner of the Washington Wizards at the time, and the video shows them and others at the owner’s box at what is now the CapitolOne Arena, the team’s home.
In a TikTok from the Paris games, Ledecky herself described the circumstances behind the clip:
My Uncle John was one of the owners of the Washington Capitals at the time. We were at a Wizards game in the owner’s box. Michael Jordan was there, he was part of the Wizards organization back then, and I was eating my popcorn and Michael Jordan started playing peekaboo with me and I was totally unfazed, just kept eating my popcorn and he started covering my mouth to try to prevent me from getting the popcorn in my mouth. …
I was definitely aware of how great he was, who he was, but totally unfazed by it. I do like to think that he inspired me and passed on a little bit of his greatness …
The existence of old photographs showing Ledecky and Micheal Jordan has been well documented since the moment she shot to stardom with a surprise gold medal finish in women’s 800-meter freestyle at the 2012 London Olympics. As reported by The Washington Post following her 2012 victory:
Katie was a fixture in the owners’ box at what is now Verizon Center. [Washington Wizards owner Ted] Leonsis recalls her at age 2, sitting next to Michael Jordan and coloring obliviously in her coloring book on the night Jordan was announced as a co-owner of the Wizards. With her brother Michael, she went to “hundreds” of Caps games, knew every player and all of their stats. She wore a Caps jersey and flung herself at the mascot Slapshot for hugs.
This photo also capturing Jordan and Ledecky, for example, was widely shared in 2012:
Because the video which reemerged on social media in 2024 authentically shows Ledecky at a Wizards game with Michael Jordan, and because this connection has been documented many times and described by Ledecky herself, the claim is True.