Sports The 90's Bulls were the best NBA team of all time

[regular john]

if jordan would have been called for palming/carrying and travelling he would have been nothing but another good player. disgusting what he was able to get away with.

are you trying to be edgy? Did he get a lot of favourable calls? yes; was he just "another good player" under any circumstances? please.

Nobody was helping him hit fade away jumpers like it was nothing.

 

[regular john]

For OP

General - Jordan > Lebron

Who thinks Lebron is better? Jordan has the edge in skills, heart, overall athleticism, individual accomplishments and titles.

Imagine them playing 1 on 1. Lebron would break the rim with so many forced jumpers that he has no chance of hitting. Regular Jordan falls off the couch and beats him; Angry Jordan makes him want to give up playing basketball.

 

[GO BIG RED!!!]

are you trying to be edgy? Did he get a lot of favourable calls? yes; was he just "another good player" under any circumstances? please.

Nobody was helping him hit fade away jumpers like it was nothing.

the other players even had a name for it. the jordan rules. were they just trying to be edgy?

 

[regular john]

the other players even had a name for it. the jordan rules. were they just trying to be edgy?

wasn't "Jordan rules" a team-agreement among the Pistons where they had special rules saying they had to fuck Jordan up every time he drove to the basket?

anyway, are you taking at face value the words of the players that got schooled by Jordan as evidence that he was favoured by the refs?

 

[tang]

17-18 Warriors vs 90s Bulls = Warriors all day.

hard to guard the warriors perimeter, Steph is faster and release is quicker than Jordan
Klay, Green > Pippen, Rodman
Warriors have better team chemistry, team adores Steph, team hates Jordan
Steve Kerr knows all about the Bulls

 

[regular john]

and so I've been watching a lot of late 90's games and I'll share some thoughts:

Jordan was so good, when he finally shoots a bad shot you remember that one forever. say I watched ~10 games. the worst game (G4 against Miami in the 1997 playoffs) he scored 30+ points. he was so aggressive the other team would just concede. he would grab the ball and try to score every single time.

the Bulls were a good team in the sense that it complemented Jordan. no one else was really reliable. Pippen could score 20/8/8 one night and struggle to score 10+ points the next. Kukoc would explode for ~20 points if he got into a good rhythm or he could stink the place and fail to score a measly 5 points if he lost his confidence. they had Bill Wennington and Randy Brown starting at some points. Longley was a standing post. Jordan was the team.

seems that every team had one all star but most didn't have two. teams were well rounded with deep rosters and lots of guys whose job was to play ~9 minutes, score 8 its, grab 5 rebounds and make a couple fouls on the other team's star. I'm concentrating on the late 90's Indiana Pacers now, watching the 1998 Bulls vs Pacers series. it's impossible to think of that team with today's eyes. They were close to getting to the finals without having a consistent 20 pts scorer. one night they look like a great team, the other night they look hopeless. They got routed so bad in G5 it was painful to see, then played perfect team basketball in G6. Beat the Bulls with Reggie Miller having one of the most awful games ever (shot 2-13); Rik Smits scored 25 on 11-12 shooting; Jordan scored 35.

 

[regular john]

17-18 Warriors vs 90s Bulls = Warriors all day.

hard to guard the warriors perimeter, Steph is faster and release is quicker than Jordan
Klay, Green > Pippen, Rodman
Warriors have better team chemistry, team adores Steph, team hates Jordan
Steve Kerr knows all about the Bulls

I've been thinking about this. it's impossible to compare. I don't know of other team sport that has changed as much in the last ~20 years. These 90's games are wars from start to finish, games are contested possession by possession. You don't go to halftime losing by 20 and comeback. we're left to speculation but I feel that the Bulls defense would overwhelm Klay and negate Green while Jordan's game translates to any era. he is the most versatile scorer I know of. Overall I believe the Bulls adapt much better to the current era than the Warriors adapt to the 90's.

 

[tang]

I've been thinking about this. it's impossible to compare. I don't know of other team sport that has changed as much in the last ~20 years. These 90's games are wars from start to finish, games are contested possession by possession. You don't go to halftime losing by 20 and comeback. we're left to speculation but I feel that the Bulls defense would overwhelm Klay and negate Green while Jordan's game translates to any era. he is the most versatile scorer I know of. Overall I believe the Bulls adapt much better to the current era than the Warriors adapt to the 90's.

well, same things could be said about Curry, his plays were unbelievable that season. chucking up deep 3's and half court shots like nothing, I believe even a Bulls defense will be rattled with that kind of capability, I don't even know how you could adapt to that type of offense. I contribute the modern NBA being able to slow down Curry is due to Curry slowing down on his own (lost fire or motivation), not because they figured out some magic defense. When Warriors are all healthy and clicking, they were literally impossible to beat, they'd only have to be beaten by themselves (making dumb mistakes)

but you're right. it is impossible to compare. If they were the best team in their era, they should just be recognized as that

Bulls team is made to handle everything in their era
Warriors team is made to handle everything in their era

both teams thrived because they were always one up above every other team in their own era