[ad_1]
Contrary to popular belief, the NBA, in fact, continued after Michael Jordan’s first retirement in 1993. Almost two full seasons were played without him, and both were crowned champions other than the Bulls. History may recall the decade that belongs entirely to Chicago, but a mini dynasty was born immediately after its decline, as the Houston Rockets got hooked on consecutive championships in 1994 and 1995.
Jordan and the Bulls regained the title in 1996 and held it until their second retirement in 1998, prompting their most ardent fans to dismiss the two Houston championships as nothing more than placeholders. The public opinion court has since treated them as historical footnotes. Unlike many of the best Western Conference players during that time, they never had a chance to prove themselves in a head-to-head Finals matchup with His Airness himself, and without such public validation, they are subject to more conversations. asterisk than any other. championship in NBA history.
But imagine Jordan did not retire in 1993. How could a showdown between his Bulls and Hakeem Olajuwon’s Rockets develop? We are going to dive into the best series that we never saw.
Who were the Rockets of the mid-1990s and why did they never face the Bulls in the finals?
Largely forgotten now, the Rockets of the mid-1990s were offensive innovators. The first to adopt the long-ball craze that has since spread through basketball, Houston led the NBA in 3-point attempts in its two championship seasons. Robert Horry was one of the NBA’s first four players, guards Vernon Maxwell, Mario Elie, and Kenny Smith shot with impunity, and for his second championship run they even managed to lure Hall of Famer Clyde Drexler to fun.
But the sun around which all this revolved, nevertheless, was Olajuwon. One of the greatest defensive players of all time and arguably the most skilled player in history, the attention Hakeem drew generated the 3-pointers those Rockets loved so much. Even despite the big defenses that held him back, Olajuwon posted two of the best playoff runs in NBA history on the way to his two titles. He averaged just under 29 points and 11 rebounds during the 1994 postseason, and then raised his score to 33 points per game in the 1995 playoffs. Those numbers overshadow any opponent of the Jordan Finals. The top playoff scorer he actually faced was Charles Barkley in 1993, who endured 26.6 points per game in that postseason.
For those two magical playoff runs, Olajuwon was totally and completely unstoppable. He just didn’t have the team around him to make it to the Finals during Jordan’s first three mobs. His relationship with management became so poor that he demanded a trade in 1992. The Rockets finally ordered his house in 1994, but by then Jordan was in Birmingham, Alabama, playing minor league baseball.
But, as Olajuwon quickly reminds people, Jordan returned in time for the 1995 postseason. He lost to Shaquille O’Neal’s Orlando Magic in the second round, a team that the Rockets wiped out. Jordan’s defenders frequently point to his remodeled baseball body as the main reason for that, but there just isn’t much statistical evidence to suggest the validity of that theory.
Jordan averaged 31.5 points per game in the 1995 playoffs, more than he did in three of his six championship postseasons, including the two that immediately followed this one. He also had a higher field goal percentage (48.4 percent) and an effective field goal percentage (50.6) than in any of the championship races since his second race of three mobs. While Jordan’s regular season numbers in 1995 saw a significant drop in his standards, his playoff numbers did not. So if Jordan’s baseball stay wasn’t the fault here, what was?
The natural decline of a champion. Dynasties tend to die organic deaths. After a certain number of years together, the charts get old, the routine of winning year after year takes its toll and the players begin to prioritize other things. O’Neal and Kobe Bryant won their first ring in 2000 and split in 2004. LeBron James’ Miami Heat lasted four seasons; Kevin Durant’s warriors, only three. It is unknown if the Jordanian Bulls would have had the same fate if he had not retired in 1993, but no less dynastic authority than Steve Kerr, a member of those Bulls and a Warriors coach, certainly believes they would have.
“Sometimes people tell me, ‘If Michael had stayed, you would have won eight in a row.’ That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard. People have no idea how emotionally draining it is for a team to keep winning,” said Kerr. David Aldridge and Michael Lee of Athletic.
At the very least, it is not a coincidence that both Chicago breaks occurred after their third consecutive championship. Other than the Bill Russell Celtics, no NBA team has won four in a row.
The Chicago roster in that Orlando series was not equipped for competition at the championship level. Virtually all of the Bulls’ championship court was gone by that time, as Horace Grant, Bill Cartwright, and Stacey King were playing for other teams when Jordan returned. Dennis Rodman, a staple of the second three mob, had not yet been acquired, and others like Kerr, Ron Harper, and Luc Longley were still adjusting to the triangle and Jordan’s presence. Not even Jerry Krause was able to piece together a dynasty caliber roster overnight, and not even Jordan is immune to his own teammates.
The Bulls finally made it to the top, but the timing just didn’t work out. Houston lost to Seattle in the 1996 postseason, and then sacrificed its 3-point shooting identity by trading Horry and Sam Cassell for Charles Barkley. The Rockets have not returned to the finals since then. It’s also a shame, because Olajuwon played Jordan as well as any NBA star.
How the bulls and rockets were paired
Very few players beat Michael Jordan face-to-face during his illustrious career. Hakeem Olajuwon is one of them. The two met 23 times in the NBA, and Olajuwon won 13 of them. Distill that only to the years when Chicago won championships, and Olajuwon still has a 6-5 lead.
A quick glance at the Chicago charts explains why. The Bulls were decidedly perimeter-oriented throughout the six championship races. They were so missing in the middle that their only remotely effective method of defending Olajuwon was to throw double teams at him. Even that hardly worked, as Hakeem went so easily from those doubles to one of his many shooters or cutters.
Wide open triples are not a desirable outcome against a team that shot as well as Houston, but the Bulls had no choice. Just look at what Olajuwon did to poor Luc Longley when he was given rare one-on-one opportunities.
Longley was too slow for Hakeem. So was Bill Cartwright, and while he wasn’t on the list yet, it’s worth noting that Rodman also fought him. Olajuwon averaged 25.9 points per game against The Worm. The two met in the playoffs once, during the 1995 Western Conference finals, and Olajuwon absolutely roasted not only Rodman, but also David Robinson, the MVP of the time, with 35.9 points per game. . The Bulls had no real answer for Hakeem.
This is a sentiment that even Jordan seems to agree with. Houston coach Rudy Tomjanovich told Michael Lee of The Athletic that Jordan had immense respect for the Rockets.
“He gave our team great respect,” said Tomjanovich. “I didn’t think they could contain Hakeem [Olajuwon]. They just didn’t have the staff to do it. And he said he thought we were the team that gave them the most trouble. “
This does not suggest that the Rockets had some kind of magic key to lock Jordan. He averaged almost 31 points in his 23 meetings with Olajuwon, after all, but Houston lived by a set of defensive principles that served him well against Jordan. While the different games featured slight wrinkles, the Rockets generally avoided over-committing to Jordan, rather than favoring conservative and basic tactics. For the most part, they allowed their solid but unspectacular defenders (Maxwell, Drexler, Eldridge Recasner) to protect him one by one.
When Jordan used screens, on or off the ball, the Rockets tended to drop the screen defender in an effort to protect the rim. That’s the pick-and-roll 101 defense.
When Jordan saw doubles, they tended to be late, when there was less risk of Jordan passing out (although, given his underrated playing ability, he still managed to do so).
Jordan earned his points, but the strategy was based on Houston’s faith in the shot. Doubling Jordan would have created a lot of open looks for his teammates. As a team that won games based on the open shots Hakeem generated from doubles, the Rockets recognized the danger of allowing similar looks to an opponent. So they stayed home with the Chicago shooters and were confident that even if Jordan hit his man, he would meet Olajuwon on the edge.
Results were mixed, but skewed positively. Jordan’s numbers against Houston largely matched their typical totals. Chicago averaged 97.9 points per game against the Rockets in the games Olajuwon played during his six championship seasons, well below his 105-point average during that period as a whole. The Bulls shot 37.5 percent from behind the arc, but those numbers were fueled by a two-game stretch in which the Bulls shot 23-of-49 in 3s. Both games came after the 1994 league decision to shorten the 3-point line. For three seasons, from 1994 to 1997, the 3-point line was a 22-foot uniform from the basket, which is the typical length only from the corners. In his other nine meetings with the Rockets in that span, they fell to 33 percent.
These are small sample sizes, and the shortened 3-point line cuts both ways. Strategically speaking, it’s rare that a team doesn’t make schematic changes during the NBA Finals, so in all likelihood Phil Jackson and Tomjanovich would have cast different looks across a potential series. But according to the basketball we saw, Houston was acquitted quite well against Jordan. He had a strategy that largely achieved the desired effect and a mismatch for which Chicago had no response. When you consider the caliber of the Bulls team that Houston likely would have faced, they could very easily have been favored in a possible Finals series.
The butterfly Effect
Jordan’s retirement, in many ways, allowed the Bulls to rebuild. Ron Harper signed with Chicago specifically to replace Jordan as his new starting guard. He may not have joined the Bulls for a banking role. Reserve Judd Buechler also signed while Jordan was retired, and his minutes summarily decreased each season upon his return. Jordan’s absence opened touches and shots for the development of Toni Kukoc, who has already had to compete with Scottie Pippen and B.J. Armstrong for the ball.
And those are just the tangible impacts of his absence. The Bulls without Jordan still had a lot of drama to deal with. Pippen stayed criminally underpaidand its relationship with management it was never smooth. Horace Grant also fought the main office, and owner Jerry Reinsdorf released it to the media after he left for Orlando in 1994. Several of his teammates revealed in “The Last Dance” that they believe his desire for credit and stardom forced him. to reveal insider information to journalist Sam Smith for his book, Jordan’s rules. The stress of competing for a fourth consecutive championship could easily have exacerbated those pre-existing problems. Jordan himself has spoken openly about the stress of his third championship. A fourth could have been the breaking point.
Pat Riley coined the term “over sickness” to describe the phenomenon of championship teams divided by roles, money and credit. It happened to Kobe and Shaq. It happened to Durant and Draymond Green. The Bulls would have faced him in 1994. No one can say how they would have handled him, but if nothing else, it seems reasonable to suggest that Championship No. 4 would have been more difficult, internally, than the first three.
In other words, evaluating this matchup is not as simple as aligning two lists. The Bulls at the time were playing with the weight of history on their shoulders. That’s a huge disadvantage, and it’s likely that it has also hurt them from a talent standpoint.
The verdict
A showdown in the 1994 Finals between the Bulls and Rockets would appear to be a shock in large part because measuring the impact Jordan would have on that list involves too many variables. Both Grant and Armstrong formed their first All-Star teams in 1994 largely thanks to the expanded offensive roles that Jordan’s absence allowed them. Would they have also played with him? Probably not, but it is impossible to say for sure.
Chicago was visibly declining for its third championship. The Bulls won just 57 games during the 1992-93 season, a 10-win drop from their 67-win season a year earlier. His net rating also dropped significantly, and it was his first championship season without having the NBA’s No. 1 offense. The Bulls won 55 games without Jordan a year later, but their retirement completely recalibrated the team. There are valid arguments for further decline or revitalization.
Houston may have won the championship in 1994, but its vision had not been fully realized at the time. Otis Thorpe, who was not shooting, was still in the starting lineup, and Drexler had not yet been acquired. The Rockets’ second highest scorer in the 1994 Finals, Maxwell, averaged just 13.4 points per game. That lack of firepower would have been problematic against the Bulls. Even with the exhaustion of three consecutive titles exhausting them, they would probably enter this series as championship favorites.
If the two played in 1995, however, Houston would be highly favored. If the Chicago dynasty had followed a typical path, this would have been the most likely time for its demise.
Olajuwon in 1995 was not only better than any player Jordan has faced in the finals, but he had one of the best playoff runs in NBA history, including Jordan. He scored 725 total points in the 1995 postseason, behind only Kawhi Leonard in 2019, LeBron James in 2018, and Jordan in 1992, and played fewer games than Leonard and James. Chicago had no one capable of defending it.
Drexler pushed Jordan to six games in the 1992 NBA Finals just three years earlier. His addition gave Olajuwon the missing partner in 1994, and also realigned Houston’s starting lineup in a very significant way. The Rockets played three guards and moved Horry to the power front full-time, taking full advantage of the 3-point line that the NBA shortened for that same season. Chicago, which had the 16 attempts over 3 points in the NBA that season, did not use the long ball as effectively. Without Harper in this scenario, probably without Grant and a less empowered Kukoc, Jordan simply would not have the manpower to deal with this Houston roster. If the Bulls had beaten Orlando and made it to the 1995 Finals, they would have lost to the Rockets, potentially badly.
What happens after that is speculative. Not knowing if they could have acquired Rodman or not, or how they would have replicated Harper’s production, or even how the team would have gotten along without the year-and-a-half break they got from Jordan’s manic competitiveness, ultimately, it’s Impossible to project how many championships they would have won in total. Heck, the Bulls even managed to spend six final runs largely intact from an injury perspective. Would Jordan have stayed healthy eight trips in a row? Your teammates?
In the end, Kerr said it best. Eight consecutive championships would have been impossible. No post-merger franchise has been equipped to handle the inevitable loss of sustained profit for so long. Jordan’s retirement gave the Bulls time to rejuvenate and reorganize for their next three championship races. In that sense, it could even have been a blessing. In the end, Jordan may have matched his ring total even without him, but his impeccable Finals record simply wouldn’t have held up against Olajuwon’s overwhelming 1995 dominance.
[ad_2]
