Michael Jordan: Legends in Sports (6 page)

Despite all the changes and their poor exhibition season, the Bulls won their season opener against Cleveland, 116–115. Michael
scored 29 points, including 7 in overtime.

The next night, the Detroit Pistons came to town. Late in the game, Michael drove to the basket. Detroit center Bill Laimbeer,
known for his aggressive play, moved over to try to block Michael’s shot.

Laimbeer missed the ball, but he didn’t miss Michael, slamming him to the court. Michael’s teammates rushed onto the floor,
and the game was stopped for several minutes before the referees could restore order.

Once again, Michael got even. For the rest of the
quarter, he couldn’t be stopped. He finished with 33 points, and the Bulls won again, 121–118.

Despite all their problems and changes, the Bulls were somehow 2–0. Maybe Michael was right to be optimistic.

On October 29, the Bulls traveled to Oakland, California, to play the Golden State Warriors. The Oakland Coliseum was packed
with fans anxious to see Michael Jordan. When the game got going, he did not disappoint.

In the second period, Michael made a move to the basket. Suddenly, he fell to the floor. When he stood up, he couldn’t put
any weight on his left foot. His teammates had to help him to the locker room.

Michael missed the rest of the game, but the Bulls held on to win their third game in a row. Michael showed up at practice
the next day on crutches. The team doctor diagnosed the injury as a sprained ankle.

But the pain in Michael’s foot wouldn’t go away. A week later, a CAT scan revealed a small break, and doctors placed the foot
in a cast. They told Michael he would miss a couple months of the season.

Without Michael Jordan, the Bulls were not a very good basketball team. They lost four games in a row
and were suddenly just as bad as they had been two seasons before.

The injury was slow to heal. As the Bulls dropped lower in the standings, Michael became frustrated and depressed. Coach Albeck
and Jerry Krauss wanted him to travel with the team while he recovered, but Michael refused. He thought the team might play
better if the players weren’t always looking over their shoulders at him, wondering when he would return. “They need to have
their own identity,” he told reporters.

Unable to play, Michael decided it was time to make good on his promise to his mother. So instead of sitting around waiting
for his ankle to heal, he went back to North Carolina and finished his degree.

Michael was finally able to return to action on March 15, 1986. He had missed a total of 64 games.

Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf wanted Michael to work his way back slowly, playing only a limited number of minutes in each game
over the last few weeks of the season. He didn’t want to risk another injury. But Michael wanted to play, and play hard.
He couldn’t stand to play any other way. Besides, despite their poor record, the Bulls still had an outside change to make
the playoffs.

It took Michael Jordan several weeks, and several long arguments with Reinsdorf, to finally get his way. But it didn’t take
him long to get the hang of basketball again. After being inserted into the lineup in the second quarter of a game against
the Milwaukee Bucks, he took the ball straight to the hoop as soon as he touched it, dunking over seven-foot-three-inch Randy
Breuer. As soon as Michael started playing full-time again, the Bulls started winning. By the end of the season, they had
clinched the last spot in the playoffs.

Their first opponents in the playoffs were the great Boston Celtics, champions of the Eastern Conference and perhaps the best
defensive team in the league. The Celtics were led by forward Larry Bird, the smartest and arguably the best player in the
NBA. Celtic guard Dennis Johnson, considered one of the league’s top defensive guards, would be guarding Michael. No one gave
the Bulls a chance.

But after sitting out for much of the season, Michael was well rested. His foot was completely
healed, and he was at the peak of his game. The Celtics paid the price.

In game one, played in Boston, Michael started out by hitting his first five shots. The Celtics double-teamed him every time
he had the ball. That hardly slowed him down.

He scored over, under, and around every Celtic player who tried to guard him. He hit for an amazing 49 points — nearly half
the Bulls’ total score. But after trailing by only two at halftime, the Bulls eventually lost, 123–104.

In game two, Michael was even better. He moved through the Celtics as though their sneakers were filled with concrete. If
he was challenged out front, he slashed to the basket and jammed the ball. If a player tried to block his shot, he soared
around him and laid in a reverse finger roll. When the defense backed off, Michael calmly canned a jumper. There was simply
no way to stop him, and toward the end of the fourth quarter, he made it clear he was out to win.

With only seconds remaining and the Bulls down by two points, Michael launched a three-pointer. The ball rolled off the rim,
but he was fouled on the
shot. He sank both free throws to tie the game and sent it into overtime.

The Bulls let Michael work his magic. He and the Celtics traded baskets in the extra period. It was five-on-one and Michael
was holding his own. At the end of overtime, the score was tied again.

In the second overtime, the Celtics finally pulled ahead and won, 135–131. But Michael had scored an unbelievable 63 points.
No one in NBA history had ever scored that many points during a playoff game.

Even though they had won, after the game, the Celtics could only talk about Michael Jordan. Celtic captain Larry Bird was
most effusive in his praise. “I couldn’t believe anybody could do that against the Boston Celtics,” Bird told reporters. “It
shows you what kind of person he is. I think he’s God disguised as Michael Jordan.”

The Bulls and Celtics traveled to Chicago for game three. Despite the fact that he had home-court advantage, Michael Jordan
couldn’t maintain his intensity. After his remarkable performance in games one and two, he scored only 19 points with 10 assists
and 9 rebounds before fouling out with
five minutes remaining. The Bulls lost, 122–104. The season was over, but one thing was clear — Michael Jordan was the most
exciting player in the NBA.

Michael was doing things that no single basketball player had ever done before. It was as if the greatest players of all time
had been combined into one person. His old hero David Thompson had always been considered the greatest leaper in the NBA,
but Michael jumped just as well as Thompson. When Michael jumped, he seemed to hang in the air. Defenders went up with him,
but they fell back to earth while he was still rising. Julius Erving of the Philadelphia 76ers had been considered the best
dunker in the NBA, but not even Doctor J could do some of the 360-degree reverse slam jams Michael was now making. Magic Johnson
of the Los Angeles Lakers and Larry Bird of the Celtics were considered the most complete players in the game, but now some
people were saying that Michael could pass the ball, rebound, and defend as well as either man.

But Michael was not satisfied with his personal accomplishments. As much as he liked to score, he liked to win even more.
He wouldn’t be satisfied until the Bulls were winners.

That summer the team had another new coach. Doug Collins stepped in and replaced Stan Albeck. Like his predecessor, Collins
turned Michael Jordan loose.

When the 1986–87 season began, Michael picked up right where he had left off. In the exhibition season, he scored over 40
points nine times. Four times he scored over 50 points, and in one game he scored 61. Not since seven-foot center Wilt Chamberlain
averaged 50.4 points per game in the 1961–62 season had any NBA player scored so many points.

Michael kept right on going in the regular season. With virtually the same lineup as the year before, the Bulls needed him
to score as much as possible to have a chance to win. No one else on the team was as consistent a scorer.

Every time the Bulls stepped onto the court in 1986–87, the game featured a solo performance by Michael Jordan. Somehow, he
seemed to keep getting better. Over the course of the season, he scored more than 30 points an amazing 62 times. In 36 of
those games, he scored over 40 points; six times he broke the 50-point mark; and twice he hit over 60 points.

Opposing teams were helpless to stop him. Neither double-teams nor triple-teams made much of a difference. Michael often saved
his best for late in the game, as if he relished the pressure. Several times during the season, he outscored the other team
in the final quarter. In one game, against the New York Knicks, he scored the Bulls’ last eighteen points to help Chicago
win by two, 101–99.

Michael cemented his status as the most exciting player in the NBA during the All-Star weekend at the Kingdome in Seattle,
Washington. He participated in the slam-dunk contest and came away with his first slam-dunk title. He called his winning dunk
the “Kiss the Rim” jam. The victory earned Michael $12,000, which he split among his Bull teammates.

Yet Michael was more than a scoring machine and human highlight film. He did whatever he could to help his team. When Bulls
coach Doug Collins asked Michael to play forward sometimes so he could put another shooter into the guard spot, Michael readily
agreed. In addition to averaging 37.1 points per game — third best in NBA history — Michael also averaged five rebounds and
nearly five assists. His
total of 236 steals was second best in the league, and his 125 blocked shots led the Bulls.

Still, when playoff time rolled around, it was the same old story. The Bulls played the Celtics again. Michael was magnificent,
but Boston won in three games.

Some sportswriters around the league took delight in the Bulls’ defeat. They thought Michael Jordan, despite his obvious ability,
was a selfish player. They referred to the Bulls as “Team Jordan,” as if the other players just didn’t matter.

Michael Jordan had accomplished nearly everything possible on the basketball court. Although he had collected both an NCAA
title and an Olympic gold medal, one goal still eluded him: an NBA championship. Michael knew that until his team won a championship,
there would still be some critics who thought of him as something less than a complete player.

And good as he was, not even Michael Jordan could win an NBA championship all by himself.

CHAPTER FIVE
1987–1990

If Michael Jordan was ever to reach his goal of winning the NBA championship, he needed some help. The Bulls needed better
players and someone else who could score. Center Dave Corzine, a former All-Star, was near the end of his career and soon
would have to be replaced. Apart from Michael, Charles Oakley was the only Bulls player who was much of a scoring threat,
and most of his points came on rebounds. Guard John Paxson was a good outside shooter, but he was unable to create his own
shot. In short, there was no one to pick up the scoring slack if Michael slipped below his usual standards.

Moreover, the Bulls needed help on defense. Even when Michael Jordan did score 40 or 50 points, the Bulls sometimes lost.
They couldn’t keep
the other team from scoring. The Bulls just weren’t good enough to challenge for the NBA title.

Before the 1987–88 season, the Bulls finally got a little help. In the NBA draft, the Bulls selected forwards Scottie Pippen
and Horace Grant. Grant was a big banger who could rebound, play defense, and post up under the basket. Pippen was more of
a finesse player. Quick and aggressive on defense, Pippen always looked for the steal and was willing to dive after loose
balls. On offense, he could run the floor and hit the jump shot.

When the Bulls opened the season, Michael worked to prove his critics wrong. Now that he had a surrounding cast, he became
more of a playmaker, passing the ball, setting picks, and sometimes acting as a decoy.

The strategy worked. The Bulls jumped off to a 7–1 start. On occasion, Michael was as explosive as ever, hitting for 40 or
more points in a game. But he was content to score much less if the Bulls could still win.