Michael Jordan was asked how the confidence level of this year’s Bulls compared with the confidence of the team that won three straight championships. “I think we’re confident,” he said, but added, “The team that won three championships had a different swagger to it.” Winning between 57 and 67 games a year gave that team a track record of success during the regular season and a position to defend in the playoff seedings. While this season’s Bulls finished 13-4 after Jordan’s return, their overall record was 47-35, only fifth best in the Eastern Conference of the National Basketball Association, meaning that barring any Cinderella upsets, they would concede the home-court advantage in every playoff series. “I believe in this team,” Jordan added. “I believe in myself. I believe in our chances–or else I wouldn’t have come back.” But “it isn’t the same swagger” the Bulls had from 1990 through 1993.
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That quality is not in the makeup of the current Bulls. For one thing, they’ve been preoccupied with the sheer mechanics of working Jordan back into the lineup. But the other thing is that Jordan, as ever, appears to be dictating the team’s temperament, simply by his force as a leader. And while Jordan seems as mentally tough as ever, he doesn’t seem as ruthless as before.
“I think what he experienced in minor-league baseball kind of gave him a better understanding of what other people have to do,” said Will Perdue, “and how they have to [develop] the work ethic to reach a certain level. I think he got a better understanding of that when he saw how many guys were just trying to make it in the minor leagues, with the hope of maybe one day playing in the majors.”
“I’d be more concerned with their open-court play,” he added. “Their open-court advance up the floor, at times, it’s devastating. You’re looking at Michael and then Pippen is attacking you. You’re looking at both of them and B.J. Armstrong is spotting up. They have the ball in the hands of Kukoc, who can do damage with the attack or the pass. So they’re a very, very good open-court team.”
The playoffs, however, are not a time for beauty. “Let’s face it,” Bach said Saturday, “the playoffs are the half-court game.” And the Bulls know that Bach knows their half-court triangle offense “better than anyone else out there besides us,” as Perdue put it. No doubt Bach had some tactics up his sleeve that he was not about to share during a meaningless regular- season game.
