How Michael Jordan Broke the 'Jordan Rules' by Ric Bucher / CNN Bleacher Report / April 24, 2020
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archived as http://www.stealthskater.com/Documents/Basketball_08.doc (also …Basketball_08.pdf) => doc pdf URL-doc URL-pdf more sports-related articles are on the /Sports.htm page at doc pdf URL note: because important websites are frequently "here today but gone tomorrow", the following was archived on 04/27/2020. This is NOT an attempt to divert readers from the aforementioned website. Indeed, the reader should only read this back-up copy if the updated original cannot be found at the original author's site. https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2888183-how-michael-jordan-broke-the-jordan-rules how Michael Jordan broke the 'Jordan Rules' by Ric Bucher / CNN Bleacher Report / April 24, 2020 For the last month-or-so, the most eye-catching sports highlights on TV have been those from 30 years ago showing the low blows Michael Jordan suffered at the hands (and elbows, hips, forearms, and knees) of the Detroit Pistons. 3 consecutive postseasons Jordan and the Bulls faced the Pistons. And 3 consecutive postseasons the 'Bad Boys' (as the Pistons were known) recognized they couldn't stop 'Air Jordan' from taking flight. But they could decide when he landed. And how! After falling short (literally and figuratively) to those Pistons again and again and again, Jordan decided to ground himself. And that's when everything changed. For Jordan, the Bulls, and the NBA. 1 The Pistons referred to their strategy as "The Jordan Rules" apparently believing that "Goonery" was too indelicate. "The Jordan Rules by the Pistons were all about not letting him get to the basket," says former Bulls center Will Perdue who played in the last two of those futile Pistons series. "Nobody could stay in front of him. So his man -- usually Joe Dumars -- would try to make him go a certain direction, usually toward the baseline. A second defender would run at him with their hands up as if they were making a play on the ball except they'd literally run through Michael's body. John Salley or Dennis Rodman would get a running start and just take him out." While repeatedly getting knocked down never knocked Jordan out with an injury, the energy to pick himself up along with his insatiable hunger to prove the tactic couldn't stop him had a cumulative effect. It left him drained, both at the end of games and the end of the series. "I don't think Pistons coach Chuck Daly wanted to hurt him," Perdue says. "He was just looking to wear him out." After losing in 7 games to the Pistons in the 1990 Eastern Conference Finals, Jordan decided it was time to stop running headlong into a wall of Detroit big men and, instead, make himself into a big man. Rather than drive from the perimeter and then take flight leaving himself vulnerable to Detroit's punishing tactics, he worked on catching the ball where he was a scoring threat without taking a dribble: on the low block near the basket. It was an unorthodox tactic to have a 6'6" 198-pound shooting guard play that way. But it was possible because of the Bulls' equal-opportunity Triangle offense which was predicated on interchangeable players reading the defense and collectively recognizing its weak spot. "The Triangle was the ultimate disguise because we never ran a play," says point guard B.J. Armstrong who arrived as a rookie for that 7-game loss to the Pistons and stuck around long enough to pick up 3 championship rings. "Once he figured out how to manipulate the defense, there was no denying him. He'd pick apart the game as he saw fit." First, though, Jordan had 2 items on his to-do list. Get stronger and perfect his post game. "The 'Jordan Rules' worked as long as Michael played a traditional way," Armstrong says. "But he made an adjustment. … He figured out he had to catch the ball in position to score. So he learned to operate from the post and on the weak side and play the game with 3 dribbles or less. Now when he caught it, because his footwork was so good, he could score in a multitude of ways. He was skilled enough to adapt to any situation. "He wasn't just a jump shooter. He wasn't just a post player. He could play every phase of the game. At both ends. He was as fundamentally sound and complete on defense as he was on offense. His thinking was 'Y'all want to get tough? Not only can I score on you, I can also stop you.' He could always adjust. His opponent couldn't." Video Clip of the 'Bad Boys' vs 'Air Jordan' Fitness trainer Tim Grover became part of the equation after reading an article about how the Pistons' physicality was wearing Jordan down physically and mentally. He contacted the Bulls and offered his services. Jordan gave him a 30-day trial which turned into a career-long relationship. 2 "He trained exclusively with him by the time I got there," says swingman Jud Buechler who was part of the Bulls' second three-peat. " It wasn't that they were doing anything that far ahead of the curve. Some guys are just built. Mike didn't look like a bodybuilder. But the times I ended up on him in practice, it was no fun. He had this natural strength. Especially his core. From the waist down, he was a rock. You could not move him." [StealthSkater note: Jerry West once said the same thing about Elgin Baylor who is generally regarded as the 'Michael Jordan' of that era. "Elgin would yo-yo his dribble. I don't think a football player could knock him off stride when he drove to the basket." Unfortunately, Baylor's injured knees (and Boston's Bill Russell) prevented him from winning a NBA championship.] To hone his back-to-the-basket game, Jordan spent the entire 1990-91 season dragging 6'10", 230-lb rookie power forward Scott Williams onto the floor for post-practice one-on-one sessions with one rule: only post moves allowed. "I probably played more one-on-one with Michael than anybody other than his brothers," Williams says. "He always grabbed me after practice. We played free-throw line down. I beat him once. ... Well, I beat him and he called an offensive foul on me and then scored three straight to finish the game. He was relentless." The plan worked. On their 4th try, Jordan and the Bulls swept the Pistons in the Eastern Conference Finals and won the first of their 6 titles in the spring of '91. That didn't stop other players from trying to physically intimidate Jordan even if their tactics were far more subtle than the Pistons'. "Guys would file their fingernails a certain way so they'd come to points like claws and just rake him," Perdue says. "He'd look like he had jumped over a barbed wire fence and didn't make it. There were marks all over his back, legs, arms. It was almost a badge of honor for him. 'Look at what this guy tried to do to me,' he said once." Not that Jordan wanted anyone to feel sorry for him. Quite the opposite. He never wanted opponents to think they were good enough to affect him or his play. Winning the psychological battle was as important to Jordan as the physical one. "He wanted to make things look effortless like he wasn't even working that hard," Armstrong says. "That was part of the act. Because then people didn't realize just how much energy he was expending. Even with the Bulls, he made it look like he just showed up. He'd walk in 25 minutes before practice. What most people didn't know is he'd already worked out at his home gym, ate breakfast, and played 18 holes of golf. MJ was a grinder at heart." Another part of the "act" required his teammates to play along. Perpetrators who knocked Jordan down with a hard foul weren't to be confronted lest that Bull should find Jordan in his face. "He'd get mad at somebody on our team for going at somebody on his behalf because he felt it was giving that person [who fouled him] too much credit," Perdue says. "It was part of the mental game for him. He never wanted anyone to think any of it got to him." 3 That extended to how he dealt with the referees. He certainly did his share of griping about missed calls. But he was calculated in how he did it. "He rarely barked at the referees," says Steve Kerr, a guard on the Bulls' second three-peat squads. "He would hold his jersey up near his mouth and make his point. He didn't want anyone seeing that he was frustrated or angry." Jordan didn't even want his teammates knowing if he was hurt in an effort to prevent that information from leaking and providing an opening for an opponent. "Back then, if you knew a guy had a bad hand, you were going to find a way to whack it," Perdue says. "He once got a really bad infection in the webbing between his toes. He had to be hospitalized. He kept the IV insertion needle taped to his arm. He'd have the IV in until we practiced; unhook it and practice; and then go back to the hospital. Other than that, though, you never saw him getting treatment.