i've seen all but maybe 8 pistons games this year, and i can tell you they are for real. of course you can't win every game, and there will be games when the other team is shooting lights out, and you won't be able to do anything about that. that happened when chucky atkins torched them, as well as gilbert arenas. but that is by far the exception and not the rule. see the 2 drummings of the spurs, each by 15; see how they manhandled other elite teams including the heat. forcing teams into long 3's and shutting down the middle will get you wins 90% of the time. and flip has definitely opened up the offense, no question about it. once the playoffs start and the pace slows down, look for them to pick up their defensive intensity. and expect another championship.
they're not just beating teams, either. my impression of the 72 win Bulls team was that they weren't as good as their record. my impression of this Pistons teams is that they're every bit as good as their record indicates. they're beating the crap out of good teams.
Bulls beat teams by an average of 12.3 points that year. The Pistons beat teams by 9.3, which is far and away the best in the NBA (Spurs are second at 6.9), but nowhere near the Bulls mark. Think about that ... you beat a team by 11 points, and that's a let-down.
yeah, that bulls team was pretty dominant, I just remember how much of a big deal it was when they lost a game.
That's faulty logic. I'm not trying to undermine the Bull's accopmlishments, but the texture of the game back then were completely different. You could do many things back then on the defensive that you can't do today, like hand checking and what not. So defending against today's "untouchable" guards poses a much more difficult task.
my impression of the 72-10 bulls was that they were even more dominant than their record. it was like beating them when it meant something was impossible. i think 5 of their 10 losses were to super crappy teams b/c they just didn't pay attention to that game. and as the denver game showed, they could get down by 31 and then erase the whole damn thing in under a quarter. whenever they actually played anyone decent, they basically didn't lose except the knicks game and the 2 home losses near the end of the season. and i don't see how defensive rule changes affect point differential. as long as the bulls and their opponents played by the same rules and the pistons and their opponents play by the same rules, then everything is equal.
pistons are struggling a bit against the nets. kidd is actually shooting well. curious to see how this one ends.
I think it's true they were better than their record. When that Bulls team turned up their defensive intensity to maximum, other squads had no chance. Their man defense was incredible and forced a boatload of turnovers. They often made teams look completely foolish.
that was only really dominant of the last three championship bulls teams, in my opinion. it was built perfectly, just like the early years of the shaq-kobe partnership. jordan, pippen would easily neutralize any of the opposing team's star players. rodman was a dominant player in his own way (rebounding and post defense), like horry later for the lakers (clutch shooting and post defense). kukoc was a great utility player. harper was the perfect non-playmaking point guard and physical defender. plus, in the first two years of that run, they had guys like jason caffey and brian williams to provide muscle in the paint. in the last championship year, they were weak. i think they lost both caffey and williams, and were left with longley and wennington in the paint, along with buechler and kerr coming off the bench. jordan had lost his athleticism and depended too much on the turnaround fadeaway. frankly, that was a sad lineup. which makes their last championship even more impressive. the conference finals vs. the pacers ranks as one of the greatest ever in recent memory, along with lakers/kings. both series were identical--two superstars with a fading supporting cast, matched up against a loaded, deep, talented, physically superior team.
fair enough...i don't know the stats. guess i'm going by my vague impressions at the time. i just remember thinking, there's no way this is the best team of all time. i still don't think they are/were.
Hahaha, yes kind of. It also means that the defense-oriented Pistons go up against 'untouchable' guards nite in and nite out. Don't get me wrong, Jordan was AMAZING, but if they were restricted on the defensive end to today's rules, I'm highly doubtful that their record would be so lustrous.
you almost can't compare the two eras anymore anyway(mid-late 80's and present day)--not just because of the rules, but because of how expansion has killed the rosters. past contenders were so deep and talented, while these days, your front office has to be a genius to build a legitmately deep and talented team (san antonio, detroit). i really believe that if you remove about 5 or 6 unnecessary teams from the league (toronto, orlando, atlanta, etc.), the quality of play and competition in the playoffs will be much more enjoyable. of course, i'm not the first to propose this.
This man has hit the nail on the head, for sure. I remember watching tons of Bulls games that year, and Jordan/Pippen would do this double-team on the other team's hottest player- Tim Hardaway, Reggie Miller, etc.- and I always remember the players fumbling the ball out of bounds, Jordan or Pippen stealing the ball, etc. Always. They just threw teams out of whack. They ran offensive sets to perfection and smothered the heck out of teams. I've watched basketball religiously over the past 19 years, and the 72-10 Bulls were definitely the best. Top 5: 1995-1996 Bulls 2000-2001 Lakers (mostly for the playoffs, not sure about the regular season) 1985-1986 Celtics 1987-1988 Lakers 1994-1995 Rockets Yes, #5 is biased. But, still, the #6 seed. Many around the country were pulling for the Rockets that year. The first is always the most special, but the DRAMA in each playoff series in 1995 was just undescribable.
