Sigh... The START of the 1995 season was THE year that Jordan was going to have his revenge for letting Nick Anderson embarrass him during the east play-offs; at the END of the 1995 season (joined team with 17 games left). 1996 was also the start of nagging injuries for Hakeem. He could just never get over those aching knees and back. During the 72-win Bulls, Jordan was the *best player on the planet* at the time, his 95-96 team was one of the best ever. Sure, we had Hakeem. But it wasn't like he was leading a dominating team that year OR was at the top of his game; not like 95. We only won 48 games that year (in 1996-97 we achived our 2nd best record w/Barkley: 57). Our best team ever was the 1994-95 team. That team had a small chance. Emphasis, "small." Our 2004 team? Well, we'll see. But I do think that our current team could have played the 1993 Sonics a lot better. One of the reason we struggled was because we never had a guard/foward that could break down the defense during the 83 season. We had Floyd. But he's no TMac. Also, we weren't that good a passing team. We were "centric." Or should I say, center-centric (Hakeem in the post). And they just swarmed him every chance they could get. And since Hakeem wasn't a good passer at that time, that made things worse. Our 2004 team would have alleviated a lot of the problems that our 1993 team struggled against. For one, we have two stars. We can pass a lot better (all our players) and we have more collective talent; from 3-12. JVG will also emphasise defense, so there's not much loss there (execpt Hakeem's blocks). But our defense vs the Sonics wasn't a big an issue compared to our limited offense; they had our number. Not so anymore.
Many teams have been around with two young stars and a veteran cast. Better to compare them to, you know, teams with players that actually resemble Yao and T-Mac. Payton is nothing like T-Mac. Kemp bares even less resemblance to Yao.
God I hated that Seattle team! They just destroyed us every single time. The way they played zone killed us. We got Barkley to beat them. It worked....but then the Jazz got us. uggg...I hate the Jazz too!
Had we played them in the playoffs either of our two championship years....I just don't see us having one. They just matched up with us too well. Nice that they got knocked out so soon
