[Chicago Tribune] Hakeem, Drexler and Jordan?

Thought this was an interesting article. Not sure of the veracity if anyone would like to chime in:



Draft deal stranger than '1984'
Olajuwon says he, Jordan, Drexler could have been Rockets teammates

It's one of the great urban legends in NBA draft annals, a scenario that would have changed league history and maybe the entire Michael Jordan legend -- possibly made it even greater. And subsequent NBA history might be defined more by Houston than Boston, Los Angeles or Chicago.

Jordan and Hakeem Olajuwon playing together for their entire careers. How many championships would that have meant?

There are no precise parallels this year, though there are similarities with the franchise center, Greg Oden, the consensus No. 1 pick in Thursday's NBA draft. The best talent might be swingman Kevin Durant, the likely No. 2 pick.

In 1984, the consensus No. 1 pick was Olajuwon, the center on Houston's Phi Slamma Jammers. Jordan was the college player of the year at North Carolina, so he was hardly a secret. But no one imagined the heights to which he would rise.

Even then-Bulls general manager Rod Thorn warned on draft day that Jordan wasn't the kind of player you could rely upon to turn around a franchise. And it was no secret the Bulls were eager to get Olajuwon.

In fact, their manipulation was part of the reason the NBA went to a draft lottery the next year.

Back then, the teams with the poorest records in each conference flipped a coin for the No. 1 draft pick. The Bulls tried desperately to get into that flip, hoping they were due. They were in the coin flip in 1979 and lost: The Lakers got to take Magic Johnson and the Bulls got David Greenwood.

How would a reversal there have changed basketball history? The Bulls had Artis Gilmore, and Johnson had expressed an interest in playing with either Gilmore or Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

In 1984, the Bulls traded their best player, Reggie Theus, for backup big man Steve Johnson and second-round picks and went on to lose 27 of their last 33 after the trade (they were seven below .500 at the time) to finish 27-55.

The Rockets were every bit as creative. They had Ralph Sampson, No. 1 from the previous draft, but played him sparingly down the stretch and lost nine of their last 10.

The Bulls missed getting the worst record in the East by one game, and Houston got it in the West. With the apparent dumping of games to get a franchise center too obvious, the NBA changed the draft rules.

But now it got interesting.

Houston had the No. 1 pick and Portland was No. 2. The Pacers had the second pick, but had traded the rights in 1981 for center Tom Owens because they'd lost James Edwards as a free agent and needed a center. Portland, meanwhile, was loaded at the shooting-guard position with future Hall of Famer Clyde Drexler and All-Star Jim Paxson.

The Blazers were looking to recreate their 1977 championship team with a Bill Walton-type center who could pass.

"Jack (Ramsay, the Trail Blazers' coach) took a lot of heat for that," recalled Bill Fitch, then Houston's coach. "But Sam Bowie ... if you asked (23) teams then, if anyone looked at his need, it was a Sam Bowie. Had Sam stayed healthy, he was a can't-miss. I had Sam later in New Jersey and he was as good a passing center as there was. Had Bowie stayed healthy, Jack had a chance to win championships with that team. He got hurt, Jordan came on.

"What Jack did was right," Fitch insisted. "All of us at the time would have done the same thing."

Thorn said then he wanted Olajuwon, and Jordan was his next choice. Some claimed it was Bowie, which Thorn denies.

But there was the other thing that has been long rumored. It has been something of an NBA fable, and Olajuwon even mentioned it in his autobiography, "Living the Dream."

Olajuwon claimed the Rockets had an offer from Portland -- which wanted the more talented high-post center (Bowie) -- to trade Sampson for the No. 2 draft pick and the chance to draft Jordan. It was the birth of the so-called "Twin Towers" era, and the Rockets did get to the NBA Finals in 1986, losing in six games to Boston. But it was clear Olajuwon was the superior low-post center and he was the sure keeper.

Olajuwon wrote that the deal would have been Sampson for the No. 2 pick and Drexler.

"From 1984 until today (1996), the Rockets could have had a lineup with me, Clyde Drexler and Michael Jordan, developing together, playing together, winning together. But the Rockets never made the move."

Ramsay said he never heard of such discussions and that general manager Stu Inman handled trade talks. Inman died recently. Fitch, who lives in Houston and New Mexico and remains one of the great coaches in league history, insists the Rockets were committed to keeping Olajuwon and Sampson.

"We had the makings of a good team, but the drug laws wiped us out," he said. "We lost Lewis Lloyd and Mitchell Wiggins (in 1986-87) and John Lucas (for the 1986 playoffs). Sampson became a one-legged horse (from injury) and we traded him away. If we could have kept that same group, we'd have had something."

Fitch acknowledges Houston had some thoughts about Jordan.

"I had played against Dean Smith in the service -- we were friends," Fitch said. "He called me and said, 'I'm telling you, Bill, this guy is going to be the greatest.' Dean was that high on him. But we did not have the hindsight to know."

It's an airy dream to contemplate, Jordan and Olajuwon.

sasmith@tribune.com


Copyright © 2007, The Chicago Tribune



http://chicagosports.chicagotribune...un26,1,2156154.column?coll=cs-bulls-headlines