If Jordan did not retire those two years, would Houston have won?

actually it was 69-13. not 72-10. we are talking about the 96-97 season here.

The 72-10 (95-96) Bulls swept the Rockets.

and just to correct a couple things...the Rockets beat the Bulls in Houston in 96-97, and Rodman and Barkley did not play in the game. In the game in Chicago with Barkley and Rodman playing, the Bulls crushed the Rockets.

and No way the 96-97 Rockets would've beaten the Bulls. No team with Kevin Willis playing a prominent role on it would ever beat a Bulls team like that. That's just a fact.

But I do think the 94 and 1995 Rockets would've beat them. No team in the modern NBA is capable of winning 5 championships in a row in my opinion. If it were, Shaq's Lakers should have done it. A big factor nobody mentions is that the Rockets role players were much better than any of the Bulls finals opponents from 91 to 93.

 

another thing to mention....

I think we Rockets fans should know better than to say "hey, we would have beaten the Bulls in the Finals because we owned them in the regular season." I say that because the Rockets did lose the season series in 1995 to the Spurs 5 games to 1, and then beat the Spurs in the West Finals.

so the suggest that we would have beaten the Bulls in the Finals because we owned them in the regular season is not a good argument. I think the Rockets would have beaten the Bulls because besides Dream, the 94 and 95 role players were freakin awesome.

what happens in the regular season means nothing.

 

You must have been really bored.

 

I can't say what would have happened if Jordan hadn't retired. My brother, who lives in Chicago was/is an avid Bulls fan. When Jordan unretired late in the 94-95 season, he never quite got his game completely together. He had some very un-Jordanlike moments. If he came back sooner or had played the whole year, it's very likely the Bulls would have met the Rockets in the Finals. But I can't comment on that because that Bulls team never got "all the bugs out". I CAN comment on matching up the 93-94 & 94-95 Rockets against the Bulls championship teams.

To those who say we "owned" the Bulls back then, gimme a break. How many times did we lose to the Spurs during 94-95 before beating them in the WCFs? Huh? Can't hear you. They "owned" us that year and I remember DRob saying before the WCFs that this fact must be on the Rockets players minds. Remember sore loser A.C. Green ("Well, they'll never beat the Spurs"). My point is the regular season means zip when it comes to a Finals matchup. The intensity level and the game planning is too different.

On matchups: Hakeem would have given the Bulls serious problems like he did everyone else. But I submit the Bulls would have hounded and tortured Hakeem during the Finals just like the Sonics used to, but even more. They also would have pressured the ball relentlessly and taken advantage of our turnover prone guards for easy baskets. Mad Max was a great defender, but during a potential 7 game series, MJ would have destroyed Max like he did everyone during the playoffs. Max wasn't Superman. Remember, MJ raised his game in the Finals. Mad Max disappeared except for one game against the Knicks. Basically, he was sorry. Kenny (Mr. No Guts) Smith would have shrunk and disappeared too. I think Sam would have had a decent series.

One other point: Besides taking advantage of our turnover prone guards, the Bulls would have killed us on the offensive boards like other teams did. Either Rodman or Horace grant would have had a field day. To this day I'm amazed we won that first championship despite giving up so many offensive boards in the regular season and playoffs (as I remember them).

Last point: ANY of the Bulls teams would have destroyed the Knicks 4-0 or 4-1. But it tooks the Rockets 7 full tight games, and we actually trailed 3-2. Good thing Hakeem blocked Starks at the end of Game 6. Even with Starks 1-15 (or something like that) in Game 7, we only won by 7 points. The first Rockets team had way too many scoring droughts to survive MJ's Bulls.

My humble conclusion: The Bulls would have beaten either the 93-94 or 94-95 Rockets teams 4-1 or 4-2. At least a couple of the Bulls wins would have been dominant.

 

Well ... I don't care if this topic has been beat to death.. at least I would get to hear Rox fans say the opposite of what I have to hear ALL THE TIME...

that if Jordan was playing full time those years... the Rockets wouldn't have any championships...

now tell me.. are you more tired of hearing Rox fans saying the Rox would have still won... or the other people saying over and over the Bulls would have won?

Buck the Fulls. (and I live in Chicago)

as a matter of fact... same goes for the Sox.

 

Yeah...would have won anyway...AND also...

In 1996 when the Rox lost to UTAH in the Western Conference Finals...Stockton's three...we had something for the Bulls that year too...we actually matched up better with Chicago...and would have thumped their butts (did a few time during the regular season)...Utah was obviously a tougher matchup for us...but UTAH didn't match up well with Chicago....so...we should have won 3 in the 90's. But we didn't...

Bring on the 2000's!!!!! Plenty of Rockets Championships commin ya'll!

 

We should have benched in TRex in game 6. It was like Rudy and his 3 guard line of Moochie, SF, and Cat. I just wanted to scream sit down the guy who can't shoot either ft or fg.

 

Dude. Yeah. Exactly.

There's no arguement that Jordan is a great player, Bulls were great, etc.

But dude. Yeah. I didn't watch much back then, but that is so true.

 

I always remember this pic, when the phrase: Hakeem vs Jordan comes out!
But I think the bulls would won in 94 and the rockets in 95

 

funny time for anyone to be jumping on the rox bandwagon... are all newer fans bandwagoners? Or do you have to be a lifetime hardcore rox fan to post here? No newbs? No discovering the beauty of rockets fandom later in life?

 

The guy has admitted he did not follow basketball back then.

If your son who was not born when the Rockets won those two championships asks you the same question, would you call him an idiot too?

But instead of calling him a YOF, now you use the term 'bandwagon' fan. I see improvement here.

 

yes

 

I was thinking the same thing.

 

didn't think this thread would last. i guess we're all bored waiting for the next game

topics like this usually appear during the offseason

 

yes...



Debate settled. (notice this was "after" Jordan's return)

 

A Matt Maloney sighting!

 

To be able to make an honest polling on this subject one must have the knowledge of the history of the Bulls/Rockets during this period:-
The ROCKETS owned the BULLS and were completely dominant over them.
I have all the tapes to back up this statement.

 

et tu Brutus?

 

this is the excuse the world wants because they didnt want Rockets to beat the Knicks. If the Knicks had beaten the Rockets, none of this WELL JORDAN RETIRED crap would even exist.

you know it, we all know it. that's why ALL OF US need to keep rooting for what's left of that championship team. SAM, HORRY, etc..

You can look back in history and when they say that Bullsheezy " The Rockets had only one good player" then you drop this on them:

SAM TEACHING THEM A LESSON:


HORRY:


MARIO: