# Could the 1993-94 Bulls fourpeated without Michael? **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [May 12, 2020, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620 "2020-05-12T03:04:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Yankees\_1996\_Champs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Yankees\_1996\_Champs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yankees_1996_Champs)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/1 "2020-05-12T03:04:04Z")
Think about it. In the fall of 1993, the world was shocked when NBA king Michael Jordan announced his retirement after winning 3 titles, and a historic 1992 US basketball Olympics campaign! Many people feared that the 93-94 Bulls would have crumbled without Jordan, but with Pippen, Kerr and the rest of the 91-93 crew, they made a respectable 55-27 and was 3rd place in the East!! > **[1993–94 Chicago Bulls season](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993%E2%80%9394_Chicago_Bulls_season)** > > The 1993–94 NBA season was the Bulls' 28th season in the National Basketball Association. The Bulls entered the season as the three time defending NBA champions, having defeated the Phoenix Suns in the 1993 NBA Finals in six games, winning their third NBA championship, their first of two threepeats in the 1990s. This was the first season without All-Star guard Michael Jordan since the 1983–84 season, as he retired during the off-season to pursue a baseball career after the murder of his father Th... Could they have fourpeated? ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/2 "2020-05-12T03:51:43Z")
_ **Could** _ they have? Sure. Even without Jordan, they were still a pretty good team, as you note, with a ton of playoff experience, and once you get to the playoffs, weird things can happen. Did they stand a reasonable chance of it? Probably not. Look at the NBA standings for that year, and you’ll see a bunch of loaded teams. They lost in the second round to the Knicks, who had Ewing and Starks, but the East also had the Hawks with Dominique Wilkins, and the Magic with Shaq and Penny Hardaway. In the West, there were also a bunch of great teams – not only the Rockets, who won the Finals, but the Sonics, the Spurs, and the Jazz. The fact that the Bulls won six titles in eight years in that era, in which there were so many really good teams, is a tribute to the fact that they had the GOAT, _and_ surrounded him with an excellent team and excellent coaches. ---
**Author:** ![Yankees\_1996\_Champs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Yankees\_1996\_Champs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yankees_1996_Champs)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/3 "2020-05-12T04:25:22Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > _ **Could** _ they have? Sure. Even without Jordan, they were still a pretty good team, as you note, with a ton of playoff experience, and once you get to the playoffs, weird things can happen. > > Did they stand a reasonable chance of it? Probably not. Look at the NBA standings for that year, and you’ll see a bunch of loaded teams. > > They lost in the second round to the Knicks, who had Ewing and Starks, but the East also had the Hawks with Dominique Wilkins, and the Magic with Shaq and Penny Hardaway. In the West, there were also a bunch of great teams – not only the Rockets, who won the Finals, but the Sonics, the Spurs, and the Jazz. > > The fact that the Bulls won six titles in eight years in that era, in which there were so many really good teams, is a tribute to the fact that they had the GOAT, _and_ surrounded him with an excellent team and excellent coaches. The Bulls would have beaten the Rockets. The 1993-94 Jazz could have won it all, Michael was not in the way. ---
**Author:** ![BeagleJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5daacb/32.png) [@BeagleJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeagleJesus)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/4 "2020-05-12T13:58:31Z")
The 93-94 Bulls led by Pippen were a very good team, but they didn’t have enough fire power to get past: Ewing and the Knicks Barkley and the Suns Hakeem and the Rockets Shaq and the Magic Stockton/Malone and the Jazz Payton and Sonics Without Jordan defenses could load up on Scottie and sit back on the shooters which made the Bulls a very vulnerable team over a seven game series. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/5 "2020-05-12T14:09:33Z")
> [@Yankees\_1996\_Champs](#): > > Think about it. > > In the fall of 1993, the world was shocked when NBA king Michael Jordan announced his retirement after winning 3 titles, and a historic 1992 US basketball Olympics campaign! > > Many people feared that the 93-94 Bulls would have crumbled without Jordan, but with Pippen, Kerr and the rest of the 91-93 crew, they made a respectable 55-27 and was 3rd place in the East!! > > [1993–94 Chicago Bulls season - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993%E2%80%9394_Chicago_Bulls_season) > > Could they have fourpeated? This is kind of a weird question in that we’re talking about the past, and they lost, so apparently the answer is no. We are looking at this from 2020, and the probably function has collapsed. Certainly though before the playoffs started, only a moron would have bet the house against them. They were still an outstanding team. No team in the East was really better - the Hawks and Knicks finished two games ahead but I’m really not at all convinced they were actually better teams. The series between the Bulls and Knicks was very close (although Game 7 was a snooze) - the Knicks were still alive in Game 7 only because of one of the worst calls in NBA playoff history in Game 5. > [@BeagleJesus](#): > > The 93-94 Bulls led by Pippen were a very good team, but they didn’t have enough fire power to get past: > Ewing and the Knicks > Barkley and the Suns > Hakeem and the Rockets > Shaq and the Magic > Stockton/Malone and the Jazz > Payton and Sonics Dude, that’s not how the NBA playoffs work. First of all, they can’t play the Sonics AND the Jazz AND the Rockets AND the Suns. Secondly, what happened to the Sonics that year? They lost in the first round to a Denver Nuggets team that went 42-40 and was inferior to the Bulls in every way. You can’t make any rational case that the Bulls could not beat the Sonics when the Nuggets did - and the Sonics were the #1 seed in the whole league. The Magic were SWEPT in the first round by a pretty-good-but-not-great Pacers team; yes, the Bulls could have beaten them. ---
**Author:** ![BeagleJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5daacb/32.png) [@BeagleJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeagleJesus)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/6 "2020-05-12T15:12:37Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Dude, that’s not how the NBA playoffs work. First of all, they can’t play the Sonics AND the Jazz AND the Rockets AND the Suns. > > Secondly, what happened to the Sonics that year? They lost in the first round to a Denver Nuggets team that went 42-40 and was inferior to the Bulls in every way. You can’t make any rational case that the Bulls could not beat the Sonics when the Nuggets did - and the Sonics were the #1 seed in the whole league. The Magic were SWEPT in the first round by a pretty-good-but-not-great Pacers team; yes, the Bulls could have beaten them. I was just providing a list of teams in the 93-94 season that (based off memory) I thought could beat the Bulls in a seven game series regardless of when they met in the post season. Yes, most of the teams are western conference so they would only come in play _if_ the Bulls made it out of the east…which they didn’t. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/7 "2020-05-12T16:37:34Z")
> [@BeagleJesus](#): > > I was just providing a list of teams in the 93-94 season that (based off memory) I thought could beat the Bulls in a seven game series regardless of when they met in the post season. Yes, any of them COULD have beaten the Bulls, I agree. What you said, though, was that the Bulls could not get past them. But they could. Either the Bulls or their opponents could have won; there were no sure bets in the playoffs and the Bulls would not have been a significant underdog in a series with any opponent. These were all good teams; it wasn’t a great team taking on some 17-65 gang of bozos with a one-in-a-zillion shot of winning a playoff series. ---
**Author:** ![BeagleJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5daacb/32.png) [@BeagleJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeagleJesus)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/8 "2020-05-12T17:08:27Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Yes, any of them COULD have beaten the Bulls, I agree. What you said, though, was that the Bulls could not get past them. But they could. Either the Bulls or their opponents could have won; there were no sure bets in the playoffs and the Bulls would not have been a significant underdog in a series with any opponent. These were all good teams; it wasn’t a great team taking on some 17-65 gang of bozos with a one-in-a-zillion shot of winning a playoff series. Actually I said they didn’t “have enough fire power” to get past that list of teams and by that I was talking specifically about their ability to score points against opposing defenses with Scottie as the primary. Taken in combination with my last sentence in that post [_Without Jordan defenses could load up on Scottie and sit back on the shooters which made the Bulls a very vulnerable team over a seven game series_] and I was laying out the typical defensive strategy that good teams used to beat the Bulls without Jordan (regular season and playoffs). I thought that was pretty clear but I keep forgetting that on the Dope I am not talking with the types of basketball fans I am familiar with so a lot of the allusions and references I typically make must not translate well. That being said, based on your response I don’t think you and I were having the same conversation. _Could_ the Bulls have won? Certainly. But the Clippers _could_ have won too so I don’t fully understand the point you were trying to make. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/9 "2020-05-12T18:13:07Z")
> [@BeagleJesus](#): > > That being said, based on your response I don’t think you and I were having the same conversation. _Could_ the Bulls have won? Certainly. But the Clippers _could_ have won too so I don’t fully understand the point you were trying to make. Let me put it this way; at the beginning of the playoffs, what odds would you have given me on a bet on Chicago to win the title? ---
**Author:** ![BeagleJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5daacb/32.png) [@BeagleJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeagleJesus)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/10 "2020-05-12T19:15:14Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Let me put it this way; at the beginning of the playoffs, what odds would you have given me on a bet on Chicago to win the title? Back in the day I gave them a 0% chance so I would have let you set the odds to whatever you wanted while fully expecting a payday. Partially based on my knowledge of the league and part wishful thinking. Many of us were happy Jordan was gone and we fully expected Scottie and Phil to fail miserably. To their credit they proved themselves to be far more potent than expected but NO ONE believed they could win it all without Mike. Especially with the way Hakeem was playing that year. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/11 "2020-05-12T23:06:19Z")
> [@BeagleJesus](#): > > Back in the day I gave them a 0% chance so I would have let you set the odds to whatever you wanted while fully expecting a payday. That’s insane. Remind me to offer you 1-100 odds on all the bets you think are sure things… but when the money is actually on the table, I don’t think you’d take that bet. ---
**Author:** ![BeagleJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5daacb/32.png) [@BeagleJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeagleJesus)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2020, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/12 "2020-05-13T12:22:23Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > That’s insane. Remind me to offer you 1-100 odds on all the bets you think are sure things… but when the money is actually on the table, I don’t think you’d take that bet. I think it goes without saying that I am _far_ from a savvy gambler. Add in the fact that I was a broke college student back during the 93-94 season and I might have been tempted to put $20 on the Bulls not winning the championship without Jordan…but I doubt I would have had the money to back up the bet. ---
**Author:** ![Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de053/32.png) [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackknifed_Juggernaut)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2020, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/13 "2020-05-13T17:37:03Z")
It looks like they were a very respectable 8-1 before the playoffs started: [https://www.sportsoddshistory.com/nba-main/?y=1993-1994&sa=nba&a=finals&o=r](https://www.sportsoddshistory.com/nba-main/?y=1993-1994&sa=nba&a=finals&o=r) ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2020, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/could-the-1993-94-bulls-fourpeated-without-michael/853620/14 "2020-05-16T13:54:44Z")
I’m with RickJay: I don’t get the question either. We’re asking a hypothetical question about something that is factual. A better question is could the Rockets have beaten the Bulls with Jordan. I don’t think they could have in 1994, though I’d have given them a 50/50 chance in '95 with the addition of Drexler.