Originally Posted by
Ken Cheng
WC Finals is setting the benchmark for the Nuggets...since they've never gotten farther than that (Lakers, on the other hand, are rather blase about Western Conference titles because they've won about half of the past thirty of those).
Pippen and Grant were hardly worthless players.
In the season that MJ was playing baseball, the Pippen-led Chicago Bulls lost only a few more games than they did during their previous championship season (I think it was only three more games). They got to the Eastern Conference Finals and perhaps were just a bad call or two by the officials from representing the Eastern Conference in the Finals again.
Horace Grant was not as good all-around as Pippen, but with him, Shaq's Orlando Magic got to the NBA Finals in 1995, and the 2001 Lakers would not have been as successful in that season's playoffs without Grant's contributions.
If you want to play the "he couldn't have won without..." game, tell me: how many Finals or Conference Finals did MJ lead any of this teams to without some combination of these players: Pippen, Grant, Rodman, Kukoc?
Explain, then, why the San Antonio Spurs have won four of the past eleven NBA titles?