In a December 9th win over New York, Jordan passed Moses Malone (27,409 points) to take over third place on the NBA’s list of all-time scorers. Just two weeks earlier Jordan had passed Elvin Hayes (27,313) to take over fourth place. (Wilt Chamberlain is number two on the list with 31,419 points, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is first with 38,387).
The game against Phoenix on December 15th marked the 500th consecutive sellout for the Bulls, the longest such streak in the league.
It was no coincidence that the next game, the Lakers contest, brought Jackson’s 500th regular season victory as the Bulls coach. He had reached the milestone sooner than any coach in league history, a fact that didn’t help the public understand Krause’s apparent desire to see the coach leave. “To get the guys, when they have one ring or two rings, to go out and play hard, there’s the challenge,” Clippers coach Bill Fitch, who had coached Jackson in college at the University of North Dakota, told reporters. “He ought to be able to coach here as long as he wants to coach.”
JACKSON
After opening the season with eight wins and seven losses, the Bulls found some balance under Jackson and won nine of their next 11 games. “People think this team is easy to coach because of MJ, but Phil’s had to hold us together this year,” Ron Harper told reporters. “Even when Pip is healthy, this team isn’t as easy to coach as everybody thinks. We have a lot of egos to manage.”
Jackson had accomplished that with an open management/ open communication style that left his players singing his praises. He was also secure enough to give his assistant coaches wide latitude in their involvement, exemplified by Winter’s free hand in running the offense.
The son of a Pentecostal preacher, Jackson had been raised in Montana in a strict, reclusive world that left him longing for escape by the end of high school. He found it in the athletic scholarship offered by Bill Fitch at the University of North Dakota. The 6-foot-8 Jackson developed into a two-time NCAA Division II All-American, a legitimate pro prospect, the only problem being that few pro scouts found their way out to North Dakota. One who did was an enterprising young Baltimore Bullets representative named Jerry Krause, who was entertained by Fitch’s trick of having Jackson sit in the back seat of a Chevrolet and use his long arms to grab the steering wheel or unlock the front doors on either side. “I had quite a wingspan,” Jackson recalled with a chuckle.
After his 13-year playing career, Jackson had worked as an assistant coach and broadcaster for the New Jersey Nets before moving on to become head coach of the Albany Patroons in the Continental Basketball Association for five seasons. In 1984, Jackson’s Patroons won the CBA title, and the next season he was named CBA Coach of the Year. He was doing a brief stint coaching in Puerto Rico when Jerry Krause contacted him about an assistant coaching job with the Bulls in 1985.
“I had wanted to draft Phil for Baltimore in the second round in 1967,” Krause once recalled. “We took a gamble on another player, and New York got Phil. I kept up with Phil as a player through the years. We’d talk from time to time, and I followed his coaching career in the CBA. When I got the job in Chicago in 1985, I talked to him again. I told him I needed scouting reports on the CBA. Within a week, I had typewritten reports on the whole league, detail on every player. What I saw in Phil was an innate brightness. I thought that eventually he’d become the governor of North Dakota. I saw a lot of Tony LaRussa in him. A feel for people. A brightness. A probing mind.”
When Krause fired Doug Collins in 1989, he knew that the 43-year-old Jackson was the perfect coach for the Bulls. He had been a member of Reinsdorf’s beloved Knicks when they won the NBA title in 1973. Yet Jackson actually cited the Knicks’ 1970 season, when he was on the injured list after undergoing major back surgery, as the breakthrough season in his pro basketball career. That year he sat in the stands at Madison Square Garden watching Knicks’ coach Red Holtzman’s every move. It was then, Jackson wrote in Maverick, his autobiography, that he came to understand the game. That season also laid the foundation for the philosophy he sought to instill when he became head coach of the Bulls in 1989.
“The Knicks in the late sixties and early seventies were one of the dominant teams in the NBA,” Jackson explained, “yet they were a collection of very good individual players but without a dominant star that could change the context of the game. The whole of idea of the Knicks playing together was how well the ball moved, how well they played together defensively, the fact that any of the five players could take a key shot down the stretch. It was a difficult team in that regard to defend against. They were unselfish, and Red Holtzman, the mentor, was really the guy who taught us that. Surprisingly enough, he taught us teamwork through defense.
“That was the concept when I came to the Bulls,” Jackson said, “that the ball had to move. They all had to touch the ball regardless of who was gonna score. Everybody had to become interdependent upon each other and trusting on the offensive end. Defensively, we were gonna play full-court pressure. We were gonna make defense where we started our teamwork.”
“I think Phil came in,” Tex Winter recalled, “with the basis of some very sound philosophy. I mean the philosophy of life. He recognizes that there are a whole lot of things more important than basketball. He doesn’t take himself too seriously. We all take basketball pretty seriously at times. Even then, he’s inclined to relax. I’m amazed at times in the course of the game how he sits back and lets things happen. He likes people to be able to solve their own problems, and so he gives his players the reins. On the other hand, when he sees they’re out of control, then he starts to pull them in a little bit. I think this is his strength, the way he handles the players and his motivation, his personal relationship with the players. That’s borne out by the fact that they’ll accept his coaching, they’ll accept the criticism, even though sometimes it’s pretty severe with certain players. They accept that because it’s who he is, because he’s Phil.”
“I’ve always been impressed by Phil,” former Bull John Paxson said. “He’s an intellectual guy, and I think that’s the first thing that stood out to me. You don’t run into too many intellectual guys in the NBA. The thing that impressed me is that he hasn’t allowed this game to consume him. It can be so consuming for a coach. But Phil has other interests. His family has always been important to him. And he has never let the game take a toll on him mentally.”
That mental strength, which stemmed from Jackson’s strong affinity for Zen philosophy, would play a huge role keeping the Bulls together amidst the charged atmosphere surrounding the team. “We’ve been together a long time, especially Phil and me,” Tex Winter said of the circumstances in 1997. “Nine years. I think we understand each other pretty well. Phil is the kind of guy who has the ability to not let things distract him. My Lord, I couldn’t do it. If I were the head coach, I’d be a maniac by now. And my whole team would be out of whack. That’s Phil’s strength. This Rodman thing, all the things that come down along these lines, Phil kinda just handles it in a very natural, easy way.
“He’s very good at handling distractions,” Winter added. “As far as next season is concerned, he’s said very little about it. It doesn’t seem to bother him one bit about what is coming down. I’ve told him at times that maybe he might not be concerned but some of his staff members might be. On the other hand he sets the tone. He says, ‘We’re just playing this thing out. Let’s worry about today. Let’s don’t worry about tomorrow.’”
Despite the potential conflicts of their success, the Bulls got along far better than the average NBA team. But winning championships had required more than a “better-than-average” approach. It had required a supreme chemistry. Jackson, of course, was a master at pulling all the disparate elements together. Perhaps there was no better example of this than the team’s late-season signee during the 1997 playoff drive, Brian Williams. He, too, was a free agent, but salary cap restrictions and league compensation rules virt
ually assured that he would have to move on to another team at the end of the season. Never one to show a fondness for coaches (he had played for four different teams in his six-year career), he had nonetheless taken an immediate shining to Jackson.
“He’s an excellent coach,” Williams said. “In my time in the league, he’s the most thorough, the most understanding coach I’ve been around.”
Matt Steigenga, another late-season signee, expressed a similar appreciation for Jackson, especially his knack for using a player’s mistakes for teaching instead of humiliation. “He doesn’t berate guys, doesn’t get on them,” Steigenga said. “But guys still know when they mess up. I had a college coach, if he wasn’t yelling there was something wrong. When he stopped yelling at a player, he didn’t care about that player any more. Phil’s the other way. He rarely will scream or yell or belittle a player. But he really gets a guy to see his mistake and learn from it. His mental approach and mental prowess comes through. He has that grip on players, that feeling of force. You know this man is able to lead.”
Jackson liked to call his approach “Zen Christian,” a mingling of his fundamentalist upbringing with his love of Buddhist and Native American culture. His strategies for success included preaching to his players about the great white buffalo or giving them obscure books to read or having them pause amid the looniness of the NBA for a meditation session. On more than one occasion, Jackson’s approach has left his players shaking their heads in amusement. “He’s our guru,” Michael Jordan quipped when asked about Jackson’s quirkiness in early 1996. “He’s got that yen, that Zen stuff, working in our favor.”
But make no mistake, Jackson was so compelling a figure that, while his players may not have accepted each and every of his unconventional remedies, they showed an utter and complete faith in him. And they understood when Jackson talked of the spiritual connection to the game. Jordan credited just that connection with showing him how to relate with less-talented teammates. “I think Phil really has given me a chance to be patient and taught me how to understand the supporting cast of teammates and give them a chance to improve,” Jordan said.
“He’s an interesting guy,” Steve Kerr said of Jackson. “He keeps things very refreshing for us all season. He keeps things fun. He never loses sight of the fact that basketball is a game. It’s supposed to be fun. He doesn’t let us forget about that. But at the same time, this is our job, too, and he doesn’t let us forget about that either. The amount of work involved and what it takes to win, and finally the feeling of success when you do win. He’s constantly reminding us of all that.”
That’s not to say that Jackson would hesitate to get in a player’s face, Kerr added. “But when he does it you know it’s not personal. That’s his strength. He always maintains authority without being a dictator. And he always maintains his friendship without kissing up. He just finds that perfect balance, and because of that he always has everybody’s respect. And ultimately that’s the hardest part of being a coach in the NBA, I think, is having every player’s respect.”
“Phil understands the game better than most people,” observed John Salley, who had played for a variety of coaches. “And he expects certain things that he knows his guys can give him. He gets the utmost respect from his players. A lot of people say Michael really runs the Bulls. But Phil runs this team. He runs the squad. He runs practice. He runs the film sessions. He splices the film. He organizes practice. He dissects the other team we’re playing against. He knows his stuff.
“He understands the players’ bodies. He understands when not to overuse them. He understands when he can rest you. He knows when to watch enough film. He knows when to push his players, when not to push ‘em. He knows who to yell at, who not to yell at. He knows who can take it. And he treats you like a man, as opposed to downplaying you, or talking to you like you’re less than him because of his position. He’s a great coach. He laughs and smiles at life.”
Former Bulls assistant Johnny Bach said one of Jackson’s special gifts was the ability to establish a clear team structure. “We have in the league a lot of people who think they’re a lot better than they are,” Bach said. “And that’s what coaches have to deal with. Can you get five people to play a team game when all the rewards seem to be for individual achievement? You’re talking about fragile egos. Big egos. People who had status and can lose it in this game so quickly. Phil is great at defining roles and having people face up to what the hierarchy is. Here’s Michael. Here’s Scottie. And he does it in a very intelligent way. He doesn’t do it to put you down. But he clearly addresses the problem.”
Jackson knew the faith his players had in him was no small thing. “I believe that there is a tenuous trial sometimes between coaches and players,” he said. “I’ve found that I have the confidence of my group, so that they feel comfortable. And it’s not anything where if I try experimental things that they feel threatened or can’t deal with it. It’s sort of something where I’ve had an open working forum to try a variety of styles and approaches, all of which seem to be enjoyable to them. The only thing they don’t like is monotony and constancy. But we still make one thing constant, and that’s fundamentals. The one thing that we always strive for is to make fundamentals and execution a part of our game.”
His players used the occasion of his 500th victory to marvel at the circumstances of his impending dismissal. “It baffles me to understand that he’s not welcome,” Jordan said. “He certainly still knows how to coach the game.”
In fact, the Bulls star rated Jackson an equal to the much revered Dean Smith, Jordan’s college coach. “I think they’re very similar in the fundamental aspects with which they coach the game,” Jordan said. “With their caring about the players. Players first, management, everything else is second. I think their dedication to spreading the wealth is very evident. Their overall love for the game. I think you can see it in the way they coach. They’re very poised in pressure situations. They don’t let the game or the situation speed up their thought process. As a player, if you see that, then you tend to maintain a certain poise in pressure situations. So I think those are key components to winning.”
Jackson used the occasion of his 500th win to do something he had said he wouldn’t do—take the pressure off of Krause and Reinsdorf. Their selecting him as Bulls coach in 1989 “was a miracle for me,” Jackson said. “It’s a great success story. A lot happened in this organization that just all clicked: the players, ownership, general manager. Motivation isn’t something you teach players. They have to bring that themselves. This organization, Jerry Krause and his staff, have found players who have that kind of motivation.”
Asked if he was being “squeezed out,” Jackson replied, “I don’t think there’s any squeezing going on. This is a mutual agreement that we’ve made, Jerry Reinsdorf and I. We look at it as an opportunity—not as a farewell, see ya’ later. This is not a last gasp.”
Jordan, though, refused to accept that. “It’s too obvious to see the guy’s success in such a short amount of time to say, ‘Now, we need a change.’ It’s something deeper than what you see on the basketball court,” he told reporters.
The star pointed out that Jackson had guided the Bulls through difficult circumstances after taking over in 1989. “We had coaches coming in and out of here,” Jordan said. “We found a good one and we stuck with him and … he gave stability to my career. We all have so much respect for him.”
That respect once again proved to be the bedrock of the Bulls’ superior chemistry as they worked their way through yet another challenging season. It could be seen in the excellent year Dennis Rodman was having. “He treats you like a man,” the mercurial rebounder said of Jackson. “He lets you be yourself.” Rodman’s December hair decoration was yellow, with a smiley face in the crown.
“Dennis is staying out of trouble,” Jordan pointed out. “We probably expected him to be a pain in the butt this year
but he hasn’t been. He’s just gone out and rebounded and done his job. You have to respect that.”
“Dennis has had problems with other coaches, but he knows Phil is on his side,” Ron Harper observed.
Jackson, though, pointed out that one of the major differences with Rodman was the behavior clauses in his contract. “The Bulls put (behavior clauses) in the contract,” Jackson said. “Rather than being a rebel, he’s chosen to do the things that are appropriate. He’s having a lot more fun. And he’s right back at the top of the league in rebounding.”
And wearing a smiley face in his hair. “I love having the most famous hair in the world,” Rodman conceded to reporters. “People wonder what’s going to happen next. It was Chip Schaefer’s doing. Chip told me, ‘Be a happy face, shock everybody.’ Well, here it is.”
Yet all the players knew that Jackson’s respect faced a bigger challenge than Rodman’s behavior. Much good will would be needed to lure the angry and frustrated Pippen back to the team. Fortunately, Jackson had the substance in abundance and was using it discreetly to pull Pippen back into the team circle. As December passed, there were clear signs that his efforts were working.
In the middle of the month, the forward appeared at the team’s annual holiday party, where an 8-year-old boy asked Pippen, “Are you going to get back on the team?”
“Yeah,” Pippen replied with a shy, soft smile.
A week and a half later, he began practicing with the Bulls. “I’m just trying to get myself healthy,” he said. “If I have to come back and play here then, you know, that may be the way it has to be.”
“It’s money, blood money.”
—The Devil’s Advocate
Blood on the Horns Page 23
