The Chicago Bulls were well on their way to sweeping the Seattle SuperSonics in the 1996 NBA Finals and completing the most dominant season in NBA history.
Coming off a then-record 72-win regular season, Chicago cruised to the 1996 NBA Finals, losing just one game along the way. But the Bulls could not finish off the Sonics in Game 4. They failed to close out the series again in Game 5.
With the lead suddenly cut to 3-2, Gary Payton became the talk of the town after coach George Karl put him on Michael Jordan in Games 4 and 5. But while Payton and the Sonics believe his defense was the key to Jordan’s struggles in both games, MJ refused to give his rival the credit.
“Are you sure that Payton was the cause of my frustration?” MJ told SLAM Magazine. “I had good shots. I don’t think Gary’s defense on me dictated the way I played or the frustrations that I had. I just missed some easy shots. I’ll tell Gary, ‘Bring it on again.’ I Invite anybody to guard me. But as far as him stopping me, I can only stop myself.”
The Sonics started to win
Karl had wanted to put “The Glove” on MJ all series long, but GP dealt with a tore a calf muscle and the Sonics head coach did not want to wear out his point guard. But after the Bulls raced to a 3-0 series lead, George decided to put the league’s best perimeter defender on the superstar guard.
After scoring 36 in Game 3, MJ was held down to 23 points on 6-19 shooting in Game 4 with the Sonics winning the contest 107-86. Then in Game 5, Jordan scored 26 on 11-22 shooting, but the Bulls shot just 29-77 as a team and lost again, 89-78.
“I wish I could have played [Michael] in the first three games, but I had torn a muscle in my calf and George had told me that he didn’t want to wear me out. I was telling George, ‘Please just let me play against him.’ First game, he killed us. George didn’t really want me to do that. He said, ‘Well, we’ve got a long series, let’s just wait.’” Payton said.
MJ had a lot on his mind in that series
According to MJ, he had a lot on his mind during that series, and that affected his game. That’s what frustrated him, not Payton’s defense.
1996 was Jordan’s first championship series in his comeback and there was more pressure than ever to win, especially since the Bulls were beaten by the young Orlando Magic the playoffs the year before. It was also Mike’s first Finals without his father who was murdered in 1993—there were reports that he wanted to finish the series before Father’s Day which coincidentally was when Game 6 was to be played.
MJ he struggled against “The Glove” in Game 6, scoring just 22 points on 5-19 shooting. But despite averaging just 23.7 points on 36.7% from the field against Payton from in the last three games of the series, Jordan famously laughed off Payton’s claims during one of the iconic scenes from “The Last Dance.”
“I had no problem with “The Glove,'” he said in the documentary. The numbers, however, say otherwise.