Basketball Breakdown: ‘The Jordan Rules Explained: How Michael Jordan Was Defended By The Pistons’

Source:Basketball Breakdown- with a look at the Jordan Rules.

“Coach Nick uses Game 6 of the 1989 Eastern Conference Finals to demonstrate the defensive philosophies used by the Detroit Pistons under Chuck Daly to stop the Bulls Michael Jordan.”

From Basketball Breakdown 

I just want to reply to a few things that the guy who calls himself Coach Nick said and then I’ll get into the Jordan Rules.

This might sound superficial, but to start off your own video by making excuses for the why the Pistons beat the Bulls 3 straight years in the Eastern Conference Playoffs, because Michael Jordan was tired, or he was playing for an inferior teams and as a result having to do a lot more for the Bulls, then Larry Bird had to do the Boston Celtics, or Magic Johnson had to do for the Los Angeles Lakers, is pretty lame.

Either you and your team are good enough to beat the Detroit Pistons, or you are not. You play 90-100 games a season, you are going to take injuries, you are going to get tired, you are going to lose key players, especially when you play for an inferior team (at least by NBA championship standards) like the Chicago Bulls of the late 1980s.

As far as the Jordan Rules: Michael Jordan wasn’t the great all around player in 1989-90, that he was even in 1991. The Bulls around him weren’t as good either. The Pistons knew this (perhaps not about 1991 in 1989, unless they were psychic) and knew that no other player on the Bulls team, even a healthy Scottie Pippen, who was only 23-24 at this point, was good enough to beat them by himself. Which meant that for the Bulls to beat the Pistons, someone whose name wasn’t Michael Jordan, was going to have to do that himself.

Coach Nick explained what the Jordan Rules were very well. Every time MJ drive to the lane, there was not just the guy guarding him that was where to try to stop him, but at least one Pistons big man as well.

So that could be Bill Laimbeer, plus Rick Mahorn, or Laimbeer and James Edwards, John Salley and one of the other Pistons big men as well.

So MJ is going up against Joe Dumars or Dennis Rodman, play 2 of the Pistons big, strong, big men as well. Which meant MJ taking a lot of fouls and a lot of punishment in those 2 series in 1989 and 80, perhaps 88 as well and that took a tole on him.

But the Jordan Rules also made MJ a bigger, stronger player, as well as the Bulls a. better team. because now they knew they needed someone besides Michael Jordan, if they were going to get past the Detroit Pistons and into the NBA Finals. 

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