If I were a sculptor, I’d use as my subject Michael Jordan, as he appeared during a break in game one of the Eastern Conference final. The Detroit Pistons were beating on Jordan every time he drove into the lane; they were shoving and pushing and even, on more than one occasion, tripping him, trying to send him down onto the court, as if applying the football strategy that, after three quarters of sustained punishment, the athletes most often dealing out the punishment will prevail in the final quarter. Jordan fell hard on the bone of his right hip early on, and after that he seemed to be almost dragging himself through the game. He’d been injured before, and he’d taken shots before, but he’d never before let it show so noticeably. It’s possible he was trying either to psych up his teammates or to draw more attention from the officials as the brawl with the Pistons began–he recovered from these injuries quickly enough to play the rest of the series–but his injured condition seemed real enough. The Tribune ran on its front page the following day a remarkable photo, Jordan in a pose out of the neo-classical sculpture of Lorado Taft. I left it sitting on my desk for the duration of the season, because it seemed to epitomize the series, giving it a tragic dimension.
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The title of the sculpture would be “Hermes in the Midst of his Third Labor With the Detroit Pistons,” because the Bulls, this year, for the third straight time, saw their season end in a series with the Pistons. The Bulls, it seemed, never really got over the feeling of defeat and impending doom that was so present–even via television–in game one, played in Detroit. They came close on a couple of occasions, in games four and six, played in Chicago, but the Pistons–after they won those first two games at home–always seemed to be in command, always seemed to be dictating the pace of the series even if they weren’t in control on that particular day. The series was like a game in which one team opens a big lead, then lets the other team claw back before reasserting itself at the end. The Bulls played up to their potential to tie the series twice, in games four and six, but the Pistons were always ready to regain the lead–and in the case of game seven to win the series–when it mattered.
And that’s just the starting lineups.
Should the Bulls have made a deal at mid-season to bring in a veteran scorer off the bench? No. The cost would have been too high; Jerry Krause was right to stick with the three rookies, in the knowledge that next year–not this year–will probably be the Bulls’ peak season. Can the Bulls improve themselves enough to challenge the Pistons even a year from now? That seems more in doubt now than it did just a month ago, but it’s possible: if King and Will Perdue can improve enough to trim Cartwright’s playing time to a point where, like Edwards, he’s playing in offensive spurts; or if King himself improves enough to claim the starting power-forward post (and if Grant is willing to become a supersub on the level of Detroit’s Salley); or if B.J. Armstrong can give the Bulls a legitimate starting point guard; or if–and here’s some early cold-stove-league speculation–the Bulls can sign Adrian Dantley as a free agent, and if his broken leg is healed enough to allow him to come off the bench as an Aguirre-type dose of instant offense, then the Bulls can challenge the Pistons for league domination next year. But the Philadelphia 76ers will be better after the draft, and the Cleveland Cavaliers will be much better with Danny Ferry, and the teams out west in Portland and Utah will still have those monster centers who give the Bulls so much trouble, and right now that all seems so wearying to contemplate.
