Michael Jordan had an impressive NBA career, becoming one of the most honored players of all time, and the greatest of all time in the eyes of many fans. The Chicago Bulls legend won many individual awards, including MVPs, DPOY awards, and scoring titles.
The most important, however, is the championships. MJ stated that the championship count was very important for him. That’s something that drove him during his entire career and took to him to win six titles.
He had to face incredibly difficult rivals to reach his goals, but once His Airness reached his peak, there was no stopping him. He played against so many legends during his career, having different records depending on the rival. When his time to rule the league came, he was ruthless with his opponents, beating many of them during his championship runs.
Jordan used everything he could for motivation, beating some of the greatest players of his generation on his way to six championships. During an old interview with the late Stuart Scott, Mike reflected on the fact that he prevented players like Charles Barkley, Patrick Ewing, and Karl Malone from winning NBA championships, to which Jordan replied like only he knows (7th slide below).
“You know, you can talk about it, I joke around with my friends about it, Charles and Patrick and all these guys. I take great pride in making sure that they don’t win. I want them to win, but I just don’t want them to win when I’m still playing. I want them to feel like if they won a championship, it doesn’t feel quite the same because they didn’t face Michael Jordan.”
MJ was a really good friend of these players, but he was one of the fiercest competitors in the NBA. No matter how cool they were off the court, Jordan was always on a mission and he never rested until he won the title. He thought he deserved the 1993 MVP award instead of Charles Barkley and that fueled him ahead of the Finals. He felt the same about Karl Malone in 1997 and didn’t let him go away with that.
We can name many reasons why MJ took it personally against those guys, but the main reason for him was just beating them to let them know who the man was. Classic MJ.
