The GOAT debate between Michael Jordan and LeBron James is never-ending. It's also pointless as everyone knows that Bill Russell is the greatest NBA player of all time. 11 time NBA Champion. Five time league MVP. 12 time All-Star. Had his number retired league-wide. I'm just saying...
Anyway, what isn't debatable is that the 1990's era Chicago Bulls are the most dominant team since Russell and the Celtics owned the league in the from 1957 through 1969. The only reason the Bulls didn't win eight straight titles was Jordan's break between the two three-peats.
More than those victories, the 90's Bulls have continued to impact and influence basketball in the nearly three decades since their last championship. And a lot of that has to do with coaching, specifically the lessons Steve Kerr got under the learning tree of Phil Jackson in Chicago.
The continuous era of Bulls dominance
Since the end of that Bulls run, the three most dominant teams have been Kobe Bryant's Lakers with five titles, Tim Duncan's Spurs with five titles, and Stephen Curry's Warriors with four titles. All three of those teams have very direct connections to Jordan's Bulls.
After winning six titles with the Bulls in the 1990s, head coach Phil Jackson headed to LA to be the bench boss for the Lakers. He won five more titles there with Bryant. As a player, Kerr won three titles in Chicago, then joined San Antonio to win two more with Duncan before retiring from playing.
Kerr would spend six years in the Suns' front office before becoming the head coach of the Warriors in 2014. He would go on to win four titles as their coach, a position he still holds 12 years later. Even if the Bulls haven't come close to winning a title since 1998, their influence on the NBA remains strong.
Great coaches often start as great players
In his playing career, Kerr was coached by two of the best to ever do it in Jackson and Gregg Popovich. While Popovich never won am NBA title as a player, both Jackson and Kerr did. In Jackson's case, he was a member of the Knicks team than won in 1970 and 1973.
The throughline for the Bulls since the end of their 90's dominance has primarily been coaching, and in Jackson's influence on Kerr. Beyond that, Popovich had to face Jackson's Bulls In his early days as an assistant and head coach the 1980s and 1990s more than once. That had to be educational.
Iron sharpens iron, and that is what the 90's Bulls did for franchises like the Lakers, Spurs, and Warriors. Their dominance is an extension of what Chicago did throughout that decade. The Bulls forced other franchises to up their games or fail, turning the ones who listened into juggernauts.
Add us as a preferred source on Google