If this was, as he predicted it would be, more relief than exhiliration, then why did Michael Jordan initially leave the Chicago Stadium floor Sunday night a two-time NBA champion by covering ground with huge, joyous bunny hops, his arms punching up through the noise and the haze?
Maybe because the Bulls' 97-93 victory over Portland in Game 6 of the NBA finals arrived in such unexpected, historic and ironic fashion. Maybe because he simply was carried away by the current of emotion generated by the crowd. Maybe, just maybe, because his eighth professional season finally is over.In the days before the Bulls won their second consecutive title, Jordan predicted final victory would bring relief most of all. But he never expected an evening like Sunday's: Down by 17 points in the third quarter, Jordan played the part of cheerleader as some unlikely members of his supporting cast resurrected the Bulls with a pivotal 14-2 run that opened the fourth quarter and paved the way for Jordan and Scottie Pippen to bring the trophy home.
This time, Jordan did not embrace that trophy with tears, as he did last spring when the Bulls defeated the Los Angeles Lakers in five games. This time, he greeted it with dance, which began immediately after the Bulls outscored Portland 33-12 in the fourth quarter and continued some time later when he re-emerged into a Stadium crowd that just wouldn't go home and was carried into the stands by the adoring fans.
"Last year, seven years of frustration, anxiety, determination had built up inside me and it came out in tears," Jordan said. "Last year was for the city and the organization. This year's more selfish, more for me and what I've gone through."
A season that was filled with controversy - when he declined to accompany the Bulls on a White House visit, when the book "The Jordan Rules" was published, when his gambling association with known drug dealers was investigated - culminated Sunday night when he became the first player in NBA history to win both regular-season and playoff MVP awards in consecutive seasons. He scored 33 points and led in scoring in all 22 playoff games this season.
Last year, the Bulls breezed through the playoffs with a 15-2 record. This year, they went 15-7 and survived a seven-game scare by New York in the second round. Both ways, the result was the same.
"What a long, strange trip it has been," Bulls coach Phil Jackson said. "Last year was a honeymoon. This year was an oddyssey.' "
The strange part is that Jackson's superstar sat and watched the game's most important minutes. The Blazers led by 15 points in the second quarter, repelled a brief Chicago comeback to lead by 17 late in the third and were ahead 79-64 entering the fourth quarter. By then, even Jordan admitted the thought of a seventh and deciding game on Wednesday flew through his mind.
But Jackson calls himself an instinctive coach, and his instinct Sunday was to send Jordan for a breather and send workmen Bob Hansen, Scott Williams, B.J. Armstrong and Stacey King into the game with Pippen serving as the lineup's paste. Hansen immediately responded with a three-point shot and the audience stirred. When Hansen stripped a layup away from Jerome Kersey, the sound began to come in waves. By the time King earned a trip to the foul line to pull the Bulls within 81-72 with 10:05 left, the noise was solid.
From there, the Blazers' lead slipped to seven, then five, then three points before Jackson sent Jordan back into the game with the Bulls trailing 81-78 with 8:36 left.
"I felt like a cheerleader, I felt like Cliff Levingston," Jordan said about his stay on the sidelines. "On this day when we really needed them, those guys meant so much to us. I wanted to let them know how much I appreciated them."
Jackson said he went to his reserves because the Bulls needed "their energy, their legs. . . . Either you're daring or you're stupid, depending how it works out."
Call it bold this time and that unorthodox lineup pulled the Bulls back into the game, but then Jordan and Pippen won it.
They combined to score the Bulls' final 19 points over the last seven minutes. Most crucial: Pippen's desperation three-pointer at the end of a 24-second clock that tied the game at 85 with 5:20 remaining and back-to-back jumpers first by Pippen, then by Jordan that turned a tied game into a 93-89 lead with 1:39 left.
The Blazers never got closer than two points again. When they pulled within 95-93, Jordan secured the championship by making two free throws with 11.8 seconds left.
"I was thinking if I didn't make those free throws, it would haunt me for the rest of my life," Jordan said.
Those free throws made the Bulls the first Chicago team to win consecutive titles since the Bears in 1940 and 41 and the first to clinch a title at home since the Bears in 1963. They also sent fans into the streets in downtown Chicago, where television reports showed some celebrators stomping a taxi into scrap metal.
Inside the Stadium, Jordan, Pippen and their teammates were mobbed by fans for close to an hour after the game. "That's why I hate to leave the Stadium," Jordan said. "When you think a game's over and done with, they pick you up and carry you along. If this game was in Portland, I don't know if we could have made that comeback."