The closer they get to breaking the NBA record for wins in a regular season, more voices come out and disrespect the Golden State Warriors by suggesting they wouldn’t have been that good in a different era. The latest in the long line is Scottie Pippen, who happened to play on the 1995-1996 Chicago Bulls team, the current record holders.
Where does the animosity for the Warriors come from? Simply because they’ve been so successful for the last two seasons? The way they’ve been doing it, seemingly inventing a new way to succeed though three point shooting? Is it the growing arrogance of Stephen Curry? Is it the fact that it’s been easier and easier for them to get away with things thanks to officials calling (or not calling things) their way? It might be just plain, old-fashioned jealousy.
According to Pippen, who won six NBA championships with the Bulls playing next to Michael Jordan, these Warriors wouldn’t stand a chance against his Bulls team that went 72-10 in Michael Jordan’s first full season back from his first retirement. Jordan, unlike others like Pippen, Charles Barkley and Oscar Robertson, had nothing bad to say about the Warriors, and even told Klay Thompson to go and get that record. If he can.
Speaking to the Dan Patrick Show, Pippen said the Bulls would sweep the Warriors in a series. He didn’t think they’d take a night off during a series against such a team (although the Bulls didn’t sweep a single one of their six finals series), and thought that he’d be the one guarding Stephen Curry due to his size probably bothering him a little bit, while Jordan would get the assignment of guarding Klay Thompson most of the time.
With the Warriors at 68-8, having to go 5-1 in the remaining six games (two against the San Antonio Spurs, one in San Antonio) in order to break the record, Steve Kerr, who was also part of the Bulls winning the three championships from 1996 to 1998 and that 72-10 season, thinks his players might be a bit burdened by all the talk of the record.
I think they want the record. But I think what they probably realize is maybe all the talk and all the focus on the record has gotten us away from the process of who we are. do think the constant questions and talk about — whether it’s home win streak or record or whatever — I think all that stuff does take its toll, whether the players know it or not, whether it’s a conscious thing or not, and it probably has taken a little bit away from, as I said, our process or our work. I think it’d be cool to break the record but we all know what our focus is. We want to win a championship. The championship goes up on the wall, and records are broken. People break records. Championships last forever.