Michael Jordan Was A Psychopath Competitor

Picture this:

You’re a rookie.

It’s your first year in the league.

As a high draft pick, there’s loads of hype surrounding you and expectations around playoff/championship talk. You’re the type of player they build franchises around.

You’re playing the Chicago Bulls IN Chicago.

The game starts, and right after making a nice play in the first few minutes of the game, you decide to go for a little friendly banter with Michael Jordan.

Your team’s up by a few points, and you figure hey, why not?

This is the dumbest fucking thing you could have done.

Michael Jordan now wants to enslave your family, burn down your village and destroy your crops.

He wants to eat your soul.

You start to see this fire burning inside of him.

His eyes get wide, he starts smacking his gum more ferociously.

He’s now grabbing his own rebounds while scoring almost at will.

40 points, 50 points, who knows how many he’s going to end with?

Your teammates are just laughing while you’re stunned on the bench thinking to yourself “What the hell just happened?”

You poked the bear. Rookie mistake.

They’ve all learned not to poke the bear.

Now the fun part about this story is that it’s not actually real.

It’s just an amalgamation of what routinely would happen on any given night in the NBA between 1984 and 1998.

Michael Jordan lived to destroy his opponents at a molecular level.

He’s arguably the most competitive and capable athlete of all time, here’s a quick recap of his accolades:

• NCAA Championship w/ North Carolina (1982)

• National College Player of the Year (1984)

• NBA Defensive Player of the Year

• 10x NBA Scoring Champion

• 14x NBA All-Star

• 3x All-Star Game MVP

• 5x NBA MVP

• 6x NBA champion

• 6x NBA Finals MVP

That doesn’t include starting the Jordan shoe line and owning the Charlotte Hornets, both of which made him the first billionaire basketball player.

But Evan, what do his accolades have to do with anything?

Honestly?

Not too much.

Except on TWO occasions he perceived he was robbed of the MVP during the regular season (1993, 1997) and it turned him into a monster in the playoffs.

He would say “Ok, fine, you got that. I’m gonna get this" in reference to the Finals/FMVP trophy.

He’s a full blown competitive psycho, he’s always trying to beat you and dominate.

In everything.

Quarters, Golf, Basketball — you name it, he’s going to try and win, even if there’s no metrics to win by.

Here’s a few things I’ve learned by studying the GOAT:

1) You’re Only As Good As The People Around You

People like to call the 90’s Chicago Bulls a “super team”, and they were — not by the modern definition.

It wasn’t put together by superstars asking for trades to the same team.

Jordan never asked for trades, never asked for specific players around him.

He never had diva-like tendencies. He was routinely underpaid.

But, he rode his teammates hard. He would make them better players. If they were playing poorly, he would drill them and be as vicious as a dog.

He knew you’re only as good as the other 4 guys on the court with you.

He wasn’t nice. He wasn’t there to be nice.

Jordan wanted to win at all costs.

2) It’s Going To Be A Fight

Here’s a quick history lesson:

Jordan and the Bulls in the late 1980’s were on the rise.

He was learning how to lead a team to the playoffs every year.

His face was everywhere on advertisements.

Everything was looking primed for him to take over as the face of the NBA.

Enter the “Bad Boy” Detroit Pistons.

Potentially the dirtiest team in NBA history, they would make it their sole mission to keep Jordan from scoring by any means necessary.

Throwing elbows, tackling, starting fights — You name it, they probably did it to him… constantly.

They would try to rattle him and his teammates.

The Bulls spent 3 years losing to them in hotly contested, close matchups.

Finally, a breakthrough. In the 1991 Eastern Conference Finals, the Bulls swept the Pistons 4-0.

It took them 3 years to win their fight against Detroit.

3) Use Whatever Fuel You Can To Win

It didn’t take much for Jordan to get motivated. Besides his internal fire of wanting to be the greatest ever, he would do whatever it took to keep himself going.

A player once said “Nice game, Mike” after putting up a career best against him.

That’s all he needed.

The Bulls played his team for a second match up, and Jordan TORCHED him, going off for 36 points in the first half, eventually ending with 47 points.

He destroyed him.

He took such offense to someone saying “Nice game” to him that he came back in the next matchup and demoralized this poor guy.

Except the guy never said that.

Jordan admitted that he made it up.

He created an imaginary monster to slay.

The craziest part? It worked.

I’m not advocating that you need to be as hardcore as the greatest competitor American sports has ever seen.

Hell, I’m not even saying it’s a good thing to be that competitive.

I’m saying there’s always some wisdom to be learned from exceptional people.

Michael Jordan is exceptional.

He’s the greatest basketball player of all time and there’s really no argument.

(Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals (his last game with the Bulls) has the highest TV ratings for an NBA game of all time AND is the most watched game in NBA history. It’s never returned to those levels)

Suck on that LeBron! (just kidding)

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I appreciate you guys.

Thanks for reading.

Evan