If the Bulls rebuild for next season starting next month–and thatdecision is pending–Michael Jordan will be welcome to participate in all tactical maneuvers.
“I want Michael to play here as long as he wants,” Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said Sunday. “Whichever direction we go, I’d like him to be part of it.”
Whether Jordan would care to stick around with the furniture rearranged is the question, but his inclusion on management’s wish list for 1997-98 automatically would seem to alter the traditional locker-room definition of rebuilding. Particularly in Chicago, where the Cubs have been rebuilding since the 1945 World Series.
Reinsdorf prefers to avoid waiting 52 years between parades. Instead, he thinks his franchise could change a few bodies without sinking into the abyss. With the free-agent system now, teams needn’t languish in the NBA’s black hole for long periods, like the fallen Boston Celtics’ dynasty.
“If we do it right, hopefully we don’t have to be bad for more than one season, bad being missing the playoffs,” Reinsdorf said. “And if Michael’s still on the team, it will make the playoffs.
“But our objective is to start each season on opening night feeling we have a realistic shot at the championship. Whenever we break up this team, which will have to be done, whether it’s after this season or after next season, we can win and rebuild at the same time if we do it right.”
Reinsdorf swears on a stack of Albert Belle’s best interview tapes that all options pertaining to the Bulls’ future still are being explored. There is no blueprint hermetically sealed in General Manager Jerry Krause’s designer coat pocket.
The team’s quest for a fifth title in seven years could influence the twin Jerrys. So might the marketability of Scottie Pippen, if the Bulls shop him around at the playoffs’ conclusion. Should they find he is worth significantly more to this team than any other, might that sway management to postpone interior decorating?
“You’re free to speculate,” Reinsdorf said. “I will tell you that I have instructed Jerry Krause not to conduct any discussion of determining the value of Pippen or any of our other players until after the Finals. That story about how there’s a deal on the table with Philadelphia is false.”
Pippen’s contract is up after next season, however, and this is where free agency could hurt the Bulls. They can buy help to rebuild and avert a Celtics-like funk. They also can stay with Pippen and take the chance that he would leave them with nothing but a giant hole in the lineup.
“If these guys were all 25, it wouldn’t be a problem,” Reinsdorf said. “But they aren’t. If I’d have been guaranteed in 1990 that we’d win the title in 1991, as we did, then miss the playoffs for five straight years, I’d have said fine.
“The circumstances are different now. We’ve won four, which is terrific, and we’re going for five. But sooner or later, we have to get younger, which doesn’t mean we’ll decide to do it after this season. If we get the fifth, we might think about six. This is a very special team.”
Reinsdorf dismissed a recent remark by Lamar Hunt, owner of the Kansas City Chiefs and a Bulls investor, who volunteered that the days of Jordan, Phil Jackson and Dennis Rodman are down to a precious few.
“Lamar was speaking as a fan,” Reinsdorf said. “He can’t have inside knowledge of a plan because there is none. When he says this Bulls team has only a precious few days left, that’s true. But if we rebuild after next season instead of now, that’s still basically a precious few days, isn’t it?”
What about Jackson? Is he welcome to stay, even if management supplies new names to be played later?
“Phil and I agreed not to discuss his situation in public,” Reinsdorf said. “I’m on record as calling him the best coach in the NBA. But whatever happens with Phil or the players will have nothing to do with money. With what I’ve got in payrolls on the White Sox and Bulls–more than $100 million–can anybody honestly think money is what this is all about?”
