by benji on Thu Aug 21, 2008 5:24 pm
Ignoring that (which is true) there was one other aspect to the Dream Team that a team until this years (but far far less still) doesn't have. Everyone on the Dream Team was willing to not be "the man" and have their role changed by Chuck Daly. We can't forget that Charles Barkley was made the centerpiece of the offense because Daly decided nobody in the world could stop him from scoring. I'm sure half the team was pissed about this, but they didn't let it bother them on the court, they deferred to Charles as the first option. Other than Barkley, nobody else scored over 15ppg, not even Jordan. Both Jordan and Pippen agreed to be primarily perimeter defenders.
Most of these guys came up having to play on "teams" not being the man since they stepped foot onto an AAU team where everyone deferred to them. Plus they had those guys like Robinson, Stockton, and Mullin (even though he was fourth (!) on the team in scoring and led the team in rebounding) who were more than willing to take a back seat and just do what they can to help. Sorta like Kidd is doing now, barely shooting let alone scoring at all. As well, you had Jordan-Pippen, Malone-Stockton...Bird and Magic came up, as basketball players, together essentially, Barkley and Jordan were friends.
You had these high scorers like Malone and Jordan, high possession guys like Magic and Ewing who had no problem not getting 30 touches a game. On that 2002 team, especially, you could tell a good number of the players had a serious problem with that aspect. I could even imagine them thinking the whole affair would be like all-star games.
