“Let me slow Michael Jordan down, then we’ll figure it out”: Gary Payton expands on how George Karl gave in and let him guard MJ during the 1996 NBA Finals

Gary Payton was perhaps the single most effective player to ever guard Michael Jordan. They faced each other in the 1996 NBA Finals.

For those of us who haven’t watched The Last Dance but have heard of His Airness, the 1995-96 NBA season represents perhaps the greatest comeback season by an NBA player in league history, in terms of sheer team dominance.

Michael Jordan had lost maybe half a step, and his otherworldly bounce was no longer a regular feature on Sportscenter. But he was now the game’s deadliest mid-range assassin, and he shot a higher volume from there than everyone else.

A 72-10 breeze through the regular season and an 11-1 record through the Eastern Conference Playoffs pitted Jordan and his Bulls against the emerging Seattle SuperSonics from the West, led by Gary Payton and Shawn Kemp.

MJ’s Bulls sealed their 4th championship trophy on Father’s Day 1996, leaving fans with an all-time image of Michael Jordan weeping with the trophy in his hand and dedicating the laurels to his dad.

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But a lot of people remember the series more for how Gary Payton turned the series around for a bit when George Karl switched him onto MJ from Game 4 onwards.

Gary Payton reveals how he overruled George Karl in guarding Michael Jordan in the 1996 NBA Finals

Gary Payton was recently a guest with VladTV. One of the revelations he made during the interview was why George Karl didn’t put him on Michael Jordan earlier on in the Finals:

“I think that he (SuperSonics head coach George Karl) was trying to preserve because I was hurt. I had a torn calf during the day, I tore my calf against Utah in the Conference Finals.”

“So it was one of the things when Game 4 came and we were down 0-3. I said ‘Look, it is what it is. Let me slow him down, and then we can get everybody in a rhythm. And when I slow him down, don’t worry about me. I’ll figure it out.'”

“We knew we couldn’t stop him, we just had to slow him down. We had to make other players do what they had to do, and that’s when Pippen and Kukoc picked it up. But I slowed him down, and we won the next 2 games!”

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