Father-son duos in the NBA may not be all that uncommon nowadays, but it remains special nonetheless. Ron Harper’s son Dylan will be the latest second-gen athlete to step foot into the league, in the Spurs’ season-opener against the Dallas Mavericks and a lot of questions directed at him in the build-up were about his father.
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A five-time NBA champ, Ron Harper played for four different teams and also shared the locker room with some of the best hoopers of all time. The highlight has to be playing with Michael Jordan on the Chicago Bulls, or perhaps even his battles against the icon when he was elsewhere. Because Dylan admitted that although he doesn’t know too much about his dad’s peak basketball days, he never forgot those matches against Jordan.
Ahead of Spurs vs. Mavericks, Dylan was asked whether any of his dad’s performances stood out in his mind. Sadly, the answer was no.
“Nah, he a little too old for my understanding,” Dylan clearly stated. “But definitely I mean, I’ve seen clips like, highlights on YouTube where he playing against Jordan in those playoff battles.”
Harper vs. Jordan was a matchup that wasn’t as frequently discussed, but was still integral to both men’s career trajectory. Yes, they won three championships while repping the same Bulls uniform, but before that, when Ron was at the Cavaliers, there were some interesting playoff matchups. Out of all those who tried to guard Jordan, it was Ron who made him work the hardest.
It arguably made Ron a better player, which is why even after his success in Chicago, another championship team in the Lakers snapped him up. That’s where he won two more championships, taking his total ring collection to five. When asked if he sees those things all the time, son Dylan agreed.
“I mean he got five of them… you walk in [the house] you see them right away.”
Difference between Ron and Jordan
Unlike Jordan, Ron doesn’t appear in GOAT conversations, but he understood ‘His Airness’ better than a lot of players in the 1990s did. The main difference between him and Jordan? MJ had the freedom to do pretty much whatever he wanted on the hardcourt.
“When I played against MJ, he always gave me my respect and I always gave him his. But he had the ultimate green light,” said Ron in an interview with SLAM.
“I always had guys on my teams who were great, too… So it’s not like I could shoot as much as him. I’m not saying if I did shoot as much as him what would have happened,” he added, before revealing how in games where MJ would score 35, he would finish with around 10 less.
That’s why Ron knew that to win, his teammates would have to outscore Jordan’s.
