“How is this even real? Michael Jordan was bonkers in the 1987-88 season!”: Jamal Crawford can not believe what Bulls legend achieved at age 24

Jamal Crawford expresses his disbelief at the sheer magnitude of what Michael Jordan achieved in the 1987-88 regular season.

While Michael Jordan won all of his 6 championships in the 90’s, it’s easy for us to forget that he dominated the 80’s as well. Drafted 3rd behind Hakeem Olajuwon and Sam Bowie, MJ had a chip on his shoulder from the very beginning.

MJ truly exceeded expectations in every season by securing All-Star selections, but the Bulls were not competitive yet. They posted losing records in 3 straight seasons, until exploding to 50 wins in 1987-88. What made the difference? Well, they were helped by an historic season from their franchise player.

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1987 was also the year when Bulls traded for 5th pick Scottie Pippen from the Supersonics. They also acquired star Horace Grant in the same draft, and the duo along with MJ would prove to be the catalyst for the Bulls’ first three-peat.

The Bulls did their part, and now it was MJ’s turn to show up. And the GOAT didn’t disappoint, and played out one of the most extraordinary seasons in league history.

3-time 6MOTY Jamal Crawford recently retweeted a post which detailed all of MJ’s achievements, and couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Same here, Jamal. Same here.

Michael Jordan became the first player ever to win MVP and DPOY trophies in the same season

The GOAT didn’t leave any stones unturned. He scored 35 points a game that season while averaging a league-high 40 minutes in all 82 games. Not only this, he was also the steals leader for the season.

For all the “stat nerds” out there claiming he might have been inefficient, well, he maintained a 60% True Shooting rate. NBA Twitter understandably flipped out after getting reminded of MJ’s accolades.

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The Eastern Conference in the latter half of the 80s was exceptionally stacked, however, and MJ was denied a championship. Larry Bird’s Celtics and Isiah Thomas’ Pistons would prove to be too much for the fledgling Bulls roster, and serve as added motivation for future seasons.