The year 1988 for Michael Jordan was arguably one of the best years a player has ever had in the history of the league. Out of everything that he had accomplished in that one year, his first and only Defensive Player of the Year title is probably the most impressive. Recently, MJ’s DPOY was put under the scanner by Tom Haberstroh of Yahoo Sports as he made some serious accusations of stat-padding against the Chicago Bulls legend. Following the allegations, rapper-turned-podcaster Joe Budden trashed Jordan for resorting to marketing gimmicks to win awards throughout his career.
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To put it into context just how impressive MJ was in 1988, here’s a list of his accomplishments from that year. He was the league MVP, an All-Star, the All-Star Game MVP, an All-NBA First Team nominee, the DPOY, an All-Defensive First Team nominee, the scoring champion, the steals leader, and the winner of the Slam Dunk Contest.
However, Haberstroh has managed to put an asterisk over this legendary season. According to the veteran reporter, a lot of the individual awards won by MJ were a result of concessions that officials made during the Bulls’ home games. Budden resonated with this argument and declared that he has always claimed that Jordan’s highly touted greatness was manufactured to a large extent.
During a recent episode of his podcast, Budden said, “I kept telling y’all, Michael Jordan is just one of the greatest marketing machine tricks to ever live. Y’all didn’t think that the league was doing some bullsh*t for Michael Jordan?”
The veteran rapper added other instances of the league trying to promote Jordan, “They moved the three-point line five feet up for him…Reggie Miller was tight. They did expansion teams for that n***a, made teams weak, but this story speaks to stat padding.”
Budden further said that he believes the source for this major expose is credible.
The report from Haberstroh revealed that the scorekeepers allegedly inflated MJ’s numbers to make it look more impressive. After much research, he found that there’s major discrepancy in MJ’s road and home game numbers.
Haberstroh wrote, “A closer look at Jordan’s 1987-88 season reveals a substantial discrepancy between his home and road statistics, raising questions about the authenticity of his off-the-charts steals and blocks numbers that season — and shining a light on an era that seemed particularly vulnerable to the hidden hand of home bias.”
In his report, Haberstroh called MJ”s DPOY “the most consequential Defensive Player of the Year award in NBA history.” It is also believed that MJ knew about the inflated numbers as well.
When you look at the timing of the award, it makes total sense too. This is the late 80s we’re talking about. The technology to trace every move wasn’t there, so, it’s understandable why the scorekeepers at home would have tried to sneak in better numbers in his favor.
Additionally, the league wasn’t as advanced or popular back then, and it was in dire need of a superstar who could take it to the international markets. MJ had the potential to do it and pushing his name to the forefront was lucrative for the league.
However, there’s no definitive evidence to prove there was a league-wide conspiracy to push Jordan. But Joe Budden certainly believes that a lot of the noise MJ generated back then was artificial.
