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ONE love, blood, life
i disagree.
while i certainly don't want to sell pippen short, and i'll take pippen over both odom and pao, it's certainly not because pippen was more talented than either of those two guys. pippen just had "it." he was a gamer, and a lock down defender to boot. he was the perfect second fiddle. if he had been drafted somewhere where he would have been forced to be the #1 guy, i certainly don't think we'd be talking about scottie pippen in the same light we do today, and he certainly would not have been on the top 50 team.
odom and pao are both incredibly talented, but tend to be soft (especially pao). after that... derek fisher is certainly as good if not better than ron harper or bj armstrong, and the lakers have a very capable bench.
michael jordan made no name, ordinary players into house hold names, many of whom would go on to become terrible terrible GMs thanks to their association with Jordan.
here is the most glaring difference between Michael Jordan and his relationship with his teammates and Kobe Bryant and his relationship with his.
Michael Jordan would be intense and yell at you and get in your face. Kobe Bryant is intense and yells and gets in your face. Michael Jordan would then pass you the ball on the next posession, showing that he still had trust in you. Kobe Bryant will say "fuck it" and shoot a fall away jumper.
Take Michael Jordan in his prime and switch him out with Kobe Bryant and the Lakers win this series. Switch Kobe Bryant with Michael Jordan in the 90s and the Knicks, Suns and Jazz would all have NBA Championship Banners hanging from the rafters. The Bulls may still have gotten a title or even two, but certainly not 6.
I think you're selling some of those players from the Bulls title years short.
Horace Grant was a legitimate 13-14ppg/9-10rpg/1bpg/1spg/2-3apg guy in his prime. He was very, very solid role player, and he WAS the 'third scoring option' on those first three title teams.
Bill Cartwright averaged 20+ppg in his first two years in New York, and 14-17ppg four more times after that. He was already over 30 and injury-plagued when he got to Chicago, but they also never used him as a scoring option, and he was still a great defensive presence for them. Grant once said, 'no Bill Cartwright, no three championships'.
Looking at the later teams...
Dennis Rodman is the greatest defensive PF ever, and the greatest rebounder ever. The Lakers have nothing close to him as far as interior defense goes.
Toni Kukoc was widely considered to be one of the very best players in Europe before he came over. He was an integral part of that second three-peat. He could score inside and out. In 98-99, after everyone had left and he was still on the Bulls, and he finally had a full-time starting role, he averaged 18/7. What has Gasol averaged since being traded to the Lakers? 18/7.
Ron Harper was a 20+ppg guy before coming to the Bulls. Just the year before signing with the Bulls, he put up 20ppg, 6rpg, 4apg, 1spg. He suffered a knee injury, and when he came to Chicago his PT was cut considerably, and he had to change his game to suit playing next to MJ when MJ came back, to being a more defense-oriented player. Derek Fisher has always been a role player. Ron Harper was a stud who had an injury, decrease in PT, and the situation of having to play a different role cut his numbers way down.