Michael Jordan

Nobody knew. If they tell you they knew, they're lying.

When Michael Jordan joined the Chicago Bulls in 1984, he did so with a reputation, but not the reputation he left the team with some 14 years later.

Following his three-year collegiate career at North Carolina, Jordan came to the Bulls with the expectation that he would be a wonderful athlete to watch, a tremendous dunker, a high-flying talent like the Bulls had perhaps never known.

But no one knew about Jordan's relentless competitiveness, at least not to the level he eventually displayed. No one knew that he would be impossible to stop offensively.

In his first season with the Bulls, Jordan averaged 28.2 points and shot over 50 percent from the field. He led the Bulls to the playoffs that first year despite the team having a 38–44 record. The Bulls lost to the Milwaukee Bucks in the first round.

After missing 64 games with a foot injury in his second season, Jordan came back in March '86 and got the Bulls into the playoffs again with a record of 30–52. There they got a first-round matchup against the Boston Celtics. In the second game of the three-game series in Boston, Jordan scored a playoff-record 63 points in a losing effort, giving an indication of who he was in terms of competitiveness and scoring ability. After that game, Hall of Famer Larry Bird compared Jordan to God.

In his third season, completely healthy once again, Jordan really set the NBA on its ear with 37 points per game. He scored more than 3,000 points in the season, something that had not been done since Wilt Chamberlain's heyday. He added more than 200 steals and 100 blocks, playing the entire game on both ends of the court to indicate his status as a complete player.

In the '87–88 season, he won his first MVP award after scoring 35 points per game. He was also named Defensive Player of the Year. The Bulls finished above .500 for the first time with Jordan at 50–32 and won a playoff series for the first time against the Cleveland Cavaliers. They were eliminated in the second round by the Detroit Pistons.

The Bulls were eliminated each of the next two years by the Pistons in the Eastern Conference Finals, but Jordan continued his scoring mastery, averaging well over 30 points a game.

In the '90–91 season, the Bulls finally had the will and the talent to beat the Pistons in the Eastern Conference Finals and went on to defeat the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA finals for their first title. Jordan's competitiveness and emotional need to win came out in the postgame locker room celebration when he hugged the championship trophy and cried, huddled with his father and best friend, James Jordan.

With one title under his belt, Jordan was unstoppable the next two years. He led the Bulls to the NBA title in '92 in a convincing series against the Portland Trail Blazers, who were led by one of Jordan's so-called athletic predecessors, Clyde Drexler. In '93, Jordan and the Bulls beat the Phoenix Suns in the Finals for their third straight title. He averaged over 40 points in the finals.

After the '93 playoffs, Jordan faced two adversities. He was accused of having a gambling problem, although he never committed any crimes. He also had to deal with the July death of his father, which was believed to be a factor in his decision to retire before the start of the '93–94 season.

Jordan attempted to play professional baseball, the sport that was his first love, but failed to get above Double-A level.

Revitalized by his absence from the game, Jordan returned to the Bulls in the spring of '95, but the Bulls lost to the Orlando Magic in the second round of the playoffs when Jordan was revealed to be slightly out of shape and slow with his reaction times. In the summer of '95, Jordan rededicated himself to the task of an 82-game NBA season, and with Pippen and a new cast of teammates, he led the Bulls to three more NBA titles, playing the Seattle SuperSonics once and the Utah Jazz twice. In 1998, with a battle over a new collective bargaining agreement looming and the prospect of the Bulls breaking up their dynasty, Jordan retired again.

By the end of his career with the Bulls, Jordan had won 10 scoring titles, including seven in a row. He owned the top regular season career scoring average of 30.1 points, and the best playoff career scoring average of 33.4 per game....