In the recent past, maintaining players’ workload has been a hot topic in the NBA. In order to prevent injuries and keep players fresh for the playoff stages, there has been a lot of talk regarding maintaining players’ workload and giving them calculated minutes on the court.
We have seen that some of the key players have been troubled by injuries and their every minute on the court is taken into consideration by the experts.
However, analyst Stan van Gundy has called out modern players for complaining about their minutes giving Michael Jordan’s consistency example. Jordan had a glorious career and didn’t miss a lot of regular-season matches for Chicago Bulls.
Van Gundy wrote on his Twitter account, “Michael Jordan got hurt and missed 64 games his second year in the league. He came back from his foray into baseball in 1994-95 to play 17 games. In his other 11 years with the Bulls, he missed a total of 7 games and averaged over 38 minutes a game. Still seemed OK in the playoffs.”
In fact, Michael Jordan missed only four regular-season games from 1991-93. Furthermore, he played every game in his second three-peat from the 1995-96 season to the 1997-98 campaign. He led the Bulls to three championships during that phase.
Meanwhile, players like LeBron James and Kevin Durant are fine with spending more time on the court but their coaches have come under the scanner for keeping their minutes in check. James is playing his 19th NBA season and he is still going strong.
The LA Lakers talisman scored 29 points against New York Knicks after returning to action from a knee injury. Lakers will next face Milwaukee Bucks on Tuesday.
