Michael Jordan averaged 31.5 points and 23 shots per game during his 13-year stint with the Chicago Bulls.
However, that didn’t mean that Coach Phil Jackson let MJ take all the shots he wanted, anytime he wanted.
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In fact, Jackson revealed that he didn’t even design the Bulls’ offense in a way where Jordan would always get the first touch, even though it kind of looked like that. According to The Zen Master, the coaching style he implemented on the Bulls was centered around sharing the ball.
The Bulls were the masters of the famous Triangle offense, but the very foundation of the team’s offense was about making every player on the court capable of scoring and allowing them to shoot whenever they felt confident.
“It’s not just about getting Michael Jordan the ball 25 times a game so that he can score 35, 40 points,” Jackson once said in an interview. “It’s about this team having the best feel about it, players seem to play a lot better if they can touch the ball and if they can have a chance to shoot once in a while.”
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The Bulls indeed shared the basketball, even during crunch time and that’s the reason why some of the team’s most iconic playoff highlights featured not only Jordan but the key role players as well. Game-winning shots in the Playoffs by John Paxson and Steve Kerr are just a couple of examples of this fact.
The Zen Master
Drawing deeply from Zen Buddhism, Coach Jackson introduced the Bulls to the concept of meditation. It seemed like a radical practice for a group of world-class, alpha-male athletes. However, the team eventually witnessed the positive results.
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Jackson taught his players about the benefits of mindfulness in a team setup. Before they knew it, the Bulls stopped reacting out of frustration or ego on the court. They were already functioning as a single unit.
Looking back, Phil believes that it was that approach and consistency that helped the Bulls prolong their success and dominance.
​”We started to get into this idea, ‘one breath, one mind.’ Which became the next ability that, as a group, we’re going to sit and extend this period of thought, dropping thought and just following our breath till we feel like we’re one breath one mind as a group,” Jackson said in another interview back in 2020.
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“We eventually became a team that was playing for themselves,” he added.
Phil thinks many coaches trust only one player
Jackson was used to coaching the best player in the league and it would’ve been easy for him to just clear the lane for Jordan or Kobe Bryant. However, it wasn’t Phil’s style to rely on only one star and hope for the best.
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Instead, Jackson ensured that the other players also felt that he trusted them. Looking at the modern landscape of the NBA, Phil reckoned that it’s no longer the case with most coaches today.
“I think you have to be a salesman,” Phil said of coaching. “When you’re a coach, you have to be able to talk about the good of the whole, but you have to be able to convince them that this is something that’s good for the team, maybe it’s not just good for one person. And I think a lot of coaches coach because it’s good for one person and because that person’s where they put all their trust in.”Â
Jackson has proven that his unique blend of brilliance and insightfulness is arguably the best coaching strategy the NBA has ever seen. Team above the individuals. Of course, having MJ and Kobe lead your squad can only benefit you, but they couldn’t achieve the success that they did without the team.
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This story was originally published by Basketball Network on Mar 27, 2026, where it first appeared in the Old School section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.