B.J. breaks out!
B.J. Armstrong kicked off the 1991 playoffs with a career game
“B.J. gives them a lot of help off the bench. He’s a lot different from Paxson at that point guard spot in that he gives Chicago a lot of quickness, especially defensively.”
— TNT color commentator Jack Givens during Game 1 of the 1991 Bulls-Knicks series
From 1985 to 1997, Jerry Krause used his 15 first-round picks on 11 forwards, three centers and one guard.1
If the one guard is any indication, maybe he should have drafted more guards.
That’s because the one guard that Krause selected with a first-round pick during the dynasty is his only post-Scottie/Horace first-rounder who eventually became a starter: B.J. Armstrong.
And when the Bulls kicked off their championship playoff run of 1991, it was B.J. Armstrong leading the way off the bench.
The Bulls won a franchise best 61 games in ‘91 with incredible lineup stability. Phil Jackson’s club used just three starting lineups all year, with the starting five of Paxson, Jordan, Pippen, Grant and Cartwright starting 73 games plus all 17 playoff games.2 MJ, Scottie and Pax each played 82 games, with Cartwright at 79 and Horace at 78.
B.J. was the only other Bull to play all 82 games. He was a true sixth man, never starting a game while finishing sixth in minutes in both the regular season and the playoffs. B.J. was the #1 spark off the bench, scoring in double figures 31 times in the regular season.
That production was on full display on April 25, 1991, Game 1 of the Bulls-Knicks first round series and the first playoff game of our first championship season. The Knicks were easy pickings for the Bulls: we were the East’s #1 seed, New York was 39-433 and we swept them 4-0 in the regular season. If Patrick Ewing or Charles Oakley had any hope of upsetting the Bulls, B.J. and the gang disavowed them promptly.
In what is still the biggest loss in Knicks postseason history, the Bulls picked apart New York like a boy with a daddy long-legs. We won by 41 points4, outscoring the Knickerbockers in every quarter and dominating in the passing lanes, with 15 steals to their four.
The usual suspects led the way: MJ with 28 points, plus six boards, six assists and two steals, Scottie with 25, seven boards, three assists and four steals. But the most memorable performances came from the backup backcourt of B.J. Armstrong and Craig Hodges:
ARMSTRONG: 18 points (6-8 FG, 1-1 3P, 5-6 FT), 10 assists, 2 steals
HODGES: 16 points (7-10 FG, 2-3 3P, 0-1 FT), 3 steals
“I just tried to come out aggressive on defense and I got some open shots and they went down,” Armstrong said. B.J. entered with under a minute to go in the first quarter and the Bulls leading by two. Jordan hit two free throws, got a steal and then hit a three. Scottie forced Gerald Wilkins to lose his dribble out of bounds, and the Bulls closed the quarter with B.J. knocking down a 3 off the Jordan assist.
Just like that, the lead went from two to 10 and eventually up to 21 in the 2nd quarter, with the Bulls blowing the doors open on a 29-9 run, much of which came with MJ resting.
“It’s a real lift for them when the team plays as great as they did with Michael on the bench,” Oakley said. “They played like they wanted to make a statement and we played like we were laying down.”
While Phil wasn’t as impressed — he made a point of noting that the team could have played better offensively — he knew where his bread was buttered.
“Hodges shot terrific and B.J. had some good shots,” Jackson said, and indeed, the backup backcourt brought the fight right to the Knicks. Armstrong made an impact all over the court — he defended Mark Jackson as soon as he entered and seemed to always be around the ball even when he wasn’t scoring.
His energy was essential; when B.J. checked in, Jordan was just 1-6 from the floor.
Armstrong’s 18 points were a new playoffs career high, but his 10 assists stood out even more because of how easily the ball seemed to flow through him whether in transition or in the triangle. In the second quarter he had a steal off of a bad inbounds pass, took a beat to assess the floor and saw Hodges darting back into the offense. Armstrong fired a pass back to the three-point line to Hodgy, who knocked down the jumper.
B.J. had another great assist to Hodges, a beauty to Horace off a pass from Jordan that MJ made while sitting and a highlight reel assist to a streaking Pippen for a two-handed jam that ended up in the team’s 1991 championship video. He also gamely handled a peak 80s/90s playoff basketball moment when Jerrod Mustaf laid Armstrong out on a layup attempt, drawing a flagrant foul.
Hodges helped Armstrong to his feet, and you could sense a real camaraderie and mission from the two sharp-shooting guards. Later, when Hodges missed a layup, B.J. tipped it in on the follow.
“The two shortest guys on the court lead the break, and they connect,” TNT play-by-play man Ron Thulin said as B.J. and Hodges shared a high-five on the way back up the court.
Craig Hodges: The ReadJack Interview
Craig Hodges couldn’t believe what he was holding. But there it was. A check for $20,000, his prize money for winning the 1990 three-point contest at All-Star Weekend. He wanted to do something real with that money. This was a chance to make good on his vision.
Armstrong made a habit of scoring in double-figures off the bench. He led the team in 1991 with 31 such games, and in 1992 with 44. Though Armstrong replaced Paxson as a starter in 1993, he came off the bench eight times and scored in double figures in five of those games.
Across all six championship seasons, B.J. had the team’s most games with 10+ points off the bench with 80, followed by 79 for Steve Kerr and 73 for Toni Kukoc.
He delivered some of his greatest playoff games against the Knicks, which was great considering how often we played them. Of his four career 20-point playoff games, three came against New York, including his playoffs career high of 23 in 1994. He had 15 playoff games with 16 or more points. Eight were against the Knicks; one of his best was a clutch 18-point performance in Game 2 in 1992 to tie their second-round series.
“It was time for someone to step up and shoot those shots,” Armstrong said. “I feel confident in myself that I can make them, so I stepped up and took them.”
That confidence was on display a year earlier in 1991, as Armstrong’s moxy, shooting and quick-strike passing helped the Bulls kick off their race to ring #1.
“B.J. Armstrong says his most prized possession is his college degree,” Thulin said during Game 1. “That may change — it could be an NBA championship ring if things go according to the Bulls’ plans.”5
In the spring of 1993, the Tribune reported that Armstrong’s “most prized possession” was still his college degree, meaning not even two championship rings could knock his education off its perch. I doubt a third did either. B.J. always knew what mattered most. When he entered a game, his teammates knew too.
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And for fun, more screenshots from Game 1 of the 1991 Bulls-Knicks first-round series:
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OKAY… one more thing.
As I was hunting for newspaper material on B.J.’s big game, I was flipping through the Tribune from April 26, 1991 and saw that on page 6, the paper reported that the Chicago Power soccer team had won the 1991 NPSL championship by defeating the Dayton Dynamo 12-10 for a three-game sweep.
The Power of the National Professional Soccer League (NPSL, not to be confused with today’s NPSL, the National Premier Soccer League) became Chicago’s first indoor soccer champion — the old Chicago Sting were an outdoor team that won titles in 1981 and 1984.
I bring this up because growing up, I vaguely knew about the Sting and the Power, which is to say that I knew they were successful soccer teams in Chicago, but I didn’t know that one was indoor and one was outdoor, and I didn’t know when they played, in part because the Tribune did things like burying their championship on page 6! The April 25, 1991 Tribune had no mention of the upcoming title match.
Over at the Dayton Daily News, not surprisingly, the Power-Dynamo game received front-page sports coverage to intro the game on April 25 and then cover the game on April 26. Just fun to look back and see that reminder of our soccer teams and how they were covered.
Bulls all-time draft picks, via Basketball Reference. As Bulls GM, Jerry Krause used just three of his 22 1st round picks on guards: B.J. in 1989, Corey Benjamin in 1998 and Jay Williams in 2002, his final 1st round pick. He did trade Olden Polynice for Scottie Pippen, who played a lot of guard. His first pick in 1990 was in the 2nd round, where he took Toni Kukoc who he envisioned as a point guard. In 1999, Krause drafted small forward Ron Artest, who played some 2-guard. The only other 1st round pick that Krause truly spent on a guard was in 2000, when he drafted center Chris Mihm at #7 but immediately traded him for #8 pick Jamal Crawford. So if we’re being very generous with definitions, Krause used 1st round picks to acquire rookie guards six times in 18 drafts: Scottie, B.J., Corey Benjamin, Artest, Jamal and Jay.
Only two other Bulls started a game in 1991: Stacey King replaced Horace for six games and Will Perdue was in for Cartwright for three.
Since 1977, 53 teams have made the playoffs under .500, with only three winning a playoff series, though interestingly, all three reached the conference finals. In 1981, the 40-42 Kings met the 40-42 Rockets in the WCF, with Moses Malone’s Rockets winning and then losing the Finals to the Celtics. In 1987, the 39-43 SuperSonics also reached the WCF. Two 50-loss teams have made the playoffs since 1977: the 30-52 1986 Bulls, who would have missed the playoffs if MJ had remained injured, and the 31-51 1988 Spurs.
For the Knicks, the 41-point loss surpassed their previous worst playoff loss of 40 points, 130-90 vs. the 76ers in 1978. For the Bulls, the 41-point win is now third in franchise history but was a new record at the time, passing the 27-point win in 1975 over the Kings. The famed 42-point blowout in Game 3 of the 1998 Finals set the new franchise record, which the Bulls blew out of the water in 2015 with a 120-66 Game 6 elimination of the Bucks.
Another great quote about B.J. during the broadcast: “This is a young man who says he wants to be a world political leader. Really interested in politics. … An exceptional young man.”