Larry Bird’s Big Praise for Michael Jordan Comes at a Cost as Fans Troll the GOAT Nonetheless

On April 20, 1986, in the heart of the Boston Garden, Michael Jordan didn’t just play basketball; he etched his name into the cosmos of greatness. Facing a powerhouse Celtics team and fresh off an injury, MJ walked into hostile territory and lit it up like no one before him. It wasn’t just a playoff game; it was a declaration. Yesterday marked the anniversary of that iconic eruption.

But here’s the wild part: Jordan was just 23, in only his second season, coming off a broken foot that sidelined him for 64 games. No rhythm. No real help. Just raw will. Then he walked into the Garden and gave Boston hell. Larry Bird, stunned, showered him with praise and didn’t call him Mike, dropping one of the coldest lines ever. He called him God in disguise.

 Commemorating the iconic performance, the handle @nbaonespn shared a post, showcasing the statistics of the game, 63 points, 5 rebounds, 6 assists. The post was captioned, “Never forget MJ’s legendary 63-point playoff performance 😳” The post also shared some of the adulation shared by his opponent in the playoff series and one of the greatest to do it, Larry Bird, such as, “ I would never have called him the greatest player I’d ever seen if I didn’t mean it”.

However, after the post was shared, trolls were quick to pile on Michael Jordan. Their remarks varied from joking about MJ’s conversion rate to how his points are void because of his loss.

Fans troll Michael Jordan on the anniversary of iconic night

Fans wasted no time flooding the comment section of the post. One commented, “Got swept so it doesn’t matter,” saying that although MJ scored 63 points and had an unbelievable series individually, the Chicago Bulls still lost against the Boston Celtics overall.

An Instagram user commented, “Wait so LeBron get swept by spurs a get it held against him but Jordan get swept by Celtics a get praised ?” this fan is referencing the playoff defeat LeBron suffered when he was with the Cleveland Cavaliers, which still gets held against him, – in spite of him scoring 22 points, 7 rebounds, and 6.8 assists.

Another user commented, “Jordan is the most overrated player of all time  22/41💔 trash and he got swept 🧹” calling MJ overrated because of the conversion statistics of 41 attempts and 22 free throws leading to his gargantuan points tally at that time.

Some fans took the logical route, such as one fan commenting, “if they had social media back then they woulda called him a ft merchant,” speaking on the high free throws that MJ converted in the playoff series, contributing to the culmination of his high points tally.

Another fan observed, “The efficiency is crazy,” taking shots at the 41 total attempts by MJ out of which he was able to score 63 points. One keen individual also commented, “I can’t take Jordan’s stats seriously, I mean the people who do the box score even admitted they intentionally inflated Jordan’s stats”, stating that they could not take MJ’s performance metrics seriously since they were apparently inflated by the box score-keepers; although this claim is a little speculative, it is still considerable. Regardless, that night was just a peek into the storied career that would follow the young man.