Four Legendary Teams

May 14, 1998, Los Angeles press conference.

Harris led Kobe and O'Neal to the event.

The flashbulbs had been going nonstop from the moment the three stepped out of their cars. Every major media outlet in the United States was present! It was not just American media, either—large numbers of foreign reporters had also turned their attention to the only four teams still standing!

The kingly Bulls! Chasing their sixth championship, Michael Jordan was making his charge for the title of the greatest player in history!

The purple-and-gold Lakers! With the best record in history at 73 wins, the newly crowned MVP and the league's top center wanted to overthrow the Bulls' reign and complete a changing of the guard!

The Galactic Jazz! With three Hall of Fame-caliber superstars all in their prime, they had the best roster on paper in the league! Now that their chemistry was complete, they swore to claim the championship!

The Bad Boys 2.0 Magic! The '93 twin stars had meshed seamlessly and were playing the best basketball of their careers. Under Chuck Daly, the decorated coach of the Bad Boys, their goal was to defeat the Bulls once again!

Four legendary teams! In any other year, each of them would have had a high chance of winning it all! Even past championship teams could not claim with certainty that they were stronger than these squads!

Four teams! Not one of them had a 100% chance of winning the championship! The gap between them was tiny, and any small accident could alter the outcome.

This was not merely a golden age for professional men's basketball in the United States! It was a golden age for basketball across the world!

In the NBA's fifty-year history, there had never been a year in which so many elite