Chicago Bulls: Building all-time one-year starting five

Power Forward: Scottie Pippen (1993-94)

It should come as no surprise that the best individual season for eventual Hall-of-Fame 6-foot-9 forward Scottie Pippen statistically would come in the absence of MJ. Jordan and Pippen were possibly the greatest duo in NBA history, but the latter of the two posted his best per game stats of his career on his own.

While Jordan was trying his hand with the Chicago White Sox minor league organization (Birmingham Barons mostly) in the mid-1990’s, Pippen was trying to keep the Bulls afloat. And the closest he would ever come to getting an NBA MVP (at least for the regular season) would come during the 1993-94 campaign.

The Bulls were coming off back-to-back-to-back NBA Championships entering the 1993-94 campaign, and it looked as if Pippen could still keep them in title contention even without Jordan. And he definitely gave all he could to the effort. In 72 games played, Pippen averaged 22.0 points per game, 8.7 rebounds, 5.6 assists, a career-high 2.9 steals, and 0.8 blocks, while shooting 49.1 percent from the field and 32 percent from beyond the arc.

Pippen would finish third in the MVP voting for the 1993-94 season, and he would get one of his seven All-Star selections. Best of all, he would be named the 1994 All-Star Game MVP and to the All-NBA First-Team.

The advanced numbers proved just how good he really was. He registered a 7.7 box plus/minus rating, 6.8 value over replacement player rating, .194 win shares per 48 minutes, 23.2 player efficiency rating, and 54.4 true shooting percentage.