When we debate NBA GOAT, we pull up Michael Jordan’s resume to compare it to Bron’s, Kobe’s, etc. Something that stands out on the Black Cat’s side is his 1988 Defensive Player of the Year award. That was the same year he won his second of 10 scoring champion titles, becoming the first player to win both NBA awards. Now this notch in MJ’s career has been cast in doubt by a retired NBA stat keeper. In a detailed piece on Yahoo Sports, the sports analyst Tom Haberstroh revealed that the statistics that won Jordan’s lone DPOY could have been made up.

Why is it relevant 36 years later? As Haberstroh put it, it gave Jordan the validation for decades to come. Fabricated numbers translate to nullifying MJ’s one accomplishment no one has repeated in NBA history.

Michael Jordan’s DPOY – Fact or Fiction?

25-year-old Jordan won his one and only DPOY award alongside the scoring title in 1988. At that time, the UNC alum was dismissed as someone who could only make individual scoring records but not win a title for the team. He apparently took it personally and entered the 1987-88 season to prove he was a two-way player. The Bulls’ star averaged 35.0 points, 5.9 assists, 5.5 rebounds, 3.2 steals, and 1.6 blocks in 82 games, and the led league with 259 steals and 131 blocks. He got 37 votes from the media to win DPOY over Mark Eaton and Hakeem Olajuwon.

This rare accomplishment was uncontested until twenty years after Jordan’s retirement. Now Haberstroh presented a startling disparity between Jordan’s home and road game stats. He averaged 4 steals and 2.1 blocks when he played at the United Center. On the road, he was recording 2.1 steals and 1.2 blocks that season. The difference in both stats is 182%, not a common facet in DPOY winners. His stock was 82% higher at home than it was on the road. But it’s always been a discussion about home and road game stat disparity. Where does the question of fabrication come from?

An NBA stat keeper identified as Rucker revealed that he was one among many scorekeepers who exaggerated the numbers for home teams in the ’90s. Rucker said that every time they reviewed games, some assists or rebounds were debatable. In most cases, the benefit of the doubt went to the home team player. It was customary to give the home crowd some extra incentive to hype their team’s star with a few inflated figures. So Rucker can give examples where, if you reviewed old games, you can prove the figures were padded for the home star.

Disclaimer; there doesn’t seem to have been an official review of Jordan’s 87-88 stats. Mostly because the NBA was still not primetime until Jordan was leading the Bulls to the finals for the first time in the ’90s, and there’s very little footage of the tape-delay era. Haberstroh procured and reviewed six home games. He confirmed Jordan had at least 12 steals in one home game where the final box score stat was 28. That was more than the opposing team’s turnovers. The NBA has no plan to review the stats.

No other player including Jordan came close to this statline in history. Does it change anything?

Strength in numbers or it’s all relative?

What LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, and Wilt Chamberlain have in common with MJ is that they’re all scoring champions. What they don’t have in common are two things – Jordan’s DPOY win and the three others making it to the All-Defensive First Team. Now Jordan was a two-way player. He did have strong defensive skills. However, not only were his aerial abilities and mightier offensive skills outshadowing it but there happened to be better defenders in the league. Offended, he was left off the All-Defensive First Team in 1986-87. He claimed that DPOY was based on reputation and returned the next season to prove himself. That’s what the DPOY represented for him.

In current times, the home and road box score disparity has reduced to an insignificant percentage with modern technology aiding stat keepers. But in the ’60s, these accusations haunted statkeepers. Wilt and Bill Russell’s teams accused opposing scorekeepers of juicing up their respective star’s numbers. It doesn’t take away the fact that Wilt holds nearly every scoring record and Russell has 11 rings.

Jordan is five rings short of Russell’s title and he’s nowhere near Wilt’s best records where Kobe Bryant is. Sure it’s easier to count points than analyzing a rebound in a stat-based award like DPOY. These numbers don’t determine why any of these players are in that conversation. It’s their impact on the game. And not like the NBA is inclined to change history.

Stay tuned for more such updates, and to follow what Shaq’s ex-agent, Leonard Armato, has to say about the infamous Shaq-Kobe feud, Caitlin Clark’s Olympic snub, and more, watch this video.