Nothing pre-social media compares to what is going on now in terms of hating.

I’m 41, not in my age group. We ingored our own teams and watched Jordan every chance we had

They were generally pretty loved. It was akin to tiger woods’ run in golf. Yea there were some against it, but largely they were so entertaining and fun most people were on board.

MJ was just that entertaining a personality

People didnt hate them, mj was the most popular human on the planet, along with michael jackson

Despised them, but respected them

Except Rodman, whose job it was to funnel most of the hatred toward himself

There was no hatred like there is today - outside of the local rivalry anyways.  The hatred you see today is purely because of social media and the rage baiting algorithms designed to piss you off.  It’s fucking awful.

I can only speak as someone who was just a child.

For children, it was probably like how every kid loves Steph Curry. I grew up in Orlando Magic territory and every kid loved MJ. Tons of Jerseys and gear

The Bulls and Michael Jordan were like rockstars, but they had their share of haters. I grew so tired of them winning that I started rooting against them toward the end. And every single game that was close in clutch time, you just knew MJ was going to pull through, whether you were rooting for or against him. It was either incredibly infuriating or like knowing you had a secret code.

But through any of the hate that was present at the time, there wasn’t really any disrespect - everyone knew how great they were. There wasn’t any disrespectful talk like there is today. Everybody fully understood how undeniable it all was. Which is all a testament to both MJ and the team’s overall greatness.

(edited to add): For example (and in short): Nobody… nobody was saying MJ sucked or lacked skill in any way. Everybody knew that would have been a dumb thing to say. Which is why it’s so frustrating for us who grew up in that era to see so many younger people claiming this today. If you were there, you know just how grossly untrue this claim is.

Well, I can safely say I hated them.

Bulls weren’t hated, they were respected. But once that song comes on, you know your team is about to get their ass kicked

I actually really liked Scottie Pippen and BJ Armstrong more than Jordan. Granted I was like 5.

No. It’s hard to think of a team lead by the most beloved player of all time being hated in the way teams/players are today. I lived through the dynasty too and was old enough to know what I was watching and following.

I don’t think the Bulls were hated at all. There were fans that didn’t like them but it was more of a respect dislike versus a “they are overrated” Everyone knew how great they were and they were watching history. And you have to remember, Jordan was one of the most famous people on Earth in the 90s.

You just can’t compare pre-social media to today

Without social media, it’s really hard to say. That being said, MJ was and still is the most popular athlete of all time. From what I saw and experienced back then, the Bulls were largely beloved.

Cavs fan since the early 80’s here.

MJ and the Bulls were villains and despised by fans of the teams they faced in the playoffs.

The difference, in my opinion, is that there was a great deal of respect for them, too.

If you weren’t invested in a team that couldn’t get past the Bulls, or were simply more casual you likely loved the Bulls. They were awesome.

It cannot be repeated enough in this post that social media and media in general today is designed to do nothing but piss people off and get them angry at each other for engagement

Everything back then had many magnitudes less of haters and people generally just appreciated great things across all sports and entertainment mediums, world was a way better place

as a LAL fan, the bulls were not hated by my circle of NBA fans. most ppl whether did they like or did rooted for the bulls had tons of respect for MJ for what he was doing.

Honestly they were beloved by a lot of random fans and cities.

They weren’t hated at all, they were adored lol. 90% of basketball jerseys at school were Jordan. 95% of bball shoes worn at school was Jordan. Space jam was a classic. The bulls dominated the sport right when sports truly were becoming part of mainstream tv viewing in the US. Jordan was one of those inevitable figures where it just seemed like he’d always come out on top, and in the 90s, he did just that.

Only ppl who hated the bulls were scorned fans of the teams they demolished

Haters didn’t have the ability to get particularly loud back then and Mike was literally everywhere. I was born in ‘87 and spent the first half of my childhood seeing black people as a super athletic race with the coolest people

My recollection (born in the 70s) is this: Everyone in the 80s (except pistons fans) was either pro-Lakers or Pro-Celtics. Those were the two dominant franchises and if you followed the playoffs and your team’s season was done, you simply chose a side (some of it regional, some of it style, some of it race, some of it unis, whatever, you had a preferred team.)
Jordan was so transcendent that during the Bulls run you were either Pro-Bulls or Anti-Bulls. Once he vanquished Drexler, there were no candidates for equal billing. So people did what people always do - they fell into two camps - those who root for winners because they admire excellence and those who root underdogs because they are the better story and more heroic and fun (think Luke Skywalker vs. Darth Vader).
And I would say more people got on the Jordan bandwagon than critiqued it (unlike today with OKC and GS). I attribute that to Jordan just being that damned good. He was inevitable in a way we haven’t seen since and its why old heads still have him above LeBron. Bron’s a better all around basketball player but Jordan would have beaten him 6 or 7 times out of every ten. That’s why Jordan’s the GOAT and why Jordan elevated the NBA to a new status of relevance globally.

Chicago bulls and Michael Jordan were a global phenomena - like kids in Ghana and Malaysia and Brazil wore their tshirts and they were prettt well universally loved.

Maybe some knicks and jazz fans didn’t like them but that’s it.

Yelling at the newspaper and broadcast in the 90s is nothing like hate right now. Everything was rose tinted because you’re not seeing every stupid moment and you’re not bombarded by takes every day. Just a better media ecosystem.

So much that people actually cheered for Stockton and Malone. 😄

Die hard Suns fan since ‘82. I wouldn’t say hated. They were feared. Respected. There was a feeling of inevitability with Jordan’s teams.

Suns won 62 games in 92-93 & were the 1 seed & were still the underdogs. That Suns team was so dominant and couldn’t even force a game 7 with home court advantage.

But we didn’t hate the Bulls. We respected them. Once Jordan got to the Finals, you just knew he wasn’t going to let his team lose. It never happened.

Seems like they played every Sunday afternoon which was one of the only national broadcasts I can remember growing up in the 90s (we didn’t have cable so I don’t know if that would have made a difference).

There was a real feel of inevitability watching the that they would always find a way to win.

Growing up in Houston TX and a rockets fan, I would check the paper each morning for game scores and would be pumped when a loss was added to the bulls standings. It felt so rare.

They were certainly hated in certain markets, but we didn’t have a way for the masses to spread vitriol the way we do now.

Im from Detroit but when I was 10 me and all my friends were MJ heads, dont remember him being hated at all

I compare it to the most popular rock band going on tour. Everyone came out to watch them and root for them- even on the road. Regular season games were must see tv, especially the weekend games on NBC. Triple headers with MJ and the Bulls as the headline. There’s a reason why the Bulls brand was global at the time and in some ways still is given how much they’ve sucked recently. That’s how popular the 90s Bulls were.

I am a die-hard Bulls fan since the ‘80’s but boy did I hate Bob Costas calling their games, he kissed Jordan’s ass so much, I think that contributed to some of the Bulls hate.

Given how universally beloved MJ was and how undeniable the GOAT debate was, the fact Lebron has been able to even put himself in the conversation and have people defending him just shows how good of a run he’s given MJ. It’s like competing with a literally mythological Greek God in popularity. I don’t think anyone will ever surpass MJ’s mythos

While hate watching has probably always been a thing, it’s never been more popular than it is now. But that’s because people have learned over the past 3 decades that you get a lot more attention and money by ragebaiting.

24,000 people in the Charlotte Coliseum chanting “Don’t Touch Mike” and he’d still get fouled, usually after making the basket anyway. I didn’t hate them, it just felt like our team was taking their turn playing against God.

The Bulls were not generally hated because everyone knew what they were witnessing. The greatest team ever led by the greatest player ever. They were like rockstars. You may have been a fan of another team, but you still watched the Bulls and Michael Jordan in awe.

You only temporarily hated them while they played your home team. Once the game is over, you went back to cheering for Jordan and his Bulls.

Pre-internet I don’t think you hated anyone but your rival. That said, MJ took two of my chips and I hate him for it

By fans of other contenders, hated but respected. By the rest of the planet, absolutely mesmerized. MJ grew the global interest in the game.

Hated?

MJ’s Bulls were feared.

There hasn’t been another team like that since then.

I lived through it as a kid, so not quite the answer you’d want but I didn’t see Bulls hate really. I’m sure hardcore fans felt differently, but the adults around me were vaguely Bulls fans the same as the average casual fan was a Warriors fan a few years ago. The local team wasn’t winning and the best player in the world was doing incredible things, might as well watch and enjoy it.

I had a Chicago Bulls hat for Christmas one of those years even. People loved the Bulls and MJ especially. He was the most famous person on the planet.

I never rooted for them but they were popular

With WGN they were the one team you could constantly watch so that probably lessened the hate

I think only by Knicks, Cavs, Pistons, Jazz, Sonics, Lakers, Blazers, Suns and possibly Heat fans. I don’t remember anyone else disliking them other than teams fan bases they beat

There were a couple of back-in-my-day Bird/Magic/Wilt fans who didn’t like them, but they were otherwise universally loved and considered must watch TV.

They weren’t, really.

Knick fan here. Truly hated Pippen. Really angered me when he got the dunk over Ewing and stood over him like some tough guy since I was old enough to remember when X McDaniel made scared him almost to tears. Had the greatest respect for Jordan, who remains the most terrifying athlete I’ve ever witnessed.

I grew up in California as a Warriors fan. My family did not go to a place of religious worship, but we never missed a Michael Jordan national broadcast. Never.

It’s not like the Warriors were seeing them in the Finals. I enjoyed every minute of repeatedly watching the Bulls break the hearts of the Cavs, Pistons, Knicks, etc. and the cherry on top was seeing them beat annoying teams like the Jazz and Lakers in the Finals. Also, BJ Armstrong was unstoppable on Genesis if you moved him to Center. Beat everybody down the floor. That’s real Small Ball, Nellie.

It wasn’t really like that back then. People still read physical newspapers to hear what local, and some national, sportswriters thought and then you would talk about it with your friends. League pass didn’t hit cable til 2000 or so but I don’t know if anyone who had it except sports bars for a while, so games were less accessible (and you had to tune into certain ESPN shows to watch a limited selection of highlights), I think because of that people were generally more excited.

My recollection, which may be off but whatever, is that it was more like the early Steph/Warriors experience. People were excited to see the Bulls. MJ was a massively popular cultural figure who had the coolest shoes and commercials and the best ESPN highlights so it was cool just to see him. Obviously there were people who didn’t like the Bulls/MJ, but most sports hatred back then was for your actual rival teams.

I didnt live in the States but the Bulls were huge in Europe, they were the ones that brought it really but there was no hate it was just awe and amazement. Loads of Spurs fans in Europe because of history of European players there or players who had played in Euroleague before like Ginobili. Lakers are obviously huge also.

Maybe people hated the fact they were by far the best team but evryone knew it was a special time for basketball and it was a joy to watch them as much as you can

Universally loved except if they maybe played your team

They weren’t dirty like Bad boys, all around success, not political for most part, weren’t known for flopping or overly ref assisted games, very fundamental team with MJ’s flash and Rodman to bring some color

I genuinely would not know. I was a huge MJ fan, so I loved them and as a kid didn’t even consider that someone would hate the Bulls or MJ. Like, he’s MJ.

grew up in nyc, love the knicks and still had a “running of the bulls” poster on my door as a kid

Michael Jordan was massively popular. I was at an Atlanta Braves game where they announced that the Bulls had finally beat the Pistons in the ‘91 playoffs and the whole crowd cheered.

The Pistons were hated. The Knicks were hated. The Bulls were loved because Michael Jordan was such a huge superstar

I think they were universally respected but hated by fans of the Knicks, Pistons, Cavs and Jazz.

Pretty loved for the most part, especially Jordan. Only team I remember people hating was the Yankees. Hell even the Lakers were mostly loved until like 2002

If you keep winning, everyone has no choice but to love you.

As a pistons fan I hated them but they were celebrities literally everywhere on the planet

They were actually widely hated but you only heard that on an interpersonal level because the sports media at the time wasn’t interested in that kind of rhetoric like it is now.

So they only got glazed by media, which is all most people heard outside of their personal circles.

On an individual fan level, of course fanbases hated the Bulls. They won everything so you felt like your team had no shot. That’s never too fun.

1. Some of my earliest memories are of my dad hating when the bulls played us, Spurs, but that’s about it lol

Though little me was very confused as to why my favorite played Crazy Hair Guy was no longer on our team anymore lol

I moved around a lot and there was no local team where I was born. We would move back there when following my Dad to where his job sent him didn’t make sense.

Seemed like half the kids were Bulls fans there, because all the kids just had to pick somebody. What else are they going to do?

Sometimes I would live in places where they actually had a nearby NBA team and yet half the kids were still Bulls fans and they would talk trash about Jordan being the best. The weirdest was when I lived in Southern California in the early 90’s. The Lakers and Clippers were both in a bad phase at that point and those local brats jumped ship immediately to the Chicago bandwagon.

Like so many things in sports, it’s the “so-called” fans that make you hate a team more often than not.

People will always have a special type of hatred for the Thunder, because they are in Oklahoma, that will never apply to teams in big markets like Chicago, San Fran, etc. People loved to “hate watch” MJ, Curry, LeBron, but they respect them as great basketball players and champions. They will never look at SGA or OKC the same way, and most people would rather OKC sink into a crater, or let the league die, than have to hear about them.

Grew up in the rural South. My parents only watched the NBA while Jordan was playing. Had every game we could receive the broadcast for that he played on our TV in the living room.

They quit watching NBA and haven’t watched it since the moment he retired in ‘98

The only people I knew who hated the Bulls were from Detroit and New York. Even the Laker fans I knew respected them after losing. I always remember one of them saying, “my two favorite teams are the Lakers and whoever beats the cocksucking pistons.”

All we had was what ESPN and NBC gave us back then. We didn’t have social media so the coverage was almost always positive outside of the time Rodman disappeared to Vegas in the playoffs between games. I’m sure there were some people in NYC,Detroit, and Indiana that despised the Bulls but their hate had to be let out in the stadium and at the bar. No real outlet for them to be seen by the masses.

When they were playing at home, the refs would immediately give your best defender 2 fouls trying to defend Jordan, game over. Hated that and them.

Back then it wasn’t deemed cool to hate and spread negativity in a way that has become the standard today when witnessing greatness. There was always a level of respect and awe to being and to witness it. Now with how at our fingertips everything is and hate being rewarded people are more free to be negative for attention, clicks and unfortunately profit.

The knock on 90s basketball was you only had to watch the last 5 minutes of the game because that’s the only time players put out any effort. MJ was accepted as the best player whether you hated or loved him. Chicago Bulls were MJ and whoever else was on the team, which was unfair to a lot of good players but that was the consensus for years. Hate at the level we see today is internet driven because it’s lucrative.

They were like, everyone’s second favorite team rather than a hated one like the lakers, celtics, warriors, etc. 

Might be that this was during the celtics’ dark ages but rhats how i saw it. Also the magic during the shaq/penny/anderson/dennis scott/horace grant era were pretty loved too

I don’t think there was a dominant team in US sports history less hated than Jordan’s Bulls.

People did complain about Jordan getting calls and stuff like that, but most of the animosity was really focused on the few fanbases they actually had rivalries with i.e. the pistons.

The rest of us loved watching Jordan play and tried to watch him as much as we could.

It is really hard to explain just how fucking cool he was. I don’t mean as a person I mean his game on the court was just fucking cool. He was like the closest thing to a superhero irl.

It was crazy you hated them but you still Secretly loved Jordan at least I did

No, but if Jordan somehow repeated his career in the social media era, he’d 100% be the most hated player ever. Across all sports probably. But there was no social media, so it didn’t turn out that way. 

Not at all. They were beloved by everyone who wasn’t playing them (and even some who were playing them). I grew up a Knicks fan, we all supported our own teams, but everyone’s second favorite team was the Bulls.

I was mostly a kid during Jordan’s run but I was still a fan and it seems like the Bulls were beloved. You didn’t want to beat them because you hated them, you wanted to beat them because they were the kings of the mountain. Jordan had everybody’s respect (eventually). There just wasn’t anything in his game to pick apart. He didn’t foul bait. He didn’t skip on defense. He was somehow a solid ball distributor despite being a high usage SG. There was nothing to hate but success.

I have never seen a sports dynasty as well-liked universally as Jordan’s Bulls.

You couldn’t image the 90s glaze of the Chicago Bulls. Imagine LeBron hate x 10.. then you might come close to the amount of admiration the Bulls received. Any journalist who did a negative report on them, 99% of them would lose their jobs.

No social media back then, so whether they were hated or not depended on your social group. I was in middle and high school for most of the run, and grew up in a city without a basketball team. Everybody loved the MJ and the Bulls. You just knew he would show up and win.

From my Dad, everyone honestly loved watching then, especially to watch Jordan.

In that time, the only person that was bigger then Michael Jordan, was Michael Jackson. Thats how insanely popular and beloved Jordan was.

Bulls were a household name. There were people who didn’t like them sure, but there were people who didn’t even like or watch basketball who loved the Bulls because of how insane that team was over the years in the 90s. The level of respect the Bulls had back then pretty much trumps any amount of hate or dislike back then truthfully.

Zeke is probably 80% of the overall hatred for the team.

I’d also like to know how many were fans of actual teams back then and not fans of just actual players. Like how lakers have had a dedicated fan base forever but now it’s muddied with people that just follow LeBron team to team. Like I know that’s always happened but how common was it? Or did most favorite players just not bounce around so they stuck with one team? Seems too many people now are fans of just players and not so much fans of any particular team unless so-so player is playing for whatever team.

I was not a Bulls fan, but grew up in “Da Region” so they were always on the television. You watched because they were amazing, just two dudes (Jordan and Pippen) playing on a whole different level than everyone else.

I was elementary school aged back then and I remember loving Michael Jordan and the Bulls, as did all of the kids around me (note: I did not live in Utah in the 90s and I was not a Jazz fan back then).

Hated? Hell no it was impressive to watch and my team sucked the majority of their run anyways so I appreciated what I saw on WGN.

Was in 5th grade in Alabama, they were loved in Alabama 😂. I remember after the last shot everyone went outside. My mom spent like 2 hours on the phone with EastBay trying to get them shoes😂

Outside of rivalry teams, only old, crochety white men — who barely watched basketball — hated MJ and the Bulls

Nearly everyone else was in awe of what they were experiencing — especially 90’s kids

I’l know they’re different sports entirely, but I’d venture to say the 90’s Bulls were more beloved than the 90’s Cowboys

My dad actually didn’t like Jordan. Claimed he was a Barkley guy. They def have their dislikers

By the end there was a sentiment from people that they would like the see someone else win. There were people who wanted the Pacers to beat them

That doesn’t necessarily mean there was hate. Hating teams/players who have no real rivalry with your own team is more of a modern thing

Hated? They were lionized…even the Knicks fan base respected the hell out of them.

As a die hard Lakers fan, I hated the Bulls. I felt like they stole their first ring from us because Magic was sick and Worthy was hurt. But I am also a Tar Heel, so it seems like I would have liked MJ, but once he left the Heels, I fell back to my pro allegiances.

The Bulls were unbeatable. It did not matter what you threw at them, MJ was going to find a way to come out on top. Imagine how good Lebron was when he was single handedly carrying the Cavs and their scrub lineups to the Finals. That was how good MJ was but arguably MJ was even better. He had this killer instinct. The catch is that the Bulls roster was not a bunch of scrubs. They had hall of fame players in their prime playing beside MJ and a great group of role players as well. And they all FIT together perfectly.

I pulled for anyone but the bulls and every time, I came out disappointed.

In that era, only the Bad Boys Pistons were hated. 

Hard to hate them with Detroit around

I was born and raised in the Bay Area. One year my aunt gave my brothers matching Bulls hats and we wore them around without any ounce of hate. I didn’t even really watch basketball back then but kids just jumped on any successful bandwagon (Bulls, 49ers, etc.). It didn’t hurt that Jordan was also in Space Jam, which I watched repeatedly on VHS.

There wasn’t much of a forum for haters back then. You either kept it to yourself or were the loud dummy at the bar or barbershop. With that said, there were plenty of Jordan haters. People were cheering for Utah and they didn’t give an F about the Jazz. You also had the same group who turned into College Basketball only fans around that time. And we know what their deal is.

Pretty loved. But we really only saw them play. Nobody was scrutinized like today. Now, we know everyone in much greater detail.

People would have hated MJ if social media existed. Kobe was extremely polarizing. It was you loved him out you hated him. Kobe is only universally loved now because he died and people realize how influence.

MJ more or less would have been the same. If social media existed, many people would have hated MJ.

Oh I DEFINITELY hated the Bulls…

not hated at all. wgn played the bulls games in the 90s across the country.

I definitely watched more bulls than Celtics in the 90s as I was growing up

As a Knicks fan, I hate them.

I’m a Hornets fan from just outside of Charlotte. I was a kid during his run but we all absolutely worshipped Jordan. I’m sure there were some adults at the time that didn’t like him or was sick of him winning or whatever, but I don’t remember a single person not liking Jordan.

I was so upset thst Jordan was returning thst I basically stopped watching until 2000. It made it so the Bulls winning was a forgone conclusion, and I hated that. Prime NBA years for me ended up being ⁹⁴⁄₉₅. Oh I was a Pistons fan though. Liking the Bulls even after the Bad Boys were gone could catch you a whipping.

my bro in law told me his family in rural as fuck Oklahoma, not even basketball watchers, hated the bulls & “fucking Michael Jordan” in the 90s.

trust me.

even 2011 LeBron hate, today doesn’t hold a candle. yall are young

In the late 80s and early 90s cable TV was still relatively new.

WGN IN Chicago broadcast almost all Bulls games. This gave people across the country a chance to see Jordan and company regularly no matter where you lived in the US.

I believe this contributed to both the love and hate of the team.

I fondly remember watching all these games live.

Not even close to the amount of hate being thrown around every day in 2026. Maybe in a year you would get like 10% of the hate you see just casually scrolling reddit for half an hour.

As a 43 year old Warriors lifelong Warriors fan, the Bulls were my team come playoff time. But that’s likely because we didn’t have much to root for until I wan an adult

Internet opinion, and perception isn’t reality

My recollection is the Bulls were beloved. People were crazy for dynasties. See also the Cowboys.

I’m damn near 50 and I can tell you that we hated the Bulls but respected their dominance and skilled play. Back then, the fringe vitriol from crazy fans was still apparent, but you had to actually look for it in niche places like local sports talk radio - where you were guaranteed to hear callers-in complaining about the Bulls for whatever perceived issue, either imagined or tangible. Nowadays, sports hate is a central tenet of the sports entertainment industry, so it is right out in front - but back in the day when your fandom was mostly confined to your family, friends, coworkers, and random dudes you saw in public wearing your team’s jersey, any hate for the Bulls’ dominance was tempered by a begrudging respect for their talent. They had the absolute-no-argument best player on earth (who you couldn’t even hate-watch well because he was so amazing), star talent surrounding him, and an obvious hall-of-fame coach - it was hard to hate without simply mainlining the sore loser angle.

Now their fans were easy to hate because they were so eponymous everywhere across the country and so many of them were bandwagoners or pop culture adopters wearing Bulls shit because it was popular.

They weren’t hated. 

In fact they were widely respected because they had talent and skills needed to win. 

And they didn’t resort to thuggish tactics to win a game. 

Of course, knick fans hated them…as did many piston fans. But we know the type of ball both of those teams played back then. 

In the end, talent and skills carried the day. And those who practiced thuggish tactics went home crying…

They weren’t. Maybe Pistons fans hated them, Boston too. But I grew up a Lakers fan and never hated the Bulls. They were a must watch on Saturdays.

Even those people that say they hated them rocked Jordan’s. The Wilson black and red basketball was the top selling basketball for 5-6 years and stores regularly ran out of them. Without social media being the fucking cancer that it is the world didn’t have as much hate spewing forth as it does today

People didn’t ‘hate’ teams/players like they do now. It’s a weird thing to ‘hate’ someone you don’t know, or a team just because they win or play a style of basketball you don’t like. The whole idea of ‘hating’ didn’t exist like it does today, and I (along with many of the other comments) blame social media. I hate the guy who punched my brother for no reason, but I root against the Celtics.

And yes, I’m calling you out for ‘hating’ the Lakers. Super weird.

Loved the Bulls and I was a C’a fan. Wanted to play like Mike, of course. Rodman was one of my favorite players. Kukoc was a unicorn back then. No one hated the Bulls. We hated Detroit tho.

Way more people loved or appreciated the greatness of the bulls than hated. Maybe specific fan bases like the Knicks, Pacers, Pistons and Jazz hated.

This might sound crazy coming from a Knicks fan, but the years we got knocked out by them you wanted to kill them, but at the same time you got beat by the GOAT and watching him was something wild.

I can’t describe what MJ or Pip were, but not sure villains were the word. It was like meeting an evil bizarro world Superman that kills you instead of saving you lol

If you were a kid between the ages of 9-14, you were cheering for Jordan.

As a Lakers fan that watched that “Layup” live, I didn’t hate the Bulls. We just didn’t have enough. And Worthy hurt his ankle. A few months later, Magic went out with aids.

Lived 7 hours to the closest NBA team. However, in the 90s you would’ve thought my hometown was a Chicago suburb based on how much Bulls gear kids had on.

Bulls were loved.

People either loved or hated the bulls. No in between. Retrospectively, we all admire and respect Jordan. People hated how good he and his team were though.

People would always say Jordan got all the calls etc.

They were loved far more than they were hated. The world was a better place before social media.

The only teams I recalled hating as a neutral fan was the late 89’-90 pistons.

Though I rooted against the 93 bulls, I never hated them.  Jordan and the bulls were simply inevitable.  It just didn’t seem possible for Jordan to lose.

No one hated them. Some people hated Rodman, because he sabotaged the Spurs. But no one hated the bulls as a team.

The Bulls were not hated back then because people had respect for Michael Jordan because people knew that Jordan put in the work to become great. It was not uncommon to see non-NBA fans wearing Bulls gear because of MJ.

LeBron will be remembered for his incredible stamina especially how many consecutive seasons he played in the NBA Finals. It’s impressive that he has played this long and I watched him in his rookie year in college back then and now it’s over 20 years since that has happened.

But LeBron is no MJ.

I never really pulled for the Bulls until late when they were playing the unlikable Jazz. They beat my first favorite player (Magic) and then my next favorite (Barkley’s Suns).

Jordan got a bunch of unfair criticism early in his career and was always fun to watch. He was too well liked and perfect to be my favorite player.

Not

I was a MJ hater. I would tell my friends that MJ could stab another player and the opponent would get called for a foul for bleeding on MJ. 

I might be a little young and also from the Chicago area but I was told whether you hated Jordan and the Bulls or not you still tuned in to watch him play!

Hated? I’m from NC and everyone was rocking with the Bulls. Jordan was the most popular player. Period. People were literally being killed over Jordan sneakers.

Jordan literally carried NBA ratings after Magic retired. I’m sure some people hated him or the team, but MJ was mostly popular.

Pretty beloved. Jordan was very liked by the majority public. He was popular worldwide, everyone wore Jordans. Therefore his Bulls teams weren’t as hated. To put it into perspective, I’m from LA and started watching in 1991. I was rooting for the Bulls instead of the Lakers in the finals.

Pretty much how LeBron is liked by the majority of fans after taking down GSW and giving Cleveland a major sports title after a 50-year drought, and breaking all kinds of longevity and age-based records well into most players’ retirement age.

I never hated the Bulls. I disliked them because they were in my team’s division. I don’t think they were really hated. It was more that people loved Jordan and didn’t really care one way or another for his teammates. The Knicks are my favorite team after the Bucks so when the Knicks played the Bulls in all of those playoff games I hated the Bulls. But, it was never hate of them specifically, just hate when they played teams I was rooting for.

Not hated, but in fact celebrated where I am from

About as much as people hated Steph and the warriors in 2015 and 2016

Outside of NY, I don’t remember them being especially hated – – we all wanted our teams to beat them, of course, but they were the main attraction for bandwagoners and casuals.

‘88 baby. There were more Bulls fans than Celtics fans in my elementary school. I’m a ride or die Celtics fan *now* but c’mon, 8 year old me wasn’t going to root for Greg Minor and Dino Radja over Jordan and Pippen.

I was born in 81’ with no geographical team in the NBA (til the Timberwolves showed up) so I got a pretty good view of Jordan and the Bulls as a small child to a hoops obsessed teen.

I don’t think that we will ever have a team or player who the neutral was more onboard with, which meant if you actually had a team you hated the Bulls that much more. Interestingly, the Bulls also had white players so your bigot grandpa had someone to cheer for (Kerr, Longley, Wennington)

I became a Showtime Lakers fan because of Magic, the Bulls (and HIV) took the crown, and to this day, after all the bad luck, mediocrity, and mismanagement I still HATE THE FUCKING BULLS

The bulls were a worldwide phenomenon. Unless you were a Pistons fan, pretty much everybody loved the Michael Jordan bulls.

There were a lot of bandwagon Bulls fans in the 90s. The only people who hated them were fans of the Eastern Conference teams they beat in big playoffs series like the Pacers and Knicks.

Hate? I would say not at all outside of a few fan bases. Jordan was pretty much universally loved.

The 80s Pistons were hated

I’m sure plenty of hardcore fans of opposing fanbases bases hated them, but those teams were must watch TV. Getting tickets to watch the Bulls play always came at a high premium because they were known world wide.

Also important to note that because there was no social media or platform for people to go to and vent. The only things you heard about them were word of mouth and whatever got posted in the paper or magazines. Most sports reporters were very positive of them because they were clearly one of the best teams of all time.

Michael Jordan was so loved that in an episode of Seinfield, there’s an episode where George pretends to be a guy named O’Brien for a free limo ride and it turns out O’Brien is a leader of the Aryan nation that was going to fly in to New York to watch Jordan play the Bulls. Even the worst racists liked Jordan if that one TV sitcom is to be believed

The best team in history

I really, really hated the 90s Bulls. Especially the 97 and 98 Bulls.

Not as hated as you’d think. People would bitch about Jordan getting all the calls. But that’s about it. Bulls were so good during both their 3 peats

They were respected and beloved

Hate? lol, wut?!

Depends on your team. For me the Bulls were Dillon Brooks level villains.

Followed closely by Vernon Maxwell. As an adult I’ve learned to appreciate both.

I hated them, but I was mostly alone with that aside from loyal fans.

People liked the likable bulls. You assholes brought along the hating every good team for clicks trend. You sad clowns stoke hate every chance you get

I think most of the country liked the Bulls. Not here in Detroit but everybody else seemed to.

Hated the Bulls. I would root for whoever they played in the playoffs. However, I respected their competitiveness, especially MJ.