This is just factually incorrect. Scottie Pippen has shown his bitterness about his time with the Bulls once again as he had the nerve to say Michael Jordan was a “horrible player” before he arrived in Chicago.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen more bitter, jealous person than Scottie Pippen.
In classic Pippen style, the Bulls legend continued his one-sided feud with Michael Jordan, his legendary former teammate, by claiming that MJ was a “horrible player” before Pippen was drafted to the Bulls in 1987, even though MJ was statically one of the best players in the NBA by that point.
This is how you know Scottie Pippen is a deeply sad, jealous, angry, and unsatisfied man. It’s truly a horrible thing to see an NBA legend of Scottie Pippen’s status, he’s a 7X All-Star, 7X All-NBA, 10X All-Defensive Team, won 6 NBA championships, made the NBA 75th anniversary team, played 1,168 career games, average 16.8 PPG, 6.4 RPG, 5.3 APG, and 2.0 SPG, still mull over his career that ended nearly 25 years ago.
Yet here we are.
For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, Scottie Pippen recently went on former teammate Stacey King’s podcast to (in my understanding) just chat with his friend, but the topic of conversation quickly turned to the 1990’s Chicago Bulls and the man, the myth, the legend himself: Michael Jordan.
And, when asked about Michael Jordan, Pippen said, “I’ve seen Michael Jordan play before I came to play with the Bulls. You guys have seen him play. He was a horrible player. He was horrible to play with. It was all 1-on-1, shooting bad shots. And all of a sudden, we become a team and we start winning. Everybody forgot who he was.” Some hot take, right?
Now, to be somewhat fair to Pippen, he’s not wrong when he said that “we become a team and we start winning” as Michael Jordan would not have been the MJ of basketball legend without the help of Pippen, Dennis Rodman, Horace Grant, Steve Kerr, Bill Cartwright, Toni Kukoc, B.J. Armstrong, HC Phil Jackson, GM Jerry Krause, owner Jerry Reindorf, etc.
Jordan may have been able to win two or three championships without these pieces around him during the 90’s, but Pippen’s right when he says this legendary team is what turned Michael Jordan into the greatest basketball player who has ever stepped onto a court. Everything else he said is complete horse crap.
Prior to Pippen joining the team in 1987, Michael Jordan had already played three seasons for the team and his second season (averages: 22.7 PPG, 3.6 RPG, 2.9 APG, 2.1 SPG) 45.7% FG shooting, was cut short after just 18 games due to a foot injury. While, in his first season, Jordan averaged 28.2 PPG, 6.5 RPG, 5.9 APG, 2.4 SPG, 51.5% FG shooting in all 82 regular season games.
Pretty good, right? Especially so when Pippen didn’t average more than 20 PPG until his fourth season in the league.
But what tops this list off is the fact that Michael Jordan averaged 37.1 PPG, 5.2 RPG, 4.6 APG, 2.9 SPG, 48.2% FG shooting, was named an All-Star, was named to the 1st All-NBA Team in his third season…which was the one directly prior to Pippen’s rookie year. How is that a horrible player?
And, to make this take even worse, when Pippen did join the team in 1987/88 and averaged 7.9 PPG, 3.8 RPG, 2.1 APG, and 1.2 SPG, Jordan went on to average 35.0 PPG, 5.5 RPG, 5.9 APG, 3.2 SPG, he won the MVP, he won the Defensive Player of the Year, he won the All-Star Game MVP, he was obviously named an All-Star, he made the 1st Team All-NBA, and he hit the famous series-winning jump shot vs. Cleveland in Game 5.
Can’t really say all of those things were down to a 22-year-old, 7.9 PPG Pippen joining the team, can you?
Jordan was the best player in a league with Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Julius Erving, Moses Malone, James Worthy, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Sidney Moncrief, George Gervin, Dominque Wilkins, etc. the moment he stepped onto the court, and the 90’s Bulls team turned him into a sports legend.
But, to be honest, I don’t really think Scottie Pippen means the stuff he says as he is a broken man. I think he would even agree with my sentiment above.
I’m not trying to be some armchair psychologist but the things that man has been through these last few years, such as losing his son in 2021, divorcing his wife, watching his ex-wife go on and have a relationship with Michael Jordan’s son (yeah, awkward), seeing the Last Dance documentary heavily focus on his deficiencies as a player, the feud he’s had with Phil Jackson, the feud he’s had with the Bulls franchise, etc., has gotten the best of him and has boiled over to the surface.
It’s really an unfortunate, sad ending the way Scottie Pippen is going down in NBA history as a he’s going to be remembered for being the clownish, jealous, bitter teammate to MJ than the all-time great defensive forward that he was.
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