NBA Twitter reacts to Scottie Pippen's wild Michael Jordan take originally appeared on NBC Sports Chicago
There are hot takes, and then there's what Scottie Pippen recently had to say about Michael Jordan.
During an appearance on Stacey King's "Gimme the Hot Sauce" podcast, Pippen described Jordan as a "horrible player" early in his NBA career.
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"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. He was all one-on-one, shooting bad shots," Pippen said.
"All of a sudden, we become a team and we start winning, everybody forgot who he was. He was a player that, really, winning wasn't at the top of his category. It was scoring. He was going after scoring titles. It wasn't until Phil Jackson showed up that kind of changed the menu a little bit. And that still took some time."
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For some context, Pippen joined the Bulls starting in Jordan's fourth season and Phil Jackson took over as head coach for Jordan's sixth season. In Jordan's first five NBA seasons, he was a five-time All-Star who won three scoring titles, one Defensive Player of the Year award and one MVP. The Bulls made the playoffs in all five seasons, losing in the first round three times, Round 2 once and the conference finals once.
Yes, Chicago didn't win a title until Jackson's second season at the helm. But to say Jordan was a "horrible" player before that is ridiculous even when you factor in the beef between the former teammates.
Here's how basketball fans reacted to Pippen's comments:
