Chicago Bulls: 3 players that dominated Scottie Pippen in the playoffs

3. John Salley, Center

It wasn’t just Pippen that ran into trouble against the “Bad Boys” in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s in the Windy City. The Detroit Pistons were the team that reigned supreme in the Eastern Conference between the fall of the Boston Celtics and the rise of the Bulls. They really passed the torch from those great Celtics teams to the rising Bulls in the East.

And one of the more underrated parts of those great Pistons teams that gave the Bulls so much trouble was the 6-foot-11 and 230 pound former Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets center John Salley. Two of the four NBA Championships that Salley got in his NBA career came with the Pistons. The other two came actually with the Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers.

Salley did play for the Bulls for 17 games in the 1995-96 regular season, and 16 in the 1996 playoffs. That was the first title Jordan, Pippen, and the Bulls won after the all-time great shooting guard got back from his stint playing baseball in the Chicago White Sox organization.

However, the trouble that Salley gave Pippen during his career resulted in a 13-15 record for the Bulls Hall-of-Fame forward. All but one of the playoff series that Pippen faced Salley came with the Bulls and Pistons, respectively. The other came where Pippen was with the Blazers, and Salley was with the Lakers.

Salley averaged 6.1 points per game, 3.8 rebounds, 0.5 assists, 0.6 steals, and 0.8 blocks, in those 28 playoff games against Pippen. Meanwhile, Pippen averaged just 14.1 points per game, 7.0 rebounds, 3.5 assists, 2.0 steals, and 1.1 blocks.