A former superstar for the Chicago Bulls and Hall-of-Fame forward Scottie Pippen was not able to stay out of the headlines of late. And it feels like a lot of that was on purpose. Pippen gave a round of explosive interviews within the past couple of weeks, namely with GQ online and the “Dan Patrick Show”. In those polarizing interviews, Pippen called out numerous big names around the basketball world.
Some specific big names that Pippen called out in these recent interviews, for various reasons, included Phil Jackson, Michael Jordan, Toni Kukoc, and Kevin Durant, among others. This isn’t usually something you get from a player like Pippen when he gets back in the thick of the media spotlight, but it is worth looking back on what actually took place with some of his teammates and coaches during his storied career.
Scottie Pippen taking to the media spotlight in his post-Chicago Bulls days
Pippen was the fifth overall pick of the Bulls in the first round out of the 1987 NBA Draft out of Central Arkansas. It only took Scottie a few years to become one of the faces of the Bulls franchise alongside the all-time great shooting guard MJ. Soon it was Jordan, Pippen, and big man Horace Grant that formed a true big three for the Bulls.
During his more than 10 year-long run with the Bulls, Pippen became a legend. He’s also one of the best forward defenders in NBA history. He registered seven All-Star nods in his career, 10 All-Defensive Team selections, six NBA Championships, and one All-Star Game MVP. All of his titles and All-Star selections came with the Bulls.
But according to some of Pippen’s recent comments, not all was great for him during his playing days in the NBA. Here’s a look into three of Pippen’s least favorite teammates of his career.
Former Chicago Bulls F Scottie Pippen’s least favorite teammates: Bill Cartwright
There is any number of ways to go with this spot on the list of the least favorite teammates that Pippen ever had. It seems like his playing days with the Bulls went pretty smooth as far as relationships with his teammates were concerned. It was mostly Jordan that was the polarizing one that often pushed his teammates to the max, and sometimes to the brink.
Pippen was the good cop, while Jordan was the bad cop, metaphorically for this all-time great duo. But one player they suited up with during their playing days with the Bulls that wasn’t so great was the big man Bill Cartwright.
While Cartwright was one of the tougher big men that played for the Bulls in the early days with Pippen and Jordan, he definitely wasn’t one of the most productive and efficient. Cartwright did have some good seasons in the NBA, but it just wasn’t usually so with Jordan and Pippen as his teammates.
Cartright played for the Bulls mostly in the latter years of his career. There was only one team that he played for, which only came for one season, following the end of his run with the Bulls.
What added fuel to the fire in terms of the relationship between the then former teammates Pippen and Cartwright was the rivalry between the Bulls and New York Knicks.
All in all, there were a few possibilities for this spot on the list among inefficient big men that played with Scottie and the Bulls but that didn’t last very long. A few other candidates included Stacey King and Will Perdue. Cartwright just didn’t tend to make friends at most of his landing spots in the NBA.
Former Chicago Bulls F Scottie Pippen’s least favorite teammates: Dennis Rodman
Here’s where we start getting down to the meat and bones of the list. Albeit, this spot on the list is situational for Scottie.
When the Hall-of-Famer and seven-time rebounding champ Dennis Rodman first landed with the Bulls from the San Antonio Spurs, there wasn’t really a warm welcome from Pippen. In fact, Pippen even apparently hated Rodman when they were first teammates in Chicago.
But that relationship was obviously able to smooth over as time moved along. It was just bad enough for a long enough period of time for Rodman to be able to make the list of the least favorite teammates ever for Pippen. There might be other teammates that were disliked by Pippen more behind-the-scenes. But the fray in the connection at first between Pippen and Rodman is, and was, well noted.
Rodman became an integral part of the back half of the Bulls dynasty teams of the 1990s. He only played with the Bulls for three seasons in the mid-to-late 1990s and won three titles in the process. The duo of Pippen and Rodman were just as important to the Bulls titles in the mid-to-late 1990s as Jordan alone.
Clearly, it had to work out between Pippen and Rodman eventually for this team chemistry to work as a whole for the Bulls. It came together in due time, and this duo would wind up as one of the most dominant defensive forward punches in the entire NBA at the time.
Former Chicago Bulls F Scottie Pippen’s least favorite teammates: Charles Barkley
Not just among former teammates of his, but just with any NBA players in general, fellow Hall-of-Fame forward Charles Barkley could be one of Pippen’s least favorite players ever. Barkley and the former Detroit Pistons legendary point guard Isaiah Thomas were two of the most hated rivals and/or teammates it seems in Pippen’s playing days in the NBA.
There was clearly a fray at times in the relationship between Jordan and Barkley. But the relationship between Pippen and Barkley never seemed strong from the mid-1990s and beyond. It definitely didn’t work out well when the two were teammates from one underwhelming season with the Houston Rockets in the late 1990s.
That Rockets team that featured an aging big three of Pippen, Barkley, and all-time great center Hakeem Olajuwon didn’t come together as planned. The three were often injured and weren’t at their peak efficiency when they were on the court.
Even to this day, the relationship between Pippen and Barkley is not a good one. Pippen even called out Barkley once again in this latest round of polarizing interviews he did in the past couple of weeks with Dan Patrick and GQ. Pippen likely won’t try to mend this relationship anytime soon, so this hatred might remain for a long time in the future.