“He wanted Michael Jordan to sign his son’s sneakers”: Karl Malone still resents Jazz teammate for requesting autographs from MJ during 1997 NBA Finals

Karl Malone’s recent appearance on the Knuckleheads podcast had a lot of interesting tidbits. One of them featured Michael Jordan – not in a good way.

Jordan faced Malone and the Jazz in two successive Finals series – 1997 and 1998. Their 1997 faceoff had a particular edge to it, since MJ felt slighted at being passed over for MVP. Karl Malone beat him to it despite having arguably inferior stats and the worse team record.

Voter fatigue contributed a lot to Michael Jordan being denied his 5th MVP in a season when the Bulls wen 69-13. This was following a season when they went 72-10 in the regular season and 16-3 in the playoffs.

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Malone and Stockton were the best duo in the NBA not named Mike and Pippen in the 90s. They are the two teammates who hold the all-time record for facilitating each other. The Stockton-Malone pick-and-roll is statistically the most successful play in the history of the game.

Karl Malone recounts how Antoine Carr ‘betrayed’ the Jazz by asking Michael Jordan for his autograph

Speaking to Miles and Q-Rich, Malone was emphatic in the way he berated his teammate. He revealed his name to be Antoine Carr:

“I’m still pissed that I had a teammate that just had a newborn son and he bought (shoes) and he sent the shoes over for MJ to sign. He got a pair of MJ’s shoes and a ball and he was gonna to take it over to Mike and I overheard it.”

“You know what Michael did? Like a O.G. should do: we’ll kick your a** in (Game 4). He played like s***, we beat them but I was still pissed the rest of the series. You can do that s*** in your offseason. This (expletive) is over here kicking our ass and you want his autograph for your son? I think the world of him and I respect that teammate to this day but it was Antoine Carr. I am pissed off about that still.”

That Knuckleheads interview with Karl Malone was a good one.

— I’m Still Learning (@bryischillin) January 20, 2021

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