Nikola Jokic has never been the best person to deal with referees in the NBA. In the last game between the Chicago Bulls and the Denver Nuggets, Jokic got ejected after complaining about not getting a foul call during a layup attempt. According to sources, the Nuggets big man was kicked out of the game for using profanities despite not having picked any technical fouls until then.
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This ejection has left many NBA fans, including the Bulls supporters, puzzled and confused. Everybody seems to believe that the ejection was unfair, and the use of profanity is quite common in the league. In a recent episode of The Lowe Post podcast, Zach Lowe and Kevin Pelton talked about the controversy while deep-diving into the thoughts of Chicago Bulls legend and broadcaster Stacey King.
King played with the Bulls from 1989 to 1994 alongside Michael Jordan and was part of the Bulls’ first three-peat-winning team. Currently, King is an announcer for the Bulls’ NBA broadcast.
Using King’s example in the podcast, Zach Lowe expressed his frustration with Jokic’s ejection. He even surmised what the former Bulls star might be thinking during the ejection. Lowe said, “They [the Bulls broadcast] were outraged! Stacey King’s like ‘Michael Jordan has said worse stuff than that!’ He didn’t stay this but I can hear Stacey King, in his head was like, ‘MJ used to say worse stuff to me, called me Burger King all the time!‘” [31 min]
Michael Jordan was a master at trash-talking, which allowed him to dominate the game both physically and psychologically. He was sometimes more harsh on his teammates than his opponents with his smack-talk. Stacey King knows that all too well and that’s why Lowe believes he must have been frustrated with Jokic’s ‘soft’ ejection.
Many believe that Jokic was ejected because he used the word ‘Motherf**ker’ and called the referee ‘b*tch.’ The situation was particularly horrible, given the Serbian Bulls fans were also upset about this. Chicago has a robust Serbian diaspora, who had probably paid money to watch the Finals MVP perform against the Bulls.
Hence, after seeing Jokic getting ejected for a trivial reason, the United Center was filled with boos for the game officials.
Stacey King has heard the worst from Michael Jordan
Stacey King experienced the heights of trash-talking from Michael Jordan when they were teammates with the Chicago Bulls. Despite winning a three-peat together, MJ never refrained from subjecting King to the worst of profanities. The latter has spoken extensively about his experience with His Airness, especially when it came to Jordan calling him out for failing to live up to his potential.
Commenting on King’s defensive capabilities, Jordan once mockingly remarked, “Can’t even stick his a** into people and get more than that…Big, fat, fat guy. One rebound in three games. Power forward. Maybe they should call it powerless forward.”
This is just one of the many examples of how trash talk has always been in the league. What Jordan used to say on the regular was worse than what Jokic said to the referee in last night’s game. Perhaps, the anger of NBA fans towards game officials is quite justified in this context.
