Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen’s very public falling out left a sour taste in the mouths of many fans. However, the bad blood between the two arose, for the most part, following the release of ‘The Last Dance‘. 30 years ago, the relationship between Jordan and Pippen — while not friendly — was certainly not adversarial.
Advertisement
Scottie was on Patrick Bet-David’s podcast when the Iranian-American businessman mentioned MJ’s recently sold Highland Park mansion in Chicago. Mike had built the 7.4-acre estate during his first retirement and he would open his doors to Pippen upon returning to the Bulls in 1995.
“I never shot basketball there,” the seven-time All-Star revealed. “I actually would go over in the morning when [Tim] Grover was training…I guess the last three championships that we won, we trained together at his house. Other than that, we didn’t really put a lot of time in away from basketball.”
Pip didn’t shoot a basketball at Highland Park because its indoor basketball court wasn’t functional until 2001. After moving to Florida in 2010, MJ listed the Chicago mansion for sale in 2012. His $29 million asking price wouldn’t attract suitors though, forcing him to finally offload it for $9 million last December.
Pippen did spend significant time at 2700 Point Lane during the second three-peat, but as he admitted, the relationship between him and Jordan was limited to work. In fact, during the podcast, Scottie went as far as to say that he and Jordan were never friends.
“Great teammate but we just never were great friends,” Pippen said of MJ. He would further share how they never met over the off-season, never played golf together, or even went for a meal by themselves. “We may have like a pre-game meal or something like that but we were- it’s always a big party of people.”
Fans have been desperate to see the six-championship-winning teammates bury their hatchet and return to their old ways. But as it turns out, there was never any friendship to return to — only professionalism.
And now even that has waned. Since the release of ‘The Last Dance,’ Pippen has shared some pointed remarks about MJ, including a serious criticism of the five-time NBA MVP’s game.
“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,” Scottie said on Bulls teammate Stacey King’s podcast in 2023.
Pip took issue with Mike’s isolation-heavy style of play and pointed out how difficult it was for the team to succeed that way. #33 explained how the ball began to move around more once he joined the team, leading to their eventual winning ways. Interestingly, Jordan echoed much of the same sentiment in ‘The Last Dance’.
“I would never be able to find a tandem, another support system, another partner in the game of basketball like Scottie Pippen. He was a pleasure to play with,” Mike said in episode 2 of the Netflix docuseries. MJ reiterated time and time again that he couldn’t have found team success without Scottie.
It probably wasn’t said enough when two were teammates, but even without any personal relationship, Pippen and Jordan were great enough to win 6 NBA championships together.
