The Last Rant
Scottie Pippen firebombed Michael Jordan for ‘The Last Dance’ in this excerpt from his new memoir
Scottie Pippen has spent much of the last year and a half capital-P Pissed about ‘The Last Dance.’ He’s made it clear to anyone who would listen—even Jordan himself—that he was not happy with his portrayal as the moody sidekick to Michael Jordan’s genius leader. Pippen has said that despite the frustration, the ESPN docuseries didn’t drive a wedge between no. 23 and himself, but excerpts released from his new memoir ‘Unguarded’ on Tuesday suggest a very different truth. Sound the air-raid sirens …
“As I watched the doc at home in Southern California with my three teenage boys, I couldn’t believe my eyes … On second thought, I could believe my eyes. I spent a lot of time around the man. I knew what made him tick. How naïve I was to expect anything else.”
“Each episode was the same: Michael on a pedestal, his teammates secondary, smaller, the message no different from when he referred to us back then as his “supporting cast.” Michael could shoot 6 for 24 from the field, commit 5 turnovers, and he was still, in the minds of the adoring press and public, the Errorless Jordan.”
“Now here I was, in my mid-fifties, seventeen years since my final game, watching us being demeaned once again. Living through it the first time was insulting enough.”
“Over the next few weeks, I spoke to a number of my former teammates who each felt as disrespected as I did. How dare Michael treat us that way after everything we did for him and his precious brand.”
If that doesn’t qualify as an ethering, we really don’t know what does. Those aren’t even the best tidbits from Pippen’s tirade, either. The first is this hilarious petty remark about LeBron James, who somehow got dragged into the mess.
“Michael was determined to prove to the current generation of fans that he was larger-than-life during his day—and still larger than LeBron James, the player many consider his equal, if not superior.”
Suggesting that some people think LeBron James is superior to Michael Jordan (they don’t) is the passive aggressive dagger of all passive aggressive daggers. Then Pippen went ahead and aired out ESPN’s $10-million-dollar laundry as a icing on the cake.
“To make things worse, Michael received $10 million for his role in the doc while my teammates and I didn’t earn a dime, another reminder of the pecking order from the old days.”
Needless to say, if the rest of ‘Unguarded’ is as juicy as this, you might want to pick up a copy when it drops on Tuesday, November 9th.