- [Clara] Look at Scottie Pippen.
Doesn't he look happy?
And why wouldn't he be?
Here he just won his sixth title
in eight years with the Chicago Bulls.
Well, there's pain behind those eyes buried deep down.
That pain was caused by this guy, and this guy,
and sometimes this guy, this guy didn't help,
and even this guy caused some issues.
Come with me.
It's time for the Beef History
between Scottie Pippen and the Chicago Bulls.
(gentle orchestral music)
Scottie Maurice Pippen only became a Chicago Bull
because GM Jerry Krause liked him so much.
Krause started his career as a scout
and was best known for discovering
Earl Monroe back in the 60s.
And in 1986 when the NBA director of scouting
told everyone, "Hey, this kid Pippen
"from mid-size NAIA school Central Arkansas
is worth checking out,"
Krause was the only one who listened.
When Pippen eventually got a chance
to impress other teams at pre-draft camps,
Krause played his best defense to keep Pippen secret.
At the Aloha Classic in Hawaii,
a friend of Krause took young Pippen on a sightseeing tour,
perhaps with the goal of making him unavailable
to talk with other GMs, but Pippen made all-tournament teams
and won camp dunk contests.
Thus he got noticed.
The Bulls had the eighth pick in the draft
and Krause worried Pippen might get snatched up before that.
So he made a deal with Seattle.
They'd draft Scottie fifth,
and then trade him to Chicago.
On draft night, Krause celebrated with champagne.
His second order of business was signing a contract
with the outstanding prospect he worked so hard to get.
Shouldn't be too complicated,
except Krause said Pippen should be paid like an eighth pick
even though he was a fifth pick
because Chicago had the eighth pick.
But Krause made a deal for him to be picked fifth
because he thought Pippen was more valuable
than an eighth pick.
It's hard to follow the logic
and I'm not so sure Krause was negotiating in good faith.
While the contract was being hammered out,
Pippen missed nine practices, kind of a big deal
since he was competing with Brad Sellers
for a starting spot.
Krause's penny-pinching and logical leaps bothered Pippen,
but he didn't make a big deal about it at the time.
He was new in the league,
and he still ended up with more money
than he'd ever seen before.
Okay, so contract out of the way, smooth sailing?
Well, turns out Coach Doug Collins planted
quite a few seeds of beef once the season got underway.
It started with Pippen not winning that starting spot
which has never endeared a player to a coach.
It continued with Collins' jealousy-inducing treatment
of Michael Jordan.
At age 23, Jordan led the league in scoring,
was a perennial All-Star,
and was in commercials for shoes and food
and cars and women's hair products.
He was generally beloved.
Jealousy was in the air with or without Collins,
but the coach didn't make it any better.
He designed the Bulls offense as, everyone out of MJ's way.
And he let MJ skip practices,
which Scottie took as an implication
that Jordan worked harder than everyone else.
Then there was Collins' less than nurturing style.
Even when Collins did try to be nurturing,
Pippen just felt belittled.
During the playoffs,
Collins decided to start Pippen, good news,
but he didn't tell Pippen until just before game time
because he didn't want Pippen to get in his head about it.
Scottie was happy to start,
but he was also like, I'm not a child.
So Collins and Pippen didn't see eye to eye,
but the biggest beef tenderizer
of Pippen's rookie year had to do with his back injury.
From January on,
Pippen complained about excruciating back pain.
The Bulls' trainers didn't see anything in his X-rays
and told him he needed to stretch more.
Collins expected him to play through it.
Clearly, the team didn't think Pippen was very hurt.
After his rookie season, Pippen got a second opinion.
He had a herniated disc and needed surgery.
To be clear, not something stretching could fix.
The Bulls really pooched that one,
but Scottie recovered and only had to miss
a handful of games at the start of the '88-'89 season.
Despite the resentment building up inside him,
Pippen played well, and in his third season,
things started to look up.
Collins was out, and Phil Jackson,
the Bulls' assistant with the CBA title, was in.
The ISO-Jordan offense was out
and the team-oriented triangle offense was in.
The harsh critiques of every little mistake were out
and patience and guidance were in.
Feeling respected, Pippen continued to improve
and became an All-Star.
Sounds like a fun season
with nothing to be upset about,
except the whole jealous of Michael Jordan thing.
Pippen even thought the Bulls' scorekeepers
favored Jordan over him.
Luckily, there wasn't enough strife to mess up the Bulls,
who lost just two playoff games on their way
to the 1990 Eastern Conference finals
where they went to seven games
with familiar playoff foe Detroit.
Unfortunately, in game seven,
Scottie got a migraine so bad, his vision blurred.
He played terribly and Chicago's season ended.
Fans and the media blamed Pippen.
Some even suggested he faked the migraine.
And hey, if he was in so much pain, why didn't he sit out?
In the wake of the loss,
the Bulls believed and defended Pippen.
How different from when they told him to stretch
his herniated disc away.
So going into the 1991 season,
Pippen and the Bulls looked like they were on the same team.
Well, of course they looked like that.
You know what I mean.
They weren't beefing.
Scottie decided the time was right
to renegotiate his rookie contract.
He was entering the last three years of the deal,
but those final two years had an option,
which meant if he got injured,
the Bulls could cut him loose.
Essentially, Scottie had no security
for those last two years
and he kinda needed security.
Scottie Pippen grew up poor in small-town Arkansas.
His mother, father, and 11 siblings
lived in a two-bedroom house without a telephone.
After signing his rookie contract,
he bought the land around his family home
and built a large house for his mother, a park,
and a bunch more houses for other family members.
So yes, a secure contract was important
because money could make his family's life more comfortable,
but there was even more to it than that.
Two of Scottie Pippen's immediate family members
became paralyzed during his childhood.
Two separate, random, horrible moments
changed their lives forever.
His older brother,Ronnie, was hurt during gym class.
It's reported as a wrestling match accident,
but Scottie says it was actually a sucker punch
from a bully.
Either way, Ronnie was in a wheelchair
for the rest of his life.
Caring for Ronnie, feeding him, bathing him,
lifting him became part of life in the Pippen household.
And I'm afraid there was more tragedy on the way.
When Pippen was in eighth grade,
his father had a devastating stroke.
Suddenly there were two wheelchair-bound family members
to care for under the Pippen's small roof.
A decade later, here was Scottie,
providing for his family with his physical abilities,
but also keenly aware of just how quickly
and randomly those abilities,
and even more basic ones like walking and talking
could be snatched away.
As you can imagine, the option on those last two years
of his contract made Pippen uniquely uncomfortable.
Plus, there were non-family reasons
Pippen wanted a new deal.
He was clearly the Bulls' second best player,
yet he was their sixth highest paid.
And around the league, other guys from the '87 draft
were restructuring their contracts
to the tune of 3 million or more per year.
As it stood, Scottie was set to make around a million
each of the next two seasons.
Let's get that new deal.
Krause and owner Jerry Reinsdorf were like,
"Sure, no problem.
"We'll get it done by Christmas."
Scottie had a nice start to the '90-'91 season.
He led the team in blocks and assists
and was second in scoring, rebounding, and steals.
But Christmas came and went with no new contract
under the tree for little Scottie.
At the end of February, little Scottie lost his patience.
He told the world the Bulls were stalling on his contract,
jerking him around and lying to him.
Why weren't Krause and Reinsdorf negotiating with Pippen?
Because of this lanky fellow.
The whole season,
Krause had been heavily recruiting Toni Kukoc,
a 6'10", 22-year-old Croatian star
who Krause predicted would be the Bulls' second best player
when he eventually joined the team.
Even though that seat was already taken.
With the hopes of enticing Kukoc away
from European basketball, Krause was waving
all the Bulls' available cash in front of him.
So Krause couldn't go promising that money
to Pippen in a new contract.
At the end of March, Krause and Reinsdorf
still weren't negotiating with Pippen,
but they did fly to Europe to try to woo Kukoc.
Pippen went back to the press
and at times sounded a little less petulant.
Kukoc ended up turning down the Bulls.
Good news for Pippen.
The big obstacle to his contract was out of the way,
but talk was still slow.
Krause offered Pippen a six-year, $15 million deal,
but Pippen rejected it.
Perhaps because the Bulls had reportedly offered Kukoc
a slightly better deal.
Pippen continued his trade demands,
and since he hadn't gotten management
to budge the first time around, he upped the ante,
threatening to let their conflict affect him on the court.
This was a lofty threat
because the Bulls were title contenders,
unless of course Scottie Pippen was too upset to play well.
But Pippen didn't end up letting management
take him out of his game.
The Bulls lost just once in the playoffs
as they marched to the finals.
With a title so close,
Pippen no longer wanted to talk about his contract troubles.
And on June 12th, 1991,
the Chicago Bulls won their first NBA championship.
Pippen was obviously a huge part of the title.
His final numbers were great, and he played stifling defense
on the one and only Magic Johnson.
Oh, in all the excitement, I nearly forgot to mention,
Pippen had a new contract at this point.
He signed it after game two of the finals.
It seems an odd time to sign a contract,
especially after Pippen said
he didn't want to be distracted.
So what happened?
Well, according to NBA rules, teams that had money
under the salary cap had to use that money
before the last game of the finals.
The Bulls had money under the salary cap,
remember, they put it in a gift basket for Toni
to pick up in Chicago if he ever chose to come.
But he didn't.
So the Bulls still had that money available
and it wouldn't roll over to the next season.
So they spent it on Pippen before the deadline passed.
The new contract had the Bulls on the hook
to pay Scottie a total of 18 million through the '98 season.
The deal increased his salary
and wasn't so bad in the short term,
but it was a really long contract.
Pippen's agents told him it was too long.
Krause later claimed he told Scottie not to sign
because it was too long
and said he would not negotiate once it was signed.
But as we've discussed,
Pippen needed a contract with security
and he needed it before the option kicked in
on his rookie deal.
So he signed.
With the contract out of the way and a ring,
things were good for a while.
In the '92 season, Krause was actually kind to Pippen.
Scottie struggled in the Eastern Conference Semis
to a point where fans were booing him
and the press was wondering, is it headaches again?
Krause shut down that speculation right away.
He even tried to gently console Pippen
in the locker room after a rough game five.
That scene made it look like their beef
was dead, buried, and forgotten.
I guess that's what happens
when you're trying to win repeat championships,
which, by the way, they did.
Feels weird not to live in this moment a bit.
But this series is called "Beef History"
not, "We Want Another Championship,
We're Too Happy to be Mad Right Now History".
And besides, Pippen would soon show us on the world stage,
the beef was merely dormant.
He had not forgiven Krause.
In the summer of '92,
Pippen was off to the Barcelona Olympics. Where,
look at that, he'd get to play
against Krause's projected second best Bull.
For Pippen, the game wasn't USA versus Croatia
or even Pippen versus Kukoc.
It was Pippen versus Krause.
Pippen and Jordan swarmed Kukoc relentlessly,
destroying him.
Krause didn't respond directly to Scottie's demonstration
and he was definitely still interested in recruiting Kukoc,
but the GM did tone down his enthusiasm
when discussing the Croatian later in the summer.
The following season, Chicago three-repeated
and crossed into dynasty territory, and once again,
we're going to skip over the celebrations
and happiness to October.
Michael Jordan retired,
which some children at home took as a personal betrayal.
No need to say who because I'm over it.
Anyway, Scottie Pippen suddenly found himself
in a position to be the leader of a dynasty.
Out of Jordan's shadow,
he relished the opportunity to be The Guy.
Predictions had the Bulls' dynasty falling,
and Scottie had the opportunity to prove them wrong.
The season started off great.
In late December, Chicago went on a 10-game winning streak
that made people think
they actually could compete for a fourth title.
Pippen led the team in all statistical categories
and enjoyed a newfound appreciation.
But that streak left the team exhausted.
It was snapped by the Hornets in a 20-point blowout.
Shortly after that, Chicago fell hard to the Magic.
These were big losses to potential playoff teams,
so maybe there wouldn't be a fourth championship after all.
A few days later, the Knicks,
who were considered the Bulls' biggest obstacle
in returning to the finals acquired Derek Harper
to replace the injured Doc Rivers.
The losses coupled with New York
instantly filling a hole in their back court
left Pippen frustrated.
Why hadn't Krause filled the MJ-sized hole in the Bulls?
Pippen was playing 40 plus minutes a game
and maybe just maybe realizing being The Guy
was more responsibility than he wanted.
He carped that it was Krause, not him,
who held the Bulls' potential in his hands.
While Pip was the most outspoken,
Phil Jackson also wanted Krause
to pick up a strong shooting guard,
but Krause didn't think he needed to,
and it's not like he'd done nothing this season.
He had finally signed Tony Kukoc back in the fall.
Doesn't that make you feel better, Scottie?
Sorry, that was mean.
As the '94 trade deadline approached,
some talented players were available,
but Krause made zero moves.
So Jackson moved Pippen to shooting Guard.
Then he moved Toni Kukoc
into the starting lineup at the three.
This did not improve Pippen's mood.
Before a home game against the Cavs
at the end of February, Pippen lashed out at Krause again.
And the Bulls went on to play poorly.
In the third quarter, the Cavs were up by 18
and the Chicago fans booed.
Though the boos were directed at the whole team,
Pippen, the leader, felt the boos were intended for him,
and he felt that wasn't fair.
After the game, Pippen said,
"I've never seen a white guy get booed in the stadium."
Bulls' management was less than happy
with their star implying their fans were racist.
Krause wrote an apology for Pippen to sign
and it was in papers the next day.
He basically said,
Pippen didn't really think fans were racist.
He was just upset from the loss.
But here's something interesting.
The Krause-authored statement covered another topic too.
It said, "I also made some statements
about Jerry Krause and my teammates, which I now realize
I said in the frustration of a losing game,
and I realize that the statements were not true."
Looks like Krause took advantage of the situation
to force Scottie to take back his criticism.
There were some clues that this statement
wasn't a true reflection of Scottie's feelings.
Mainly his most recent anti-Krause comments came
before the Cleveland loss.
Despite the drama,
Pippen and the Bulls had a pretty solid season.
They defied expectations with 55 wins.
In the opening round of the playoffs,
they got revenge on Cleveland.
Against the Knicks in the Eastern Conference Semis,
they fell behind two games to none.
Game three was not Pippen's finest hour.
With 1.8 seconds left and the game tied,
Chicago called timeout.
Jackson drew up a play for Kukoc, not Pippen.
But it was Scottie's turn to be The Guy, remember?
Pippen took the play call as a personal insult.
Cursing Jackson, he sat down and refused to enter the game.
Chicago had to call a second time out
to sub someone in for him.
Kukoc hit the shot, so at least there's that.
But the game winner didn't lead headlines
in the days that followed.
The press maligned Pippen for self-benching.
The guy quit on his team.
From Pippen's point of view, it wasn't that simple.
His team had been shoving him down
ever since he was a rookie.
Some of that was kind of minor,
a sensitive player getting his feelings hurt.
Some of it was straight up a team treating him
with little to no respect.
It was bound to culminate in something ugly.
Pippen wasn't innocent.
He was jealous, dramatic, and immature.
Both sides have fault in this beef.
Now, we know Scottie Pippen
did eventually win three more titles with the Bulls.
So how'd they get past this dark moment?
Did they find some peace,
learn to respect and understand each other?
Nope.
There's still years and years of beef on the bone
with more lies, slights,
trade demands, and even a bus fight.
There's another serving of beef on the way.
Thank you for watching part one
of Scottie Pippen Versus the Bulls.
Part two is coming your way in two weeks.
In the meantime, you can watch these other videos
that I picked especially for you,
though I did have to make some assumptions
about who you are and what you like.
So sorry if I blew it.
For Secret Base, I'm Clara Morris.
Goodnight and good game.