Like I've said many times before...it was a mistake in the 1st place for the Rockets to go after a 33 year old Pippen who missed 38 games the previous season and was severely limited in the 98 playoffs. Then on top of that, they give him 5 years 67 million? Even though he doesn't fit the system and is breaking down physically? Then on top of that, we have 2 rookies STARTING in the backcourt, one of which isn't even a point guard (Mobley), and we just have a bad mix of vets and rooks to fill out the roster... People were expecting us to win a title with a 36 year old Olajuwon (had a pretty good year), a 35 year old Barkley (still a good rebounder, decent shooting by his standards), and a 33 year old Pippen (who averaged 14, 6, 6, and 2) However, those #'s may be due to the fact that the season was shortened by 30 games...definetily saved the wear on their bodies. Fools gold in a sense...since the rest of the roster stunk as well. But, the way the team was constructed is what led them to their doom. Olajuwon and Barkley did what they had to do...Rudy T. made them the 1st 2 options rightfully, and they produced...just not as efficiently as in years past. Pippen, didn't fit the system, and his shooting %'s suffered because of it, but since Mobley wasn't a true point guard, Pippen was basically the point guard, and he did average 6 apg. He did what he could in a system that did not use his strenghts and talents. Pippen's highest 3 point % in a season was 37 % in 1996, when the Bulls won 72 games and were blowing teams out and when the 3 point line was still shortened. Pippen and Drexler were COMPLETELY different players...Drexler was able to score from anywhere on the court and was more skilled offensively than Pippen...Pippen was the better defender, ball handler and slightly better playmaker. Both could move without the ball, but Drexler didn't do that much in Houston after 95...he was asked to post up/iso more as he got older. Pippen even in his best years, wasn't a great iso scorer...he benefitted from the mid range jumpers and the slashes that the triangle gave him...even without Jordan...He had the 15 ft and in all to himself if he iso'd...with Dream and Hakeem that would be impossible. But that season was destined to be brutal with the make up of the team and with an aging core and a player who was used to winning 60+ games, playing out of role, with a rookie back court and horrible bench... The season ended horribly as we lost to LA in the 1st round. Then when Pippen made his comments (what he said was right, but he said it in the wrong way...can't blame him for being unhappy...Rockets had no future) Then in a panic move, CD trades Pippen for pennies on the $, and we give those pennies big contracts, I'm guessing to try and let the team grow around Francis and Mobley (they overestimated their talent...Francis was good, but he didn't have bball IQ and is limited by ONLY being effective with the ball in his hands) But I think management more than anything else set the team back...we shouldn't have never went after Pippen in the 1st place, and they should've known that the supporting cast was just awful...JVG and CD made the same mistake in 2005, 2006, and 2007 when they thought Yao and Tmac themselves could carry a team of crap to success... CD was just a horrible evaluator of talent...great assistant coach, but should've never been promoted to GM.
dude, did you read any of Clutch's posts on this subject that I posted? When does being 33 years old make you dribble the ball off your foot in the playoffs? A panic move? Pippen wanted to go to LA and management hated him so much they wouldn't do it. No I blame Pippen, you work it out and you do what you say you are going to do. When MJ left Chicago, Pippen wanted to find an easy way back to the winning, he thought he had his chance with Houston, but when he found out it was hard he wanted out. Even Phil didn't want him back.
Logically, you can reverse that and say the same thing about Jordan. They both only won championships with one another, and both complemented each other perfectly. (And no, I don't believe either statement is true. I disagree: neither is overrated.)
except jordan was a BEAST without pippen and put up ridiculous stats and dominated before pippen came along. pippen helped play a role that allowed the team to win. that's why kobe helped his status by winning without shaq.
I hate Pippen as the next person in here, but man the team we had in the nba shorten season in 99 was something. I wish we could of seen more of it. You had the Legends in Dream, Barkley, Pippen, and a perfect blend of youth, in Cuttino, Dickerson and Drew.
He was a very good player in Chicago...Top 50 all time?? No way. But all star, 1st team NBA for 8 years, no problem with that, since Bird got old and retired...he was the best small forward til 98, then it was Grant Hill. Pippen was a great defender and disruptive more than anything...with Michael, they were devestating on defense. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGznGVHo458 But in 94 and 95, WITHOUT Jordan, Pippen had 1.5 great all around seasons http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/p/pippesc01.html 1994: 22ppg, 8.7 rpg, 5.6 apg, 3 spg, and shot 49% from the field 1995: 21 ppg, 8 rpg, 5.2 apg, 3 spg, and shot 48 % from the field. No doubt he was a great player and the perfect compliment to Jordan. He was athletic, long, and could play full court D, plays the passing lanes, could guard multiple positions (from pg to pf) He actually shut down Barkley in this game...held him scoreless for almost 2 quarters after Barkley was killing their power forwards. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SGe-vp_l8U He changed the series vs. Indiana when Jackson put Pippen on Mark Jackson and did an okay job against the great Magic Johnson in the 91 finals...Jordan was too small/short to guard Magic. Pippen was a great player for 8-9 years...he deserved to be an Olympian and a mulitple all star/All NBA/All NBA Defense...I think he got overrated with the Top 50 all time. But great player nonetheless...
Again, as a person who remembers the series, here's the stats for the critical game 1 against the Lakers. http://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/199905090LAL.html Mobley -60% FG 13 points 6 assists Barkley -58% FG 25 points 10 boards Dream -76% FG 22 points 8 boards PIPPEN 39% 14 points The reason we lost?? Pippen.
He maybe Chewbacca in Chicago, but he was the Phantom Menace in Houston. Paper: Houston Chronicle Date: THU 05/13/1999 Section: Sports Page: 1 Edition: 3 STAR It's down to heart of the matter / Now playing at arena near you: Pippen, the Phantom Menace By FRAN BLINEBURY Staff NOT that it happened very often. But you know how Michael Jordan would have responded if he'd made that costly turnover in the final 7.6 seconds of the playoff opener against the Lakers. Clear the decks at the Great Western Forum. Sound the alarms. You would have had incoming for Game 2. And plenty of collateral damage. Jordan would have taken advantage of the slightest opening in the defense and blasted his way like dynamite through a rock face to create the ones that weren't there. He would have forced the action. He would have imposed his will on the game. Scottie Pippen took two shots in the first quarter. The Phantom Menace. The Rockets have walked so quickly to the brink of elimination, yet in the three-plus months since his heralded arrival in a stretch limousine with police escort, Pippen has inched no closer to understanding his role on the team. "I don't know," he said. "You've been watching all year. Maybe you can tell me." I can tell him this. Jordan or Larry Bird or Magic Johnson would never have felt the need to ask a columnist for such clarification. And maybe that has been the problem all along. That we have been blinded by Pippen's glittering collection of NBA championship jewelry earned in his years with the Bulls and Jordan and expected him to do too much upon arrival. Pippen came to Houston with the papers as one of the NBA's 50 greatest players but without a pedigree as the horse who can pull the wagon. Maybe we chose to overlook that in all of those Chicago title runs, it was Jordan, John Paxson, Toni Kukoc and Steve Kerr who stepped up to make those memorable game-winning plays. Not Pippen. Perhaps we forgot that when Jordan was off chasing curveballs for the 1993-94 season and most of '94-95, the Bulls did not advance to the NBA Finals, and the most memorable image of Pippen was his petulant refusal to get off the bench for the last 1.8 seconds of a playoff game against the Knicks. Now, his Game 1 shot at Charles Barkley is a bookend of non-responsibility. The Rockets expected a leader. What they have gotten is a fragile ego who would prefer simply to kick in the chorus line. What Pippen and his other former Chicago teammates - Kerr and Luc Longley - have discovered is that life outside of Jordan's shadow can earn you a bigger paycheck. But it comes at a higher price. Nobody's stock has plummeted like Pippen's in a season-long soap opera of ambivalence and discontent. When he complained about the Rockets' offense, every accommodation was made for him. Pippen has been allowed to bring the ball upcourt and start the offensive sets. "We have a system where the coach is very flexible," said Hakeem Olajuwon. "You are free to do whatever you want. You can't say you need to get somebody more opportunities, more touches. He has the ball in his hands. He has the ability to create. We welcome that. We want that." Too often Pippen has shirked that responsibility, offering up an enigmatic smile and cool facade when what the Rockets have wanted and needed is fire and passion. Or at least a championship veteran's understanding of the game. Prior to Game 2, he still maintained that Barkley's foul on Shaquille O'Neal with 28.4 seconds left in the opener was not a smart play. "If we make them work the clock down and they score, we still get the last shot," Pippen said. Yes, but the score is then tied and the Rockets must score to avoid an overtime on the Lakers' court, where Olajuwon has five fouls. "Well, uh, yeah," he said. As it was, with the Rockets ahead by one point, if Pippen had held the ball on the perimeter, he could then have lofted a shot to beat the 24-second clock that did not have to go in to be effective. If it bounced high off the rim, most, if not all, of the final four seconds could have run out by the time LA got to the rebound. "You could see it that way," he said. Believe it. Jordan, Bird, Magic or Barkley would have seen it that way. Following Game 2, Pippen said his 0-for-7, three-point night was a result of hard labor at both ends of the floor. "I'm chasing Glen Rice all over the court on defense," he said, "and then the Lakers are cross-matching and having Kobe (Bryant) make me work real hard just to get the ball up the court." So maybe Cuttino Mobley could handle that duty? "I'd rather do it," Pippen said. "I'm taller, and I'm a veteran." That's the problem. He wants it both ways. The money but not the burden. The acclaim but not the responsibility. "I know what I have to do," said Pippen. Maybe this would be a good time to start.
I agree with you, Pippen didn't play great here, but his talents are limited on offense, especially with his back injuries. The Rockets didn't have to give pippen that contract...they were trying to delay the inevitable: Rebuilding It was STUPID to go after Pippen at the time. If it was 1995, sure it would've been better, since there was only 1 post up option and the team was younger/more skilled. But in 1999, no way, especially after an injury plagued season. If they were trying to sell tickets, they succeeded...Les is rich for a reason: he's a smart man, and he knows big names will sell tickets. I'm not saying what Pippen did was right...he went about the worst way imaginable.... BUT the ROckets still could've gotten more value for him if they had waited. the Knicks, Pacers, Lakers, Blazers, Kings, Suns, Heat, 76ers, and Hawks were all contenders that could've used an extra offensive threat like Pippen to help them contend vs. the Spurs. I know his value went down after that season and the off season, but they basically took the 1st deal they saw...thats bad management. They should've just kept him instead of taking that junk back, which they ultimately turned into multiple worse contracts...I know it would've been a distraction but those contracts made it worse in my opinion. Who knows, maybe he agrees to a buy out if another team is willing to pay him $, or he retires, or the Rockets find a suitor at the trade deadline such as the Kings, Pacers, Blazers, or Spurs, etc. who were fighting for a title vs. an up and coming LA team. There were mistakes made on both sides, Pippens being bad, but basically ROckets management compounded the mistake by making a dumb trade.
hindsight dude. everybody was excited about Pippen. Pippen was suppose to showcase his talents outside MJ's shadow. If you polled people about the Rockets back then with Pippen coming on board, it was be a majority positive and that we were contenders.
Exactly. That was the test case of what he could have been, in his prime and healthy, without Jordan. And, the last two seconds of that Kukoc shot aside, with an inferior supporting cast he was great that season-plus minus Jordan. I disagree with you in that I think he is one the all 50 (certainly at the anniversary that team was selected). If you agree he deserved all those all-NBA selections, and throw in his defense, I think he qualifies as the best small forward of the 90s. Because of that, I think he makes the cut. But otherwise, agree completely with your take. Hilarious. Pulling out Blinebury's hoary column to prove a basketball point? I like how, five minutes before his deadline, he just looked down at whatever was playing in theaters to come up with the next movie title to throw into the Random Metaphor Generator (TM), nevermind that the title/film has nothing to do with his intended meaning. Man, what a hack. Thanks for the memories, tinman.
I agree with you 100% on this game. Those guys (Mobley & Dickerson) disappeard the next 3 games...but being rookies, they probably couldn't handle the playoffs. They shouldn't have been starting in the 1st place. The Rockets shouldn't have given Pippen that much $ and should've atleast gotten a decent point gaurd. My biggest problem is that, CD always thought that big names/all stars can win on their own. He did it with Hakeem, Barkley, and Drexler (no solid Point guard, went after OLD vets) understandable, since Dream, Drexler, and Chuck were future HOF's He also did that with Tmac and Yao, even though they were young and didn't know how to win yet. The vets he got couldn't produce on the court, and he went after people who came from losing backgrounds or old Knick players for JVG. He almost always neglected the role players and when he went after them, he gave bad role players big $...just a bad GM (Shandon Anderson, Kelvin Cato, Moochie Norris, Eddie Griffin, Mobley, Mo Taylor, Kenny Thomas, etc.)
Can't blame CD on Griffin, nobody predicted his outcome, he was a top talent in that draft. PG has always been an issue for the Rockets. Call it the Kenny Smith curse, since people wanted him out but neglect to remember how good and consistent he was. the Kenny haters.
As an 11-year old, who was a BIG Pippen fan from his Bulls days, I thought we had a chance as well, but I didn't know the game as well as I do today at 20 years old. Believe me I was as excited as anybody. Especially since we had some horrible luck in the 98 playoffs with Barkley's injury vs. Utah and Drexler retiring. I thought like everybody else that Dream and Barkley would get healthy (which they did) and that Pippen would come in and just take over Drexler's role. He proved himself in 94 and 95 without MJ, so thats why ppl felt he could help us, but that was when he was 27 and 28 years old, not 33 going on 34. Plus, he NEVER played with a post player before, now he was asked to play with 2 post players...great ones at that. But the make up of the team (2 rookies starting in the back court/ Sam Mack Othella Harrington and Brent Price being your best bench players...no way we were contenders Just like no way we were contenders with Chuck Hayes or Ryan Bowen starting at power forward and Luther Head being our bench and Rafer playing 44 mpg.
He was rated the #1 talent for most of his college season leading up to the draft. There was a reason he dropped far enough for the Rockets to trade up to land him: other teams stayed away, because he was correctly perceived as an erratic, sullen head case who kept punching out his teammates. I don't believe in curses. I do believe that talent evaluators who give long-term NBA contracts to Matt Maloney need to understand the role of the PG better. Only Dawson, Tomjanovich & Blinebury (who suggested above he'd be better bringing the ball upcourt over Pippen) ever thought Mobley was a point guard. Re: Artest, I didn't say he wasn't funny, or didn't go out of his way to post stream-of-consciousness online videos in which he quite clearly exhales (suspiciously weed-looking) smoke. But he sure doesn't have class. Tell me: how many domestic violence arrests does it take for one to lose "class," in your opinion? If your answer is two or more, then no, Artest doesn't have class.
I could understand the Griffin deal (drafts are always hit or miss to some degree; NCAA talent doesn't always transfer to NBA) But sadly he had other personal issues (RIP) Yaa point guards were an issue with the exception of Calvin Murphy and Steve Francis (productive, but not smart; too many TO's) Smith was an okay point guard to me until 96, where he was just getting old. We needed a point guard who could shoot the 3, and there weren't many point guards who could shoot better than Kenny Smith (Mark Price and Stockton maybe the only ones better). But Scott Brooks and Cassell were better ball handlers and late in games, they would be put in if Smith was struggling. Malony was too slow and 1 dimensional and Threatt was okay, but old. Bryce Drew was a joke and Brent Price was never that good and was always compared to his bro. Sura only lasted one season due to injuries, Mike James doesn't know the meaning of the word pass. Rafer was a decent point guard, but couldn't shoot for nothing and unlike the championship years, we had no other option except Luther who couldn't handle the ball very well. Aaron Brooks: good so far with scoring, but next season will tell us for sure how good he can be. Lowery: a nice back up, solid and can attack the basket.
what does Artest's personal life have to do with anything? I mean what about us? does Clutch have to give us a personal life survey before we can post? seriously. I don't care about Tmac's personal life or do I care about Maxwells or Yao's or anybodies. we're all human. you can say you would do something, but you aren't in the same position as these guys.
No offense, but I have ZERO respect for men who physically abuse women...not cool at all. IF Artest did these things (I don't know for sure, then thats just messed up) IF max really gave a woman herpes on purpose...thats really messed up as well. But I don't know if that happened or not. With child support, after watching 2 & a half men, and seeing how Allen gets screwed over by Judith and her lawyers, I won't always go against the man But beating your wife/girlfriend/any woman isn't cool from a man. Go buy a punching bag or something. I don't care about what a person says (as long as its not racist, sexist, insulting a religion or religious figure, etc.) but actions speak louder than words. I'm not saying I'm perfect, but I would never harm a woman or child.
What the heck else is "class," then, if not off-court actions? Elan on the court? Pippen was as graceful on the court as they come. What about Artest lying to the Chronicle a few weeks ago, allowing his agent to tell the Chron reporter that his Twitter postings speculating about his free agency were not his own, that it wasn't even his account? The Chronicle retracted their previous version of the story, believing Artest & his agent. And then a few days later, after signing with the LAL, Artest went on ESPN, and shouted on-air for everyone to Twitter him at that very same account, then released a Youtube video of him at the very time he was driving around, typing out the texts? So fine, I should ignore off-court issues? There goes your case against Pippen, but allright. Strictly on-court, then? Well, he did run from the court to take on the entire Detroit Metro population, sucker-punching the wrong guy to begin the melee. Pure class? And no, I've never hit a woman. Absent my life being threatened, I can guarantee you I never will. If you doubt yourself for even an instant in similar situations, you shouldn't be calling out anyone, Pippen included, over "class."
