Scottie Pippen (59, 203 cm) is one of the must-see names when discussing the best No. 2 player in NBA history. He is the one who is most likely to receive the most votes. The words “strongest” and “best” are different words. It could be a different story to say that a team is the strongest No. 2. In fact, not a few players with the best option skills of a team played as No. 2 or co-ace depending on the situation.
The ideal No. 2 player is a player who is thoroughly distinguished from the No. 1 player and specializes in team play who makes the No. 1 player shine even more for the team. In that respect, Pippen is still talked about as the No. 2 role model. Pippen, who was drafted by the Seattle SuperSonics with the fifth pick in the first round in the 1987 draft, was traded to the eighth-ranked Olden Polynis for the Chicago Bulls.
From this moment on, Pippen is effectively doomed to be the No. 1 player and the ace. His playing style was slightly different from that of the ace, but most of all, the reason that Michael Jordan, the best player of all time, was on the same team was because of the fact. Of course, the trade had a huge positive effect on Pippen at the time. Despite his good performance, Pippen had to train next to Jordan, who was not expected to have high expectations, and he grew up with him.
Jordan is said to have pushed Pippen to the point where he had a strong desire for success, but Pippen, who had a strong desire for success, is said to have attacked Pippen more with venom. The encounter between the two with strong grit must have had a positive impact on each other, at least as much as on their growth. Pippen was the perfect partner for ace Jordan in terms of playing style.
Jordan is called the “best scoring machine” in the history of the league. With outstanding physical conditions, athletic ability, skill, sense and desire to win games, Jordan struggles inside and outside of each game as if he is in a battle. He has struggled with intensive checks throughout his career, but he plays so fiercely that it makes me feel like he enjoys them.
With more experience, Jordan learned how to attack various defenses, enabling him to score consistently high scores. He was persistent and even equipped with killer mentality. On top of that, he was sincere in defense, as he also stifled match-up opponents as a defender, as he said good strikers can hardly be good defenders.
Pippen was also an offense and defense player like Jordan. His defense was nearly as good as it was, and his offensive productivity was very high. He wasn’t as reliably high-scoring as Jordan, but instead, he played a big role in other areas such as reading and passing games based on his wide field of view and skillful ball handling, helping Jordan focus on scoring. 유흥알바
Pippen, who was called a point forward, was absolutely the part where Chicago was able to operate the game smoothly without a special point guard during the dynasty. Pippen has also accomplished so many things, such as balancing various team defenses, unlike Jordan, who mainly focuses on interpersonal defense. If Jordan was a pillar of the Bulls’ dynasty, Pippen would have been described as a housekeeper.
Pippen, however, seems to have had a bigger dream in his mind. Despite winning two consecutive games with Jordan, he was the No. 2 player between them. As his name suggests, he moved to the Houston Rockets and dreamed of a new basketball life when his companion with Jordan was over.
At the time, Houston Astros showed keen interest in Clyde Drexler, but when Hakeem Olajuwon and Charles Barkley were included and Pippen was added to the list, the media even used the term “super trio.” However, the team’s performance was not as good as expected. All three of them were in their prime, and their combination was not good enough.
Pippen became enraged and blamed Barkley for the loss of the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round of the playoffs. Their relationship deteriorated dramatically, and Pippen ended up with the Portland Trail Blazers. At the time, Portland was splurging on its way to a prestigious team. Even before Pippen’s departure, the team was filled with namesake players such as Rasheed Wallace, Steve Smith, Brian Grant, Damon Stadermeyer, Avidas Sabonis, Detlef Schramp, Bonzi Wells, and Germaine O’Neill.
Pippen joined them in the playoffs as the second seed after 59 wins in the regular season, and ran hard to win the title. However, they ended up losing the conference finals against the Lakers after a close game to Game 7. It was all the more regrettable as they suffered a come-from-behind defeat at one point in the fourth quarter when they were about to advance to the finals by a 15-point lead.
After his retirement, Pippen took on a new challenge to remove his image as the No. 2 player, but the process and outcome were not good enough. He returned to the Bulls at the end of his career, but it was true that his image as a one-club man has been tarnished considerably. If there was a best second-in-command Pippen in the Bulls in 1990, there was Clay Thomson (34, 201 centimeters), who was considered the most ideal second-in-command in the 2010s. As a mainstay of the Golden State Warriors, he made a reputation as the Splash Brothers along with ace Stephen Curry (36, 190.5 centimeters).
He has won four titles and received the spotlight as the head of both offense and defense. Recently, Tamson has been in trouble with the club over renewing his contract. This is due to the fact that there is a significant gap between the two sides. The team awarded Tamson a five-year, $190 million contract in the summer of 2019. Even though he was unable to play for 20 seasons due to an injury, he was highly praised for his previous contributions.
However, Tamson failed to play in the 2020-21 season, and his team’s performance dropped significantly during that time. Although he returned after that, it was hard to see him in full swing. In particular, as his feet slowed down due to the injury, his defense skills, which is his biggest strength, were noticeable, and he is no longer able to find his former style of offense and defense.
In his heyday, he was a three-point shooter that was more efficient than volume, but recently, he disappointed fans by showing a decrease in success rate even though he was greedy to attack.
