Pippen was fired by the Bulls

[JimmyJammer]

Scottie Pippen says he got FIRED from his role with the Chicago Bulls ... but don't feel bad for the guy, 'cause he's pretty glad to be away from that mess!!

The 6-time champ revealed the move on the Thuzio Live & Unfiltered podcast (which was recorded during All-Star Weekend but released Wednesday) ... explaining he couldn't come to an agreement with the Bulls front office prior to the 2019 season, so they canned him.

"I got fired this year. I didn't really want it to be in the public, but I'm no longer employed by the Bulls," Pippen said in the interview.

Here's what went down ... the Bulls reportedly met with Pippen before the season and asked him to make several commitments that would mess up his gig with ESPN's "The Jump" ... but wouldn't budge on compensation, so they let him go.

So ... how is Pippen taking it?? Let's say pretty well.

"It's probably a good thing, right? ... I like to associate myself with winning."

Ouch.

Of course, the Bulls are not great right now -- they're 22-43 and don't really have any star players outside of Zach LaVine

https://www.tmz.com/2020/04/15/scottie-pippen-says-bulls-fired-him-from-advisor-role/

[JimmyJammer]

By the way, in the same interview Scottie went on to say the reason Markhanen has regressed is because he did not work hard enough. He believes it's on the player to put in the hard work to become great.

[murphs5150]

And this is what potential free agents see when they think of the Bulls. Former all star players getting a token ambassador roll with the team and former roll players getting assistant coaching jobs or front office jobs.

[Dez]

Didn't we already know this?

[ImSlower]

We're all feeling quite optimistic about the Bulls this past week, so allow me to carry on with my rose-tinted glasses. How awesome would it be if AK and the new GM managed to bring back Pippen as an ambassador, as both a peace offering to an all-time great, and a sign to the rest of the league / active players that, indeed, the Bulls are back! Next season (when that will even start is for another thread) we see a press release that Pippen is back on board. Players see him on The Jump hyping up the Bulls as an awakened sleeping giant, we back baby, etc etc. That might cost the Bulls a 100k(?) token salary as an Ambassador for a couple events a year, but little stuff like that is how we shed the mockery and start turning free agent heads.

[LateNight]

Didn't we already know this?

It certainly sounds familiar...

[kodo]

the Bulls reportedly met with Pippen before the season and asked him to make several commitments that would mess up his gig with ESPN's "The Jump"

So the Bulls wanted Pippen to show up to work. How dare they.
Pippen has another job, he probably should have just quit the Bulls thing on his own if he can't make his commitments.

I just can't muster much social outrage financially for pro athletes in general who got paid millions to play a game a few times a week (and lost most of those millions).

[HomoSapien]

Didn't we already know this?

It certainly sounds familiar...

We didn’t know what happened, just that it quietly happened.

Looks like the Bulls didn’t want it to get out either because he’s still listed as a special advisor:

https://www.nba.com/bulls/chicago-bulls-staff-directory

[bullsnewdynasty]

Well I guess it makes sense. The optics of your 2 best players in franchise history wanting nothing to do with you is pretty alarming.

[ThreeMileAllan]

Didn't Lauri work TOO hard and thats why he was always fatigued?

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[RedBulls23]

the Bulls reportedly met with Pippen before the season and asked him to make several commitments that would mess up his gig with ESPN's "The Jump"

So the Bulls wanted Pippen to show up to work. How dare they.
Pippen has another job, he probably should have just quit the Bulls thing on his own if he can't make his commitments.

I just can't muster much social outrage financially for pro athletes in general who got paid millions to play a game a few times a week (and lost most of those millions).

It would probably be a good idea to keep a good relationship with a former player who's easily the 2nd best player to ever play for your franchise. Especially when you consider there's already a bad perception around league about this.

But you know, it's important for this franchise to win these battles no matter how bad it will make them look PR wise.

[Southpaw]

^ Yeah ideally you'd want to maintain a good relationship with one of the best players your franchise has produced. Specially since your team has a bad rep around the league as an org. He's the only one from all the Dynasty years that we have a good chance of hiring as an ambassador since we know Jordan and Phil probably wouldn't sign here. They should take care of Pip, if anything.

[League Circles]

Sounds like they wanted him to finally do something for his paycheck and he didn't want to be available because he had other commitments. The whole job to begin with was a charity case. Who cares.

[dougthonus]

I see two things at play here:
1: Pippen is a complete a-hole. He lost a ton of his money by being a moron, the Bulls gave him a job that required him to do absolutely nothing but just due to past association with the team as pure charity. He would still go on TV and trash them even though he was an ambassador for the team. My opinion of Scottie Pippen is now pretty damn low watching how he behaved throughout this.

2: Even though what the Bulls did is 100% reasonable. They're furthering public perception of how they're now estranged the two greatest players in franchise history. I'm not sure how many good things Derrick Rose has to say about the org either, so maybe the three greatest players in franchise history. While I'd like to not blame them for this, because it isn't fair, sometimes you have to put up with an unfair situation and do whats best for you.

[League Circles]

I see two things at play here:
1: Pippen is a complete a-hole. He lost a ton of his money by being a moron, the Bulls gave him a job that required him to do absolutely nothing but just due to past association with the team as pure charity. He would still go on TV and trash them even though he was an ambassador for the team. My opinion of Scottie Pippen is now pretty damn low watching how he behaved throughout this.

2: Even though what the Bulls did is 100% reasonable. They're furthering public perception of how they're now estranged the two greatest players in franchise history. I'm not sure how many good things Derrick Rose has to say about the org either, so maybe the three greatest players in franchise history. While I'd like to not blame them for this, because it isn't fair, sometimes you have to put up with an unfair situation and do whats best for you.

Pippen has pretty much always been an ****. From sitting out cause his coach didn't call a play for him to the "no tippin pippin" stories, to the perpetual sulk/scowl, he's just not a very cool guy.

Also, he used the word "fired", but I don't think he knows what that means. It's clear the Bulls wanted him back, but, you know, just wanted him to maybe show up at free agent meetings or maybe go to the draft combine thing or whatever, but it was too much commitment for him with his ESPN duties. That's fine, as I'm sure ESPN paid him more (why, idk, I think he's boring as hell to listen to), but it doesn't translate to being "fired".

[TheFinishSniper]

You can't consider yourself really fired if you never really had a job in beggining or you didnt showed up on work. It's more of papa calling off your allowance for not doing choir things around house. And then making comments how terrible he is and that you dont even need it.

[dougthonus]

Also, he used the word "fired", but I don't think he knows what that means. It's clear the Bulls wanted him back, but, you know, just wanted him to maybe show up at free agent meetings or maybe go to the draft combine thing or whatever, but it was too much commitment for him with his ESPN duties. That's fine, as I'm sure ESPN paid him more (why, idk, I think he's boring as hell to listen to), but it doesn't translate to being "fired".

Yeah, I agree.

Pippen is absolutely within his rights to leave his ambassador role for a more lucrative job at ESPN or perhaps one he simply enjoys more, but that isn't being fired. Being given an ultimatum of "do your job function or you can't work here anymore" is not being fired.

It sounds more like the Bulls and Pippen had different views of what his responsibilities should be. It might be that the organization did change considerably what they asked of him because he had gotten on his feet and now had a source of income, and the charity was no longer necessity, and now they wanted him to work. It's understandable that Pippen was like "what's going on here, you can't change my responsibilities but not my pay!". That said, it still isn't being fired, and shows how out of touch he was with reality to not realize the Bulls did him a solid for all this time.

I am a bit surprised he has a role on ESPN at all. He's really awful speaking about just about anything. Takes him too long to gather his words or thoughts and seems totally unnatural when speaking like he can't let go and is perpetually nervous. Really a very poor listen on anything I've heard him do which is a shame. Maybe ESPN is thinking he'll find his niche after awhile, I'm sure it takes some guys more time than others, but there certainly isn't a worse TV personality that has stuck for any length of time which makes me think he'll either need to improve really fast or this type of thing won't be long lasting.

[coldfish]

I have to agree that the term "fired" has nothing to do with what happened here. His contract was up, the Bulls wanted to renew and Pippen didn't want the deal as proposed. Most people would refer to that as "quitting".

[jc23]

And this is what potential free agents see when they think of the Bulls. Former all star players getting a token ambassador roll with the team and former roll players getting assistant coaching jobs or front office jobs.

he has been in that ambassador role for quite a while and it hasnt helped one bit.

Chicago has had more former players involved in the team then most franchises, so thats not why they have fallen short at times post Jordan era.

[dougthonus]

And this is what potential free agents see when they think of the Bulls. Former all star players getting a token ambassador roll with the team and former roll players getting assistant coaching jobs or front office jobs.

he has been in that ambassador role for quite a while and it hasnt helped one bit.

Chicago has had more former players involved in the team then most franchises, so thats not why they have fallen short at times post Jordan era.

I think the point was that The Bulls are disenfranchised with their stars and no one cares if they have former role players around. When pursuing stars, they look at how the Bulls relationship with Jordan, Pippen, and Rose is.