Isiah Thomas brought his long-running beef with Michael Jordan back to the surface during a recent interview at the NBA Abu Dhabi games. The Hall of Famer still takes issue with how he was portrayed in “The Last Dance,” the popular ESPN documentary series that debuted in 2020.
“When I was watching ‘The Last Dance,’ I’m sitting there, and I’m watching it with my family, and I’m thinking everything is good,” Thomas said (via Eurohoops). “And then this guy comes on television, and he says that he hates me, and then he calls me an a—hole. And then I proceed to watch a whole documentary about him being an a—hole.
“I’m like, ‘Wait a minute, time out.’ Until I get a public apology, this beef is gonna go on for a long, long time, because I’m from the west side of Chicago.”
Why does Thomas have such strong feelings so many years removed from his on-court battles with Jordan?
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Let’s take a step back and examine why this rivalry started.
Before Jordan’s Bulls became a dynasty, they struggled to advance past Thomas’ Pistons, losing to Detroit in the 1988, 1989 and 1990 NBA Playoffs before finally breaking through in the 1991 Eastern Conference Finals.
Chicago swept its way to the NBA Finals, closing out the series with a 115-94 victory in Game 4. With 7.9 seconds left remaining in regulation, Pistons players walked off the floor right past the Bulls’ bench without the customary handshakes.
Cameras followed Thomas, Bill Laimbeer and Mark Aguirre as they headed toward the locker room before the final buzzer sounded.
During his interview for “The Last Dance,” Thomas expressed regret and conceded he should have congratulated the Bulls. Jordan wasn’t buying the explanation.
“Whatever [Thomas] says now, you know it wasn’t his true feelings then,” Jordan said. “You know, there’s time enough to think about, or the reaction of the public that’s changed his perspective.
“You can show me anything you want. There’s no way you can convince me that he wasn’t an a—hole.”
Jordan’s presence on the 1992 “Dream Team” was then viewed by many as the primary reason why Thomas didn’t make the roster. Thomas told ESPN’s Mike Greenberg and Jalen Rose on “Get Up” that it “personally hurt” him to be left off the “Dream Team,” and he discussed the potential impact of his infamous walk-off.
“The only thing that’s missing from my resume is not being on the ‘Dream Team,’” Thomas said. “When the ‘Dream Team’ was selected, and I wasn’t a part of it, there was a lot of controversy around it. And I still don’t know who did it or why they say I didn’t make it. I know the criteria for selection of making the team, I had fit all the criteria. And that’s a big hole in my resume. That is the biggest hole in my resume. That is the only place and that’s the only thing on my resume that I did not succeed at. …
“I tried to do everything correctly, and I thought I should have made that ‘Dream Team.’ However, I wasn’t a part of it. That hurt me, and looking back, if I’m not a part of the ‘Dream Team’ because of a lapse in emotion in terms of not shaking someone’s hand, if that’s the reason why I didn’t make the ‘Dream Team,’ then I am more disappointed today than I was back then when I wasn’t selected.”
Thomas noted that he never heard Jordan say he didn’t want him on the team, but audio from Jack McCallum’s podcast “The Dream Team Tapes” revealed a conversation in which Jordan declared he wouldn’t play with Thomas.
Jordan wasn’t the only hurdle for Thomas, though. He wasn’t seen favorably in the eyes of Scottie Pippen and Karl Malone, and Magic Johnson later admitted in his book “When the Game Was Ours” he was opposed to Thomas joining the “Dream Team.” It’s not like Larry Bird was going to bat for Thomas, either, after the ugly battles between the Celtics and Pistons in the 1980s.
To put it simply, these two basketball legends still feel a lot of animosity toward each other — and that is unlikely to dissipate anytime soon.
