It’s not a secret that Michael Jordan and Isiah Thomas have been taking shots at each other in recent times despite being retired from the NBA for several decades. These two legends starred in heated duels on the court, with Zeke and his ‘Bad Boys’ Detroit Pistons using questionable tactics to beat Jordan and his Chicago Bulls.
These encounters eventually developed a huge rivalry between Pistons and Bulls, and their superstars were at the center of it all. Jordan and Thomas became huge rivals, and right now, they don’t have any love for each other. MJ has called Zeke an ‘a**hole’ for his behavior towards him, which allegedly started in 1985.
Thomas has also shown his surprise to see that Jordan hates him but hasn’t missed a chance to take shots at him, especially on social media. However, it’s still weird to know that these two hate each other so much after saying great things about one another in the past. Back in the day, Thomas called Jordan ‘sweet’ for his play style, and during a 1998 interview, MJ said Thomas was one of his friends in the league.
During an interview on The Keenen Ivory Wayans Show, Jordan discussed if he had friends in the league, admitting that even though he competed with all of them, they had a good relationship. Besides the usual suspects, Jordan added Thomas to the mix, something unthinkable today.
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“Charles is probably one of my best friends,” said the Bulls legend. “Patrick Ewing, we probably compete against each other all the time, and people may think we hate each other but we are real good friends.”
“Magic doesn’t play anymore but we’re still good friends, Larry Bird, Isiah Thomas, we competed against each other for a long period of time, but there’s a certain respect and friendship that we carried. And then those are the type of things that happen when you play the game for a long time, you compete against all these people all the time.”
It’s unclear if he remembered everything that happened with Thomas after that interview, but right now, Jordan doesn’t even want to see Isiah. The legendary point guard has taken a different approach after admitting he didn’t know Jordan felt this way about him, snubbing him as the GOAT and favoring Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and LeBron James over His Airness.
A lot can change in 24 years, and we’ll never know if that’s what happened between Zeke and Mike, but right now, they don’t have any love for each other.
