Dennis Rodman is one of the wildest NBA legends of all time. The 5x NBA champion earned a big reputation during his honored career, becoming a big fan of the nightlife, always trying new things, and discovering new places to have fun.
Even though he landed in the league as a shy rookie, Dennis found his place in the world and started going out at night, changing his personality and having a lot of fun with that. During his days with the Pistons, he tried to get his teammates to join him, and John Salley actually did it. Salley lived interesting moments during his career, going from the wild times in Detroit to having a more professional image in Chicago, but the start of his career was full of crazy situations.
Little did he know that Rodman had found an interesting place where they could see white women and try to flirt with them. Talking on the Rich Eisen Show (via Basketball Network), Salley recalled this moment, joking about what it meant for him and Dennis to be at that place in 1986.
“When we got there, we were just the two rookies. And then Dennis started hanging out, and we started winning, and he was so exciting. He was like: ‘Hey man you gotta come out with me.’ And at that time, I didn’t really go to clubs that didn’t have black folks in them. It was 1986. But when I finally went to the club that had less black folks in them, the clubs he was hanging in. Huh. We were pissing a lot of fathers and grandfathers off—generational racism out of the window.”
These two, just like the rest of their team, didn’t care much about what was conventional, they did their thing, and that helped them be successful. Rodman became a big name in the league, even when everybody knew he was a partygoer, and the Bad Boys Pistons became the biggest force in the association at the end of the 80s before the Chicago Bulls took over from them.
That experience must have been great for Rodman and Salley, especially knowing they were doing something that nobody expected them to do. Well, that’s what happens when you’re an NBA player. Fame and status give them the green light to go to certain places that other people couldn’t be.
