Ex-Houston Rockets guard Vernon Maxwell has rarely spoken about his infamous encounter with a fan in the stands in the early 1990s. He left the game to confront a guy who was heckling him shortly after the death of his daughter.
Maxwell described the encounter during an appearance on the All The Smoke podcast with Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson.
“I should’ve never been playing,” Maxwell said. “I’m so real, I couldn’t sit out and mourn. I had to be doing something.”
After hearing the constant chatter from the fan, Maxwell walked up a few rows and threw a punch. It added to his label of “Mad Max” because of a short temper. He was fined $20,000 and suspended 10 games for the incident.
“The craziest thing about the whole situation is I’m telling the security guard, `Hey ma, you’ve got to handle that,”‘ Maxwell said. “…[The fan] is steadily egging me.”‘
MUCH LOVE FOR PIP
Former NBA player Craig Hodges did not hesitate or pause to collect his thoughts when he proclaimed that Scottie Pippen was “no less” of a player than Michael Jordan.
Hodges, a three-time winner of the NBA’s Three-Point Shooting Contest, played four seasons with Pippen and Jordan with the Chicago Bulls and had a closeup view of Pippen’s impact on the Bulls.
In a recent interview with Brandon “Scoop B” Robinson, Hodges offered a startling perspective on Pippen.
“I tell people all the time ‘MJ was MJ’, but at the same time, I don’t think Scottie was any less of a player than Michael at any point and time,” Hodges told Robinson. “I’ve seen Scottie guard Michael in practice. I knew what potential was there. He guarded (Los Angeles Lakers star Johnson) Magic. So we knew what he was capable of doing on both sides of the basketball. Nobody was more of an unselfish player than Scottie Pippen.”
Hodges will likely get some pushback on trying to put Pippen and Jordan on the same level, but Jordan has often said the Bulls would not have six NBA championships without Pippen, who was named to the NBA’s 50 Greatest Players team in 1996.
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