UNC Basketball Alumni: Jerry Stackhouse talks playing a season with Michael Jordan

Former UNC Basketball standout Jerry Stackhouse talked about the one season he played with Michael Jordan in Washington and his answer will surprise you

Jerry Stackhouse and Michael Jordan share the common bond of both being standouts at the University of North Carolina in the basketball program. They were there at separate times in their careers with Jordan playing in the early 80’s and Stackhouse being there in the 90’s.

However, the two did play a year together in the NBA.

After being drafted by the Philadelphia 76ers in the 1995 NBA Draft Stackhouse would go on to play four seasons in Detroit with the Pistons before joining the Washington Wizards from 2002-04. His path crossed with Jordan during the 2002-03 season after the GOAT decided to make a return to the NBA and play for the Wizards.

But that one season playing with Jordan wasn’t always roses. In fact, Stackhouse dreaded playing with one of his heroes growing up.

The forward appeared on Adrian Wojnarowski’s pod titled the “Woj Pod” to talk about his UNC career, his current position at Vanderbilt and his NBA career among others. One of those topics was about the trade that sent him from Detroit to Washington where he played with Jordan for one year. Stackhouse told Woj he regretted playing that one season:

"“Honestly, I wish I never played in Washington, for a number of reasons,” Stackhouse said. “I felt like we were on our way in Detroit before I got traded there. It was really challenging to be able to be in a situation with an idol, who at this particular point, I felt like I was a better player. Things were still being run through Michael Jordan. [Head coach] Doug Collins, I love Doug, but I think that was an opportunity for him to make up for some ill moments that they may have had back in Chicago.“So pretty much everything that Michael wanted to do, [we did]. We got off to a pretty good start, and he didn’t like the way the offense was running because it was running a little bit more through me. He wanted to get a little more isolations on the post, of course, so we had more isolations for him on the post. And it just kind of spiraled in a way that I didn’t enjoy that season at all. Kind of picture I had in my mind of Michael Jordan and the reverence I had for him, I lost a little bit of it during the course of that year.”"

Jordan was 39 when he played that season with the Wizards and averaged 20.0 points, 6.1 rebounds and 3.8 assists per game while Stackhouse averaged 21.5 points and 4.5 assists per game as a 28-year-old.

I’m sure there is no hard feelings between the two as Jordan has always been known as the ultimate competitor. Jordan wanted to win and would push his teammates to the brink sometimes, as we will see with ESPN’s new documentary “The Last Dance.”

You can listen to the full podcast interview with Stackhouse here.

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