Paul Pierce vs Scottie Pippen

[Living Being]

I don't hear much about Pierce anymore, but he was an elite SF not long ago, and played some shutdown defense on star players while also having great playoff performances.

I would assume most will say Pippen is better without question, but I think they have both been underrated at one time or another.

Pippen is an all-time great defender with very good scoring and passing.
Pierce is a superb scorer, sometimes great defender/sometimes lazy defender, and decent passer.

Pierce seemed to be more capable of having tremendous games, though. He also seems more intense on the floor. His overall game was a bit streaky.

Pippen made a lot of impact quietly on the floor. I personally like him more, but Pierce is in the same tier, IMO.

Just a comparison of one of their better years:
92-93 Pippen:
22 pts 8.7 Reb 5.6 Ast 2.9 Stl 0.8 Blk 3.2 TO 3.2 PF .491 FG .320 3P .660 FT

05-06 Pierce:
26.8 pts 6.7 Reb 4.7 Ast 1.4 Stl 0.4 Blk 3.5 TO 2.8 PF .471 FG .354 3P .772 FT

Not to discredit Pippen, but is he rated so much higher than guys like Pierce because of his # of rings?

Another factor to consider is longevity. Pierce has continued to put up good numbers to this day at age 35, while Pippen fell off a lot after age 31/foot surgery.

[Round Mound]

Pippen. Those Who Where Alive to See What He Did in the 1993-94 Season Know He Was a Superstar Himself. The Dude Finished 4th in PER and Lead the Bulls in Pretty Much Everything that Season. He Also Won the 1994 All Star MVP in Great Fashion.

[Whoah10115]

Pippen gets underrated because he played with Jordan and because his career stats didn't stand out.


Pierce gets underrated because the Celtics sucked.


Pippen is better, but Pierce would be higher on lists if he had decent teams around him. He had legit garbage teams.

[Pushxx]

Both are underrated. Too bad the Rick Pitino dark era of the Celtics ruined that time for Pierce.

[Jasper]

so true ....

Any case career as well as championships as well as 1 on 1

Pip would own him...

but Pierce is an old throw back player , where speed isn't as important as spacing and first step with experience.

Both must of been create teammates...

[Real Men Wear Green]

Ha! Pierce would destroy him[COLOR="White"] if they played one-on-one right now.[/COLOR]

[JohnnySic]

Pippen would give any wing player problems but PP would still get his; no one is stopping him 1-on-1.

[Sarcastic]

Pierce is better if you need an Alpha. Pippen is better if you need a Beta.


If you are drawing up a final play, it's not even a question.

[Rolando]

Defensively, I would give the edge to Pippen but Pierce is no slouch either. Offensively, Pierce is easily better than Pippen. Pierce also has demonstrated the ability to play point forward like Pippen with Pippen being a bit better.

All in all they are fairly equal but I'd give Pierce the slight edge.

[Djahjaga]

This is actually one of the more interesting VS threads. I'm sick of the KG/Dirk ones...

If we're talking about who we'd rather have on our team, it obviously depends on what kind of player you want, and these two, although they have certain similarities, are on pretty opposite ends of the spectrum.

Pierce is a bona fide scorer. Idc who you put on him -- over a large enough sample size, he'll get his points, just like any other great scorer. For an aggressive wing, he also assists and boards well, and he's clutch. Defense, not so much, especially when on those shitty Celtics teams. It's not so much inability, but let's not pretend like he was ever a physically dominating player, either.

Scottie does most things a bit better, and plays D a whole lot better, obviously. I don't think he was a better playmaker, actually; just more conscious of his playmaking role, whereas Pierce had to score, score, score if the Celtics were gonna win double digit games in the post-Toine, pre-Big 3 era. Scottie was a better rebounder. Idc what the numbers show in this case -- I don't remember Scottie that much, but I've seen enough full Bulls games to realize this. Pierce is a better rebounder than people seem to remember, but Scottie was just better.

I don't buy the whole alpha-beta thing. But I will say that Scottie might have have been a bit too self-conscious of off court things than I would like. Yeah, he was forever (and will forever be, unfortunately) in MJ's shadow, his contract blew serious donkey d*ck, and he never got enough credit, even in the wake of Jordan's retirement(s), but bitching out of that last play was ridiculous. And this wasn't young-Scottie; he should have known better. For what it's worth, Pierce, one of my favorites all time, was a dick earlier in his own career.


I think it's interesting that they're underrated for opposite reasons. Scottie's teams were too successful, and Pierce's were too unsuccessful. You've got Pierce being rated higher in these ESPN pre-season rankings when he's 33-34-35 than 7 years earlier when he was in his prime, dropping 24-27 ppg, and all around better stats.

Just shows you that public perception is A. fickle, B. arbitrary, C. mostly irrelevant (when deciding who actually was a better player). I would say it is relevant in talking about impact on the sport; whether or not you think Kareem or Wilt are better than MJ, the latter has had more impact on the sport, even if most of that was a product of the time-period/perfect storm.

[Rysio]

best player on 6 championship teams vs one time lucky sidekick ring.

[Djahjaga]

best player on 6 championship teams vs one time lucky sidekick ring.

Literally everything about this statement is ridiculously false.

Successful troll!

[Haymaker]

Pippen wasn't too good at creating his own shot. He almost always scored on transition and spotting up. That's what separates them both. Oh, and Pippen was the best one on one defender in the league for a long time.

[RoundMoundOfReb]

best player on 6 championship teams vs one time lucky sidekick ring.

I like both of them and think they're both underrated but i'd take Pippen.

[Clifton]

Pierce is one of my all-time favorites, and I've never thought very much of Pippen. But I wasn't around for his career either. Maybe if I saw him once a week on NBA on NBC my opinion would be different.