Those weren’t Philadelphia sports fans on Friday night at the United Center. They were Chicago Bulls fans, and they hit an all-time low. Their actions were so abhorrent that retired Bulls big man and current color analyst Stacey King couldn’t bite his tongue.
After booing the widow of former general manager Jerry Krause, who was inducted into the team’s newly-created Ring of Honor, bringing her to tears, King lit into the fans. King made his comments early in the third quarter of the Bulls’ game against the Warriors.
Stacey King shares his thoughts on the classless boos Jerry Krause received from tonight's Ring of Honor celebration pic.twitter.com/pxYAK2MTbG
— Bulls on CHSN (@CHSN_Bulls) January 13, 2024
“Chicago is a sports town. And what we witnessed today when Jerry Krause’s name was called — and the people that booed Jerry Krause and his widow, who was accepting this honor for him — it was the worst thing I’ve ever seen in my life,” King said. “I hurt for that lady. It brought her to tears. And whoever booed her in this arena should be ashamed of themselves. That’s not Chicago. That’s New York, Philly. Chicago’s not like that. We don’t have a reputation of being that way.
“Whether you like Jerry Krause or not, that man brought six championships here. He didn’t shoot a basket, nor did he get a rebound. But he put six titles up in this arena. There’s a lot of teams that don’t even have one. That was really classless. I was disappointed in the people that booed. It was a sad day.”
Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, who won three of those titles with the Bulls as a player, was equally taken aback by the disrespectful and disgusting behavior.
“It’s shameful. It’s absolutely shameful,” Kerr said after the game, via Cody Westerlund. “I can not believe… I am devastated for Thelma and the Krause family. What can we possibly be thinking?”
Krause died in 2017 at the age of 77. He was responsible for piecing together the great Bulls dynasty but was also blamed to breaking it apart, and was portrayed as the villain in the ESPN miniseries, “The Last Dance.”
Whatever your feelings about Krause, booing his widow to tears during a celebration of that historic team is a remarkable new low, as both Stacey King and Steve Kerr suggested.
