Sunday’s episode 6 of ESPN’s “The Last Dance” docuseries on the Chicago Bulls focused on Michael Jordan’s legendary gambling habits, from the golf course to the team plane to casinos. According to Jordan, he never had a gambling problem, he merely had a “competition problem,” and those who gambled with Jordan say he wouldn’t quit until he had won.
In an interview with Scott Van Pelt, Charles Barkley recalled the nightly poker games he played with Jordan, Scottie Pippen and Magic Johnson. According to Barkley, Jordan would regularly make huge bets in the game to try and take down the pot, simply because he had more money to burn than Barkley or Pippen did and he knew it.
“Every night – not one night, not two nights, not 10 nights. Me, Magic, Scottie and [Michael] played cards every single night. But Michael tried to buy the pot every single night. It was really awesome. Like, first of all… me and Scottie don’t have as much money as Michael and Magic, but we knew that no matter what the cards were, at the end of the night, or three or four times a night, Michael was always gonna try to buy the pot, and just like he always says, ‘what’s your breaking point of going all in.'”
