4. Dennis Rodman
His career with Detroit Pistons, San Antonio Spurs, Chicago Bulls, Los Angeles Lakers and Dallas Mavericks lasted from 1986-2000.
Dennis Rodman’s reign as “King of Crazies” may run for decades.
“The Worm” wiggled his way to five NBA rings with the Pistons and Bulls, providing a powerful supporting defensive role for the likes of Isiah Thomas and Michael Jordan. The two-time NBA Defensive Player of the Year was elected the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011.
So there is no doubting his playing skills. His antics on and off the court during his playing days would have been the stuff of social media legend.
He non-basketball highlights ranged from changing the color of his hair on practically a nightly basis and going shoeless on the bench to shoving opponents and kicking cameramen.
After a brutal seven-game series loss to Boston in the 1987 Eastern Conference Finals, Rodman rattled the old-school media world saying Larry Bird was overrated because he was white.
"“Larry Bird is overrated in a lot of areas. … Why does he get so much publicity? Because he’s white. You never hear about a black player being the greatest.”"
Today, a quote like that would be trending socially for a week. After a short-lived “acting” career, Rodman crossed into the real-world crazy by visiting North Korea three times and proclaiming dictator and resident monster Kim Jong-un as a “friend for life.”
Earlier this month, Kenneth Bae–an American held hostage by North Korea–credited Rodman’s ranting about his case as playing a role in his release.
Rodman currently has about 270,000 followers on Twitter and keeps his social media audience entertained with relatively tame posts about the progress of the Pistons and whatever else is going on his life.
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