In the world of the NBA, some players capture our hearts with their skill and sportsmanship, and then some evoke a different kind of emotion – disdain. From controversial antics to underwhelming performances, these players have found themselves on the receiving end of fan animosity.
In today’s list, here are all 30 NBA team’s most disliked player who even their own teammates couldn’t stand.
Atlanta Hawks – Isaiah Rider
Rider’s problematic stint with the Hawks was a handful. It all started when he arrived late at the Hawk’s camp because he apparently didn’t want to ride a propeller plane to get to the Hawks’ facility. It didn’t stop there. Rider arrived late in practices and actual game days. He often pouted on games when things didn’t go his way. Rider only lasted 60 games for the Hawks and his past antics still irk some diehard fans whenever his name pops up.
Boston Celtics – Kyrie Irving
Irving’s tumultuous tenure in a Celtic jersey was full of controversial statements, inconsistent play on the court and injuries. Irving had weird conspiracy theories which he voiced out during his time with Boston and his teammates and their fans were not amused by them. After leaving Boston at the altar to join the Nets during his free agency in 2019, the feud just went up several notches.
Brooklyn Nets – Ben Simmons
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After Jacque Vaughn’s surprise firing in the middle of the 2023-2024 season, details emerged that the then-Brooklyn head coach adamantly and stubbornly centered his offensive plays around underachieving former all-star, Ben Simmons. As a result, several players from the team expressed their concerns at their front office, which then led to Vaughn’s firing. Simmons can still play, but he’s nowhere near the level he was today compared to a few years ago. Plus, he’s missing a ton of games for them.
Charlotte Hornets – Alonzo Mourning
Mourning was supposedly the Hornets’ franchise savior in the 90s but he inexplicably took his talents to Miami after rejecting the team’s hefty extension for him in 1995. As a result, Mourning was extremely hated by fans and his former teammates whenever the Heat and the Hornets clashed in a game. The dislike was apparent when Mourning came to blows with his former Hornets teammate, Larry Johnson – now with the Knicks – during a game in the 1998 playoffs.
Chicago Bulls – Jimmy Butler
In Butler’s defense, his work behind closed doors made him the player he is today. But back when he was still the Bulls, his sudden rise became troublesome with his then-teammates. He wanted to become the focal point on offense but Chicago still had Derrick Rose in the lineup, albeit suffering from injury woes. This was the first case where Butler was deemed a cancer inside the locker room.
Cleveland Cavaliers – Andrew Bynum
Bynum’s brief and disastrous tenure with the Cavaliers, which was highlighted by his lack of effort during his recovery process from an injury, made him a target from the fans and his teammates. He was billed as Zydrunas Ilgauskas’s successor but we all know how that went.
Dallas Mavericks – Lamar Odom
Odom had a brief and ineffective stint with the Mavericks. He had to deal with a ton of off-court distractions. As a result, he gained weight and unexpectedly performed poorly with the Mavs. He only lasted a year with Dallas and his performance was a far cry from his glory days as a premier sixth-man player in the league.
Denver Nuggets – Carmelo Anthony
Melo had a Hall of Fame-worthy career with the Nuggets early in his career but apparently, the admiration between both of them was a one-sided street. In retrospect, Melo did cause their animosity when he demanded a trade to the Knicks in 2011. Things went petty when the Nuggets gave Anthony’s former jersey number to a then-unknown Nikola Jokic from Serbia.
Detroit Pistons – Josh Smith
Detroit fans loathed Smith’s effort – or lack thereof – as the 2013-2014 season progressed. Brandon Jennings, his former Pistons teammate, lamented that Smith often demanded the ball so he could just shoot an ill-advised three-pointer with plenty of time left in the shot clock.
Golden State Warriors – Chris Webber
Webber’s disruptive relationship with then-Warriors head coach Don Nelson and his desire to leave the team early in his career quickly soured his relationship with Warriors fans who had once hoped he would lead the team to success in the mid-90s. He also clashed with teammates due to his flashy style of play and his arrogant demeanor as the de facto star player of the team.
Houston Rockets – Jalen Green
Green was billed as the next ‘Kobe Bryant’ when the Rockets selected him as the 2nd overall pick in the 2021 NBA Draft. While it’s too early to judge if Green will truly become a star player in the future, there are recent reports where his past and present teammates were a bit concerned about his poor shot selection and the coaches’ blessing to give him the green light to shoot it every game.
Indiana Pacers – Ron Artest (Metta Sandiford-Artest)
While we all know that Artest was a hothead and vicious competitor, none of it truly compares to what happened in 2004 in what is now infamously known as “The Malice at the Palace.” The Pacers were considered the heavy favorites to come out of the Eastern Conference that season but everything went down the drain when Artest was suspended for the entire season due to the Pacers-Pistons brawl. Fans and former Pacer players often lamented that it was perhaps Reggie Miller’s last chance to win a ring before he called it a career at the end of the 2004-2005 season.
Los Angeles Clippers – Michael Olowakandi
The hopes were high when the Clippers – then the league’s most infamous bottom-dweller team – selected Olowakandi as their first overall pick in the 1998 NBA Draft. He’s widely considered one of the biggest busts in NBA history and their fans cannot possibly erase that thought in their memories.
Los Angeles Lakers – Dwight Howard
With his second appearance on this list, we might wonder if Dwight Howard is truly a villain hiding in plain sight. Lakers fans rejoiced when Howard was traded from Orlando to Los Angeles in 2012. But due to a string of poor performances and his eventual clash with Kobe Bryant, Howard decided that he wasn’t built for the bright lights of LA and left them hanging after he decided to sign with the Rockets during the 2013 free agency. Howard eventually had a couple more stints with the Lakers later in his career and one of them resulted in a championship.
Memphis Grizzlies – Chandler Parsons
Chandler Parsons’s injury-plagued and forgettable stint with the Grizzlies, coupled with off-court distractions, made him extremely unpopular among their fans and his teammates during his time in Tennessee. He was paid like a star player but played like the 15th man on the roster. In addition, Parsons berated the franchise years after his stint there ended.
Miami Heat – Michael Beasley
There was much hope for the Heat when they selected Beasley as the second-overall pick in the 2008 NBA Draft. But with every flash of brilliance on the court, there are tons of questionable shots taken that exposed the flaws in his game. He was taking away Dwyane Wade’s looks as Beasley wanted to prove that he could also become a star for Miami. That never really happened and his draft selection was a rare dud by their front office.
Milwaukee Bucks – Larry Sanders
Sanders’s promising career with the Bucks was derailed by off-court issues and clashes with management. When Sanders displayed his potential, the Bucks did not hesitate to reward him with a hefty contract as he was considered to be a part of their core in the 2010s. Sanders then violated the NBA’s drug policy during the 2014-2015 which got him suspended without pay for ten games. He retired from the game early due to stress and mental health concerns.
Minnesota Timberwolves – Latrell Sprewell
Sprewell’s infamous “I have a family to feed’ rant after the Wolves offered him a 3-year 21 million contract extension rubbed a lot of people wrong in 2004. Once beloved by fans and teammates within the organization, his demise was evident after Sprewell played poorly in the 2004-2005 season. He was labeled as the culprit of the franchise’s struggles just a year after reaching the Western Conference Finals.
New Orleans Pelicans – Austin Rivers
It’s quite hard to pick a player as New Orleans doesn’t get enough bad rep in the media, but if we could pick one, it would be Austin Rivers. It’s not that he’s a bad teammate but his stint with the Pelicans was entirely forgettable. Fans often cited that they barely remembered anything significant during the Rivers era in a Pelicans uniform.
New York Knicks – Charles Smith
Missed layups, anyone? The Knicks had a chance to put an end to Chicago’s threepeat bid in the 1993 playoffs but their hopes were quickly dashed in just one infamous possession with Smith in a starring role. He was brutally swarmed by multiple Bulls players under the basket and blocked each of his attempts to score a layup. Smith inevitably became the talk of the town for a couple of months and is pretty much hated by Knick fans to this day.
Oklahoma City Thunder – Kevin Durant
While the hate definitely happened after his tenure with OKC, it’s hard to ignore Kevin Durant’s previous actions almost a decade ago. We all know how the story goes: Durant can’t get over the hump and decided to form a superteam together with Steph Curry and the Warriors in 2016. He eventually became the number one villain in the state of Oklahoma.
Orlando Magic – Patrick Ewing
We know that Magic fans don’t want to relive this nightmare but the story’s just too good to let it pass. For those who didn’t know – when a past-his-prime Ewing signed with the Magic in the 2001-2002 season, he surprisingly chose 6 as his jersey number. The number is considered sacred to Magic fans as it is associated with their support of the then-young franchise. There wasn’t much resistance at first but when an out-of-shape Ewing compiled a string of horror shows while donning the number, their fans went livid about the whole situation.
Philadelphia 76ers – Ben Simmons
Simmons makes a second appearance on this list. The reluctance of Simmons to shoot the ball despite being wide open under the basket in an all-too-important game in the playoffs against the Atlanta Hawks drew the ire of his teammates and the whole city of Philadelphia. Clips of his blunder quickly went viral, further angering their unforgiving fanbase. Even Joel Embiid acknowledged the blunder as the turning point of the game and the series.
Phoenix Suns – Robert Horry
Only hardcore NBA fans may remember Horry’s time with the Suns. While Horry eventually became a beloved figure in the entire league by the time he retired as a seven-time champion, his tenure with the Suns was marred by multiple verbal spats with teammates and a towel-throwing incident at their coach, Danny Ainge.
Portland Trail Blazers – Raymond Felton
It’s quite odd that there are still online threads existing today berating Felton’s lone year wearing a Blazers jersey. Turns out that Felton got so fed up with the fans that he blatantly threatened anybody from RIP City to a fistfight during the 2011-2012 season. Fans lamented about Felton’s poor play due to his lack of conditioning and gaining weight during the regular season.
Sacramento Kings – Jimmer Fredette
Despite his college success, Fredette struggled to find his place in the NBA, leading to disappointment among fans who had hoped for more from the stud out of BYU. Reports surfaced that Fredette questioned the Kings’ front office on why he couldn’t have the ball more on offense, as he did back in college. He also suggested that if the Kings ran their offense through him, he’d probably become one of the best scorers in the league. Yikes.
San Antonio Spurs – Kawhi Leonard
Leonard is still disliked by everybody in San Antonio, including his former teammates to this day. Who could blame them? After suffering an injury in 2018, Leonard’s camp decided to seek a second opinion from a doctor not affiliated with the Spurs. While the Spurs doctor did clear him, Leonard was skeptical of their assessment of his injury. When Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili questioned his commitment to the team, their relationship quickly went south and irreparable.
Toronto Raptors – Andrea Bargnani
Let’s not drag Vince Carter’s name here. He made peace with the team a long time ago. Let’s list Bargnani instead. Bargnani’s tenure with the Raptors was full of inconsistent play and defensive deficiencies. Despite being the first overall pick in the 2006 NBA Draft, he failed to live up to expectations, leading to frustration and disappointment from the front office, teammates and the city of Toronto.
Utah Jazz – Enes Kanter
Kanter’s time with the Jazz was upsetting and just an overall disappointment. His defense was non-existent and his offensive game never truly developed. He went on to become a journeyman in the league. Fans of the city still can’t believe that a player like Kanter once donned a Jazz jersey.
Washington Wizards – Jordan Poole
If you are more disliked than a former all-time bust like Kwame Brown, then there’s really something wrong with you. His shot selection has been poor and his percentages are down all across the board. Wizards fans have already given up on him and the team’s front office is already looking to dump his salary as soon as the 2024 offseason gets underway.
