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Former Chicago Bulls player Jaden Ivey maintained that the behavior he exhibited when he went against the NBA’s Pride Month and anti-LGBTQ beliefs was not harmful to the team.
The Bulls waived Ivey after he posted a social media rant calling the NBA’s Pride Month “an injustice.” Chicago said Ivey had engaged in conduct detrimental to the team.
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Jaden Ivey #31 of the Chicago Bulls warms up prior to the game against the Denver Nuggets at the United Center on February 7, 2026 in Chicago, Illinois. (Jayden Mack/Getty Images)
“My behavior was not detrimental to the team,” he said in an appearance on the “PinPoint Podcast.” “That’s a lie. I was a good teammate to those around me. I was a good teammate on the floor. I made the right plays. I did exactly what the coach asked me to do on a daily basis. Whatever was needed, whatever was required of me to do, I was willing. So my behavior was not a detriment to the team.”
Ivey said he was only cut because he preached “the word of God.”
“It is strictly because I spoke the truth of the word of God and preached the gospel,” he continued. “That’s why it was detrimental to the team. I witnessed too many on my team the truth and those things.
“Everybody has their beliefs. Everybody believes in something. If somebody can talk and swear and talk about injustice about whatever it is, I can speak the truth, and that’s because my God says to speak the truth to the lost, to those who don’t know Jesus, to those who are not born again.”
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Jaden Ivey of the Chicago Bulls in action during the game against the Brooklyn Nets at Barclays Center on February 9, 2026 in New York City. (Evan Bernstein/Getty Images)
Ivey also said in the podcast that he tried to commit suicide several times.
“I’m not ashamed to say it. I’m not ashamed to say it because God was merciful to keep me here,” he said. “I almost killed myself. I had Oxy pills in my hands and my wife told me, ‘Don’t do it. Don’t do this. Don’t go down like this.” And God convinced me. And I didn’t know the truth. I didn’t do it by the grace of God. He kept me here.”
Ivey pushed back on the narrative that he is “crazy.”
“It’s really sad,” he said. “They don’t say to someone who goes to clubs, ‘Are you crazy?’ They don’t look at someone smoking weed, ‘Are you crazy?’ But to be the Christian who preaches the truth, preaches the gospel, I’m seen as crazy and have a mental illness and I’m a psychopath and I need help and I’m crazy because I love God.
Jaden Ivey of the Chicago Bulls reacts during the game against the Brooklyn Nets at Barclays Center on February 9, 2026 in New York City. (Evan Bernstein/Getty Images)
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“But I love God. I love my family, my children. I love them and will give my life for them and pour into them and I will do the will of God in the name of Jesus and do His will so that He can be glorified. Not my will be done but His will be done.”
