Where do you even start with the Chicago Bulls? It feels like it was only yesterday, but also a memory of the distant past, when the Chicago Bulls were supposed to be the biggest threat to the Miami Heat’s Big Three. We all know how that fell apart, but not all the way. Until now.
It’s been slow, but steady. Chicago has consistently fallen further away from contention in the Eastern Conference. The descent factors are mostly well-documented at this point. Derrick Rose, of course, fell apart. But so did Luol Deng, Joakim Noah, Mike Dunleavy, and now Jimmy Butler is starting to show the fissures of a career played under one of the most demanding coaches to walk the face of the Earth.
Nikola Mirotic was out. Then back. And inconsistent, but playing exceptionally over the last two games. Taj Gibson never saw his promised role as the prominent power forward materialize. And yet he’s finishing the season supporting his first-year coach, Fred Hoiberg, and helping his team hang out around while he fights through a fractured rib.
These players are the epitome and the casualty of the Tom Thibodeau system. Trust your established players and ride them for all they are worth, then wring them out to get the last few drops, then shake them out and wring again for that very last trickle.
This is bold to some, but let’s just say it: The Chicago Bulls are nothing without Michael Jordan. He was the cornerstone of the modern NBA, the modern Nike sneaker dynasty, and the sky-high expectations for another winner in the Windy City.
It’s time for Chicago to do something that seldom is a good idea, look to their neighbors in Wisconsin. The Bulls are caught between what they were and what they will become, the tie that binds them being the contracts on the books. Butler is a legitimate talent and a mostly good story, though this season has done nothing to help him. Rose is finally starting to show some signs of life and confidence in his abilities. This week, he played in his 62nd game of the season. Doesn’t seem like much, but it was officially more than he played in the previous three seasons combined.
Still, look at old highlight videos of Rose from his time at Simeon, Memphis or as NBA Rookie of the Year or Most Valuable Player. You might think you remember that player, but you don’t. It’s not until you see the amazing explosion, the tenacity and unshakable confidence that realize just how much a shell of his former self Rose still is.
They could have traded Pau Gasol at the trade deadline, or tried harder to make a move. Instead, the big man continues to fill a stat sheet while being more disruptive hindrance than help, and he’ll almost certainly opt out of his current deal at the end of this season. Either the Bulls will let him go for nothing or be forced to overpay for a player that will offer significantly diminishing returns as Father Time closes in.
What did any of this have to do with Chicago’s friendly neighbors to the north? The Bucks were a team that had enough talent on their roster to sneak into the playoffs many years, pushing for the 8-seed and the right to get run out of the playoffs by whatever team may be the most dominant in the East that year. Since a deep run that famously ended in a seven game series defeat at the hands of the Allen Iverson 76ers in the Eastern Conference Finals in 2001, the team has made a handful of appearances that all ended in the first round of the playoffs. The team had some talent and the edict under former owner Herb Kohl always seemed to be to push for the playoffs, even if it meant sacrificing some amount of the future to get there.
That’s the tie-in. The Bulls front office has become accustomed to the playoffs, failing to recognize a true contender and how that looks different from a team that needs to commit to what they’ve started. There was ample evidence that Thibodeau’s system was starting to break or the Bulls were starting to break under it. That, combined with an ugly and embarrassing war that the Bulls front office and ownership waged against Thibobeau, made the situation untenable. This is why the Bulls can’t have nice things.
When you commit to firing your coach and going with a young, inexperienced college-level guy who is supposed to be an offensive innovator the expectation is that you go all in. At first it seemed like that was how this was going to play out. The bungling Bulls management was going to get away with running Thibodeau out of town while simultaneously sweeping all of their mismanagement under the rug.
The Bulls issues that started all the way back when Rose tore his ACL and compounded from there have come home to roost. And yet here they are, as Blade would say, trying to ice skate uphill.
The Bucks have had a good amount of luck, which is what the Bulls also had in having Michael Jordan fall to them and ending up, improbably, with the No. 1 overall pick in a draft that featured Derrick Rose. But they also tempered expectations, found their coach, and now are in process of developing two of the most exciting young players in the league – Giannis Antetokounmpo and Jabari Parker.
Across the border, Chicago has clung to the carcass of a team that will forever be a “what if?”
In true Chicago fashion, while the ship is clearly sinking, the Bulls have looked reality in the face and laughed. After dropping four consecutive games and effectively falling out of playoff position, the Bulls have notched consecutive road wings at Indiana and Houston. Two games that they probably should have lost based on their current form. So they win, and stay in the fight for a playoff spot.
There are seven games left on Chicago’s schedule. They’ll be the underdog in at least four, but probably five of those games. The twist is that the Pacers lost again on Thursday night when they hosted the Orlando Magic. And the only way that the Bulls can still sneak into the playoffs is by playing this last group of games like they want it more than the Pacers do. Over the past two games it looks like they do.
Anything can happen when you have two teams so close together in the standings and the obvious answer is that you play hard and get that final playoff spot. The obvious answer here isn’t the right answer for the Bulls. It isn’t pretty and it isn’t ideal, but sitting in limbo will only produce the same fan base discontent and reputation for mediocrity that Milwaukee endured for a full decade.
Even this answer isn’t so simple, because even a reset for the Bulls hinges on the ability of the front office to get out of their own way. Drafting players like Marquis Teague in favor of players like Draymond Green and trading away two draft picks for an underwhelming Doug McDermott aren’t championship moves. In retrospect, it is easy to criticize, but there is ample evidence that the drafting and development of young players in Chicago hasn’t been great. Tony Snell has never emerged. Rodney Hood, who was still on the board when the Bulls used both of their mid-first round draft picks, has been having a breakout second half of the season for the Utah Jazz.
As it stands, the Sacramento Kings are very likely to keep their first round pick this summer as it is a top-10 protected pick and they are projected to fall within that protection which means the Bulls will have their own pick and nothing else. Not only do they need to make the most of that pick, they will need to make some tough decisions about the current makeup of their roster. It isn’t in the best interest of the Bulls future to bring back Gasol. The Kirk Hinrich era has ended. Dunleavy needs to join them. Aaron Brooks doesn’t need to come back.
Nikola Mirotic is another player that they should look to develop better and in order to do that, they’ll need to clear out some of the players ahead of him. While the Bulls are stumbling, the finally-healthy Mirotic has recorded his first career back-to-back games of 20+ points which coincided with their two-game win streak.
They passed up on Jeremy Lin in 2015 free agency, perhaps they’ll make a run at the guard this summer with his impending free agency and string of strong performances for playoff-bound Charlotte.
The most tantalizing option for the Bulls would be doing something rash like trading Jimmy Butler. Behold, the rumors surfaced today. Possible destinations for Butler could be Orlando, Boston, or any team that wants a really good player. The only scenario where this makes a great deal of sense is if there is a rift between player and coach that cannot be reconciled by time away during the offseason and a chance to start fresh with a new roster better tailored to Fred Hoiberg’s pass-and-move system.
Whatever the Bulls do in the short term, they aren’t contenders and they need to be mindful of the future. The roster is a mess and the stream of embarrassments for the front office springs eternal. The Bulls need a rebuild and maybe missing the playoffs would be the first step toward an intervention that can help get this franchise back on track.
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