This is tautologically true, but it's also true that the Bulls can get back into games playing offense, they are only in trouble against teams they can't score against. Unfortunately, the "teams they can't stop defensively" appears to be most teams, and the "teams they can't score against" appears to be almost every team. I'm not one of these guys who thinks the game is one sided. I actually think it's three sided. 1. You've got the pace of play. How well do you control how fast the game moves. Teams that control the pace tend to win more. Pace is the number of possessions in a game. 2 and 3. You've got your offensive and defensive ability, which is how much you and your opponents score in the possessions they get. Like, if we break things down into simple averages, we should have expected the Bulls to lose 103 to 89. The Bulls came into the game playing at a 93 possession/game pace, an Ortg of 97.8 and a Drtg of 102 (Ortg and Drtg are points per 100 possessions). The Blazers came into the game playing at a 88 possession/game pace, an Ortg of 107.3 and a Drtg of 99.3 (Ortg and Drtg are points per 100 possessions). So to get a quick thought on how we might expect the game to play out, take the averages of each team's factors. If both teams were equally effective against each other, we'd expect Pace = 90.65 possessions Bulls Ortg = 98.55 (the average of the Bulls Ortg and the Blazers Drtg) Blazers Ortg = 104.65 (the avg of the Blazers Ortg and the Bulls Drtg) Expected outcome = Bulls 89.3 Blazers 103.1 (Each team's Ortg adjusted to actual possessions in the game) Next, we can look at how things actually turned out. The forumula for Pace is sort of long (Pace is possessions per 48 and Possessions is 0.5 * ((Tm FGA + 0.4 * Tm FTA - 1.07 * (Tm ORB / (Tm ORB + Opp DRB)) * (Tm FGA - Tm FG) + Tm TOV) + (Opp FGA + 0.4 * Opp FTA - 1.07 * (Opp ORB / (Opp ORB + Tm DRB)) * (Opp FGA - Opp FG) + Opp TOV)). This formula estimates possessions based on both the team's statistics and their opponent's statistics, then averages them to provide a more stable estimate.) But it turns out the pace was extra slow. 83.78. Basically this is saying the Blazers controlled the tempo of the game. Multiply out the team's Ortgs and we see the Bulls had an Ortg of 117, which is considerably better than their average. It's also a better Ortg than the defensively efficient Blazers usually allow. So really, one has to say that the Bulls played about as good an offensive game as you could expect last night, especially against a good defensive team. Where they really got killed was on defense, since they allowed the Blazers to have an absurd 145.6 Ortg. That's much worse than the Bulls defense usually performs, and a lot better than the Blazers offense usually performs. So in the end, what you have was a slow-paced offensive game. Which is odd, because stereotypically one things of a slow-paced game as a defensive struggle. But here, neither defense played all that great. The Blazers, however, like to control the ball and set up shots for Roy and their bigs. They did exactly that and the Bulls couldn't do a damn thing to stop them.
That's great analysis, and the quote is the only thing I am going to nitpick. The bulls have gotten blasted on the road so we are in panic mode again and the basketball season is over and the only thing I can think of that would be worse would be to be a secret Pistons fan. But there are two reasons why the blowouts don't really mean much. First, the ceiling for this year's team was and still is the first round of the playoffs barring a huge trade or late injury. So getting blownout doesn't matter, we should really expect it against the elite teams, which the C's, Lakers, Nuggets and Blazers are. However, I do prefer this year's version of getting blown out to last year's because this year's team is in the game for a quarter or two usually. They hung with the Lakers for a while, the Nuggets for almost three, and the Blazers for one. Last year's squad was always down double digits in the first quarter and the only hope we had was that the other team would lose interest and BG would get insanely hot. So there is hope that at least the starting five has some talent. The bench, and especially Brad Miller has been awful. Hinrich hasn't exactly lit it up, but until Miller starts hitting all of the open shots Hinrich is getting him, it's hard to fault him, and his shooting is actually picking up. The other reason other reason the blowouts don't mean anything is that Vinny has chosen to go to a seven man rotation for some reason, including starting and relying on a rookie as if he thinks the bulls can hang with those elite teams. They can't and he should be getting at least Pargo more minutes, if not JJ. I have a feeling JJ is the second coming of TT and there are discipline reasons why he isn't playing, which sucks, but if he turns it around like Noah has, it will have been worth it. But the bulls have almost no chance of winning any of these games on the road with a 7 man rotation, especially if one of the guys has a night like Miller did last night. So I wouldn't put much stock in the point differential or worry about getting blown out right now. The bulls have played one of the two or three toughest schedules so far and have a very respectable record to this point. Now if they get blownout by Milwaukee or Detroit, that will be another thing.
There's always hope, but I think this team is mostly less than the sum of its parts in a lot of ways. As a side note, I generally miss players I had fun watching. They made the laundry worthwhile, not the other way around.
