Fasten Your Seat Belts, Bulls Fans

<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">There is no league in which the window closes faster than it does in the NBA.

That?s why Bulls GM John Paxson went out and got Ben Wallace now.

Paxson knows this Bulls team is ready to win, and needs to in the next couple of years before contracts and free agency force his hand on what is now his young core.

And Paxson also knows that the 32-year-old Wallace will be a lot better earlier than later in his four-year contract, which is why the 2006-07 season is shaping up as the season for the Bulls.

It won?t all be fun and games, however.

Paxson has put the pieces in place, and there?s pressure on Bulls coach Scott Skiles ? who some experts tab as the best coach in the NBA ? to find the right rotation and get the most out of a group that is being picked to win it all in many corners of the basketball universe.

There?s pressure on Kirk Hinrich to live up to the label as ?the next Steve Nash,?? as he has been portrayed by nearly every local and national announcer who has come within 100 miles of Chicago in the last year.

The Bulls have promoted Hinrich as the team?s leader, best player, smartest presence, and, simply put, the player without whom the Bulls can?t win unless he brings them home with his best effort.

But it?s a lot to put just on Hinrich, just as it?s unfair to put so much on Skiles? shoulders before this team has had even one practice together, or won a single playoff series.

Conventional wisdom and NBA history suggest that you have to win playoffs series and take steps up the ladder and into the conference finals before you can be considered a legitimate title threat.

But the Bulls are running out of time to take those steps, having lost in the first round the last two years, and a lot of the responsibility falls on Wallace to help the Bulls skip a few rungs and leap into the NBA Finals.

It?s why the Bulls took a $60 million leap of faith, so that weight is considerable ? and fair. Wallace is being paid to deliver offensive rebounds, defensive intimidation and the leadership and knowledge that comes from having won.

It?s a lot to ask, especially without any proven scoring down low, and the Bulls? insistence that they can?t post their best offensive players ? their guards ? down low.

Nevertheless, the first practice session comes Tuesday, amid hype and expectations that will reach the highest preseason level since Michael Jordan entered his final season as a Bull.

That team came through despite constant strife and unimaginable pressure to finish out the greatest championship run in Chicago sports history.

This team shouldn?t face anywhere near that kind of difficulty, but pressure and expectations can do funny things to people, and it?s unreasonable to think they?ll get along every minute of every day for eight or nine months.

They don?t have to. They just have to play together on the floor and focus all of their energies on getting past LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, and a Pistons team that still can make noise in the postseason.

At the very least, it?s fun to think about the Bulls as contenders, isn?t it?</div>

Source