That's what Krause said when he insulted every player on the championship team, the greatest coach in NBA history, and us the fans. He broke up the team because he didn't want the team to become the Celtics - those Bird/Parish/McHale Celtics grew too old and were in the midst of rebuilding from scratch, basically. Though the Celtics were truly cursed to have lost two elite NBA players (ok, one was #1 pick in the draft) to untimely deaths. How about them Celtics? What an organization! They started winning championships with a lineup including Cousy, Sharman, Russel, and Heinson. They rebuilt on the fly and continued winning championships with Sam and KC Jones, then added Havlicek and kept winning. They lost their first championship when Russell was 32, and the Jones' were 33 and 34 years old. Then they won the next season after adding Bailey Howell and Don Nelson. After another 2-3 championships, they added Jo Jo White, then Dave Cowens, then Don Chaney, and rebuilt the team to a 68 win one (but didn't win it all). But they did the next season (73-74). They added Charlie Scott and won again two seasons later. It took them 3-4 years to rebuild to championship form again, behind Bird/Parish/McHale et al. They rebuilt again and made it to the conference finals behind Walker and Pierce, blew it up and rebuilt again in about 3 seasons to win a championship and lose in the finals 2 of 3 seasons. So let's count 'em. Russell era champions, Cowens/Havlicek/White era champions, Bird/McHale/Parish era champions, and now the Garnett/Allen/Pierce version. How about them Lakers? Mikan era champs. Wilt/Baylor/West era champs. Magic/Kareem era champs. Shaq/Kobe era champs. Gasol/Kobe era champs. San Antonio has a long track record of consistent winning seasons and won some championships. Rebuilding on the fly as they went, in a small town market, and not paying the luxury tax sort of thing. They won 4 championships with Tim Duncan and a varied cast of supporting players, including David Robinson, VDN, Sean Elliot, etc., and recently Parker and Ginobili. Compare with the Bulls' organization. They "rebuilt" when Jordan came back from retirement and that's it. So much for the Bulls organization winning championships. They can't even put a 50 win team on the court since blowing up a defending champion team. Compared to the Spurs who haven't won less than 50 since 1998. It's no wonder fans of the organization (vs. fans of the team) claim the only way we'll be contenders is if we get lucky with another Jordan in the draft. Yet, the Lakers, Celtics, and Spurs are clearly the quality organizations that fans can trust to try and put a contender on the floor, even if they don't get lucky in the draft with a Jordan type pick.
A retro discussion ! Awesome ! Fatso had the right idea of trying to deal Pip and re-stock but he never had a chance The reasons ? 1. The NBA became an entertainment business in the maturation of global media and its impacts on "entertainment assets" through the course of the 1980's and 1990's 2. The by product of all of this is that the flaws of the individual proponents created its own pathos - the freedom and the rights of the individual as our hero who we celebrate and root for in their struggle against the evil empire . The human drama that followed from this ( in my opinion ) and the pathos behind it was a lightening rod for the masses who subconsciously could identify with the age of globalisation , stucturalism in the society we had created for ourself and the slow death of the individual 3. So you have the players that unwittingly blew their idiosyncrancies up to gargantuan proportions because the media enabled the stage - and their egos permitted them to tread the boards .....and you had the zero sum game of Daniel our hero against the Lion in his den ( individual voice v structuralist rule-will ) But it was always make believe relief to have our individual hero(s) win and defeat the evil empire that the media puppeteers enabled so that ordinary every day man could feel good for a bit in the transferrence to fantasy in maybe they wished for their existence
All I get from your post is Fatso would be Fat Jerry. The point I was trying to make is that organizations do matter. They attract and trade for the players that contend for, or win, championships as a team. Our organization has failed to become one of those who rebuilds either on the fly or from scratch. I'm not sure they want to be champs again...
By the way, everyone should read Woj's expose on the race for Lebron. It's got some choice Bulls info, but the overwhelming picture that comes across is the one right along with this thread. Organizations win championships, and it's quite possible to look at the Miami Heat organization, see the communication, goals, and abilities between Riley and Wade, and understand why, to quote Woody Harrelson in Wildcats, "They're champions, and we're a bunch of dildos". The article also makes Lebron, believably, seem like a huge douche. Anyway, the specific Bulls quotes
Bah. All that could be true, but the Bulls have, repeatedly, never understood it and played more than a pro-forma part in the game. The Bulls had every chance to market things as existential and entertaining. They just sucked at doing it because there's nothing existential or entertaining about an old accountant who loophole'd himself into a fortune.
I don't buy this article. It seems like a rehash of many of the rumors that were swirling but doesn't find a cogent angle. I think it's much more likely Wesley was playing good cop bad cop with Carter, especially given the way they presented a unified front at the time of the signing. There's a lot there that seems like a reach.
What seems like a reach? The only part that got my spidy sense going was Rose not fawning over Lebron enough. I'm not sure that's true and if it is then Lebron really, really wanted to be fawned over.
That seemed eminently believable to me. Actually, one of the key aspects of the story, which I do find to be very coherent. Wade (especially) and Riley understood Lebron for the gigantic baby that he is, and Wade was willing to overlook this and talk the guy up. They worked together on this, but a big part of it was Wade being in the guy's ear, for years, at every opportunity. Contrast that to Rose. It's not that Rose did anything wrong by normal standards. A normal man might, in fact, be turned off by that and find it creepy and annoying. Not Lebron though, and the Rose and the Bulls didn't grasp this the way Wade did. I believe it because everything I've ever seen from Lebron suggests this to be the case. He's used to hearing about how he's the cat's ass, so he was pretty surprised and taken aback when he didn't hear it from one team while the other team was laying it on thick.
Wow Denny, you don't like management. I never would have guessed. Thanks for sharing more of your half-baked, half-assed opinions. First, as a clear example of why you represent all that is wrong with the internet, Bias was the #2 pick, not the number one. Second, comparing the Celtics of 40 years ago and the recent Spurs with the bulls of the last ten is about as lame as it gets. There was no FA back then, and there were only a handful of teams so getting good players wasn't all that difficult. Throw in several poorly managed franchises that basically gave away players and picks to the C's and it's easy to see both why kept putting out dominant teams, and why they had a drought of 20 years when they couldn't cherry pick players. And the spurs comparison is even worse. First, they've had one of the two best big men of the last decade to build around. Second, what significant FA have they signed? They've actually been letting guys like Stephen Jackson go, more like the Bulls of recent vintage. They probably should have won more championships. The bulls struggles of the last 10 years can be put pretty squarely on the weakness of players who've come into the league in the last 10 years. In order to be championship caliber, a team has to have a player to build around. Consider that 8 of the 10 championships of the 90's were led by guys drafted 1 and 3 in the 84 draft. In the 2000's with the exception of 2004 the championships were won by teams built around Shaq or Tim Duncan (I think the earlier Lakers would have won their championships without Kobe, and probably would have beaten the Pistons without Kobe since he sabotaged that series) until the last three, which were won by an "over the hill dream team" and Kobe. So basically, if you didn't have one of 4 or 5 players (Jordan, Hakeem, Shaq, Duncan or Kobe) you weren't going to win a championship. So enough with the bulls aren't trying to win championships. They are. They are just a lot better at discerning talent than you are and operating within the confines of the CBA.
The Bulls struggles of the last 10 years can be put squarely on management. They traded away their last 4 top scorers (Rose, Crawford, Curry, Gordon), signed the wrong players to oversized contracts, paid guys like Antonio Davis, Tim Thomas, and PJ Brown an enormous chunk of our payroll, refused to deal for Gasol and others, and refuse to pay the luxury tax. We're fortunate to get Boozer, because none of the guys who could demand full MAX salary wanted to play here. The thing about the Luxury Tax is the Lakers pay it and were in the finals the past three seasons (winning two). Paying it doesn't guarantee championships though; Mark Cuban regularly pays the LT and obviously really tries to win a championship. Not paying it is virtually certain to not contend.
Whatever Denny. Lets see if you can go two weeks without writing another "I hate the Bulls management" thread.
You put the blame on the players the Bulls drafted not turning out to be Tim Duncan or Shaq. Yet the players have come and gone, especially out best ones, and the results are the same. At what point, after 13 years, is the 5 year rebuilding plan a dud?
You laid it out perfectly Denny. What have those players after they left? Jalen Rose was never that good and didn't get any team anywhere. Crawford played in his first playoff game this year, nine years into his career. I guess he's a late bloomer. Eddie Curry has absolutely stunk it up since he left, and Gordon shit the bed last year in Detroit. These guys have either never done anything worth talking about to begin with, or were best in a sixth man role, and that's being nice. These guys weren't cornerstones. It made zero difference when they left. But they were the best the bulls could get in the draft.
http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/IND/2000.html But I bet you were hawking the company line when Pax called Curry and Chandler (and Crawford) the cornerstones of the franchise. http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=20040806&slug=nba06 "Obviously Jamal is the best player in this deal, and it's not easy giving up a young talent like that," Bulls general manager John Paxson said. "The way that we looked at it is there were certain things we needed to get. We had to get substantial financial (relief), and this gives us some flexibility." ... But the Bulls have made young big men Tyson Chandler and Eddy Curry the cornerstones of their rebuilding effort. They'll be eligible for big deals as restricted free agents next summer. (and there you have it)
What was he going to say, "This is the best we could do. Who knows maybe they'll figure it out and win some games. Please keep buying tickets." Or "Thank god for Isiaih."
And I love how you are all slobbery on a guy like Jamal Crawford who's played exactly one meaningful season in his almost 10 years and willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. But now that the bulls finally have not one, but two legitimate all-stars you claim they aren't trying to win.
You keep saying our best players have been 6th men. I'd rather have all those 6th men and Rose and Boozer than other teams' 8th men and a project from Turkey. And we kept the wrong two 6th men all along.
