Bulls have a 2 game win streak. They had a 2 game losing streak to start the season. The difference? 2 losses on the road, 2 wins at home. My next objective for the team would be to prove they can win on the road. In the Bulls' 2 home wins: They allowed Washington .462 FG% on 4 more FGA, and won by 12! They have allowed Toronto .477 FG% and are up by 15 with 7:00 left in Q4.
I was thinking the same thing. To be elite, or even think about approaching elite, we have to win a good percent of our road games.
The last 3 years home games: 09/10 - 24-17 08/09 - 28-13 07/08 - 20-21 They should improve at home too. Away 09/10 - 17-24 08/09 - 13-28 07/08 - 13-28
I'll continue to be the contrarian and say that the outcomes of these preseason games don't mean anything. Toronto is horendously bad and won't win many in the regular season, but the fact that Thibodeau played the starters long minutes put this one in the bank. I still think there were a couple of things to take away from this game: -- Omer Asik could be an absolute beast. My take on him is manic because his play is manic. One series he looks like a budding all star; the next he looks like a liability who won't stick on the roster. He moves so well and has great hands, and you can't teach either of those attributes. I have no idea what to make of Asik, and wouldn't be surprised if he's a borderline all star two years from now or out of the league altogether. I loved how Reggie Evans, smelling blood, tried to post Asik up when he first came in the game, and he responded with a big block. The Bulls don't know how to play with a center his size, and Asik has no idea what to do on offense, but you have to imagine that will come with time. I almost am happy Boozer is out so that Asik can get some early season burn and may actually demand minutes when Boozer is healthy. The Noah-Asik lineup actually looks like it could be successful. --The stretches when Derek Rose and CJ Watson played together was the first time I ever saw Rose playing two guard. I don't know how much I like it. Rose can do just about anything asked of him, but it seems like such a step back to have him working off the ball. --Thibodeau is going to have to be careful about playing his starters too many minutes. I understand that he was testing out new lineups but he should have pulled the starters much earlier. I don't think the cheap shot on Rose at the end of the game was entirely undeserved. --The Bulls may somehow be stacked with minutes eaters at the two and three. James Johnson has shown me enough to make me question whether it's time to give him a second chance. He had is third good game in a row. I like Kyle Weaver and he may not even be able to make the team. Keith Bogans has played good defense in stretches and continues to hit outside shots. I think the question will be which one of them, if any, are good enough to assert themselves as a legitimate stater. --Ronnie Brewer still looks injured. It's going to take him some time to get back into playing shape. --Kurt Thomas was a nice pickup. It's hard to find veteran bigs who can step in and hold down the fort. --The Bulls offense stagnated for stretches when they weren't getting inside scoring. It's going to continue to be a worry when Boozer isn't playing. --And lastly, Ed Pickney is the fucking man. Joakim did a baseline spin move tonight I've never seen from him before. Add that to the half hook from Friday's game which was also new -- our big men are actually learning post moves. I can't imagine why the Bulls didn't hire a big man coach earlier.
Thibbydibbydoo is blessed to have Weaver, Bogans, and particularly Watson on the bench. Our last coach had Pargo and Flip. Do we at all miss Kirk?
Asik has suprised me. He is better now than Aaron is. Granted it is preseason, but he is doing well. I don't know about he rest of you, but he reminds me of Noah when Noah first came to the Bulls. He played the way Asik is playing for 3/4 of a season until the Bulls traded for Miller, and then it was as if something switched on his brain and he took off and hasn't looked back! He is avering 6 pts, almost 7 rebounds, and a block a game in just 19 minutes! Noahesque stats if you ask me. James Johnson has looked a hell of a lot better the last 3 games! He seems to be playing under control and my hope is Scottie is doing him some good. He has height and the ball handling skills to be a nice player for the bulls. Certainly the potential to be a rotation player! Don't know if it will be this season. One Brewer comes back, and with the surprise play of Bogans, he may not get as much time as he would like. I know Bogans is a guard, but my thinking is Brewer and especially Korver could play SF. With Asik improving, and if we sign Dampier, JJ could set a lot this season. Brewer looked a little better the second time he came into the game, but ya, he is not 100%. Watson looked good last night! I too like Weaver, he has height. Looks really smooth! Lucas looked ok as well. Thomas won't play much. He will play a little until Boozer comes back. We got him for the playoffs.
I think * The previous Bulls head coaches wouldn't know what to do with a post move if they had any to work with. * The pre-season doesn't mean anything, but it does mean the Raptors are terrible. They might not win 20 games. I mentioned it a while back, but they might want to consider buying a player or two (Luol in a Melo 3-way!) with their Chris Bosh TPE. * Noah is bordering on "Point Center" territory in this offense. When he has Boozer to throw to as well, he's gonna be completely nuts. * I've never really hated JJ the way lots of folks seem to (he seems to be the designated hate recepticle on BaB for instance), and I agree he looks better. I wish he didn't remind me of Marcus Fizer so much, but in great shape and properly channeled, he can be useful. * I too hope Kyle Weaver sticks. We can keep him and Scalabrine both and only have 14, so I think he will. I'm not yet convinced John Lucas III is better than an empty roster spot. In fact, if Weaver doesn't stick and any of those other guys too, I'm gonna be mildly pissed. * Asik is like a quick, coordinated version of Dillybar Bagaric. Dillybar smashed people's faces in honest attempts to block shots. Omer is good enough that when he smashes guys in the face, it's going to be because he wants to smash guys in the face. * I'm maybe a little bit disappointed Taj hasn't played as great, given Boozer's injury, as some of the other guys. Noah, Deng, Asik, Korver, and Weaver have all pleasantly surprised me. Taj hasn't been terrible or anything, but I was hoping for more than "meets expectations". Which, I realize, is sort of contradictory.
To both Mike and SST: We have the testimony from Johnny Bach that Skiles didn't want to focus on post play and bigs. The guy could care less. He was all about guard play. Bill Cartwright would have hated Derrick Rose as a point guard! (Well, maybe not, but you know the quote I'm talking about.) And Vinny, well, he had nice hair and no predeceptions. What is so cool here is that Tom Thibodeau and staff seem to understand the entire game...They don't have some skewed perspective about the importance of one aspect of it over another. He sees each position as valuable in and of itself, and knows how he wants the players he has to contribute from that position. He's even confident enough to develop his stars Rose and Noah to play multiple positions -- and not just like, "Hey, you, go play the four". He takes time so that these guys understand what it means to play the four or the two. This is really, really cool. This is the aspect of Skiles' coaching that was truly lacking, and something that made me really want Thibo -- but what he's delivering is head and shoulders above what I hoped for, even in this short time. Granted, the talent and intelligence level is greater, but what we're seeing from JJ, for example, is I think a good indication of the value-added of bringing in Thibo. Ok -- this is just preseason. But I like it.
Great minds think alike Good Hope, we actually were talking about that sort of thing a while back too. One thing I've noticed is the pre-season might be one of the better times of the season to evaluate coaches. Not so much in terms of wins and losses, but it's when they're actually implementing their sets as well as enforcing their general mindsets. When I think back to Vinny, their pre-seasons looked positively disorganized. Skiles' pre-season teams would be nice and crisp looking, but you could generally tell the various "experiments" that folks would talk up early (Curry and Chandler with real post operation, Deng in the post, Deng at SG, Eddie Badsen, etc.) were sort of nonserious efforts and were going to be quickly cancelled for the regularly scheduled SkilesTV programming (pass, pass, pass, pass, pass, jump shoot. Pass, pass, pass, pass, jump shoot).
I can only agree with you all about Skiles and big men to an extent. I think he should have won a lifetime achievement award for how he used Curry during the 03-04 season. I remember how he implemented all those little slants in the paint to use Curry in situations where he could catch and shoot without having to put the ball on the floor. Skiles wasn't committed to funneling the offense through Eddy Curry, but Eddy never has broken one assist a game. Until the day comes when he learns to pass, and I don't expect it ever will, Skiles was right to limit his role in the offense. I mean, Skiles took Curry (pass no evil), Chandler (catch no evil) and AD (move no evil), and designed an offense that allowed the Bulls to get some production on the inside. Add Ben Wallace to the mix, and I think it's quite possible that Skiles may have some the most inept starting post players in the league. If you don't have the horses, there's no way to pull a cart. Boozer, Noah, Taj and even Asik will likely prove to be more complete post players than anyone he had to work with. I think a much better evaluation tool would be looking at how Skiles uses Bogut (16p, 2a in 32 minutes last season). I'll be honest -- I haven't watched the Bucks closely for this. Can anyone speak to what types of schemes he's running now that he has a post presence?
I think all of these comments are tied together by the fact that this is the first season where we are able to attract talent because we have a star. Derek landed us the premier coaching prospect and the bench is filled with much better players than we are used to. Meanwhile, Toronto had to overpay Amir Johnson like the dickens to land any type of post presence and they're still screwed to the moon. I feel like pundits usually think players sign where they will make the most money. I don't think that's the case at all, and our experience with the championship teams and this prior off season hint that the reverse is true. And I agree about Lucas III. I haven't seen him provide anything we would want as of yet. As an aside, did anyone hear Neil Funk call him Lucas Yii last night, thinking that his first name was Lucas and his last name was III? That guy has no business calling a game. You know, he had a couple of nice moves last night that I haven't seen from him before. I think Taj is better this season. But the consensus has been that Taj has a ceiling on what he'll be able to accomplish because of his size and explosiveness, and I don't think we've seen anything to convince us otherwise.
Thoughtful as always. While I agree that Skiles was limited because of personnel, Bach's comment was made in light of what Skiles' preferences were. As I recall they were made before the season, at a time when people were questioning why the Bulls didn't seek to fill their hole of post scoring, and Bach said that essentially Skiles didn't want post scorers. I should probably look up the article. If I find it I'll post it. The guy had a bias against big men. Now, he has Bogut, and Bogut is a good, passing big man. I'm not saying that Skiles is a dummy. Just that his forte is guard play, and his preference in coaching, too. I just get the impression that Thibo has got the full package in terms of his perspective on the game.
Skiles absolutely used Curry and Chandler to their best abilities, IMO. He started Curry and the offense went through him for easy buckets early on. I don't at all think Skiles shied away from using the big guy in the post, though the inability to pass out of the post was worth limiting his minutes. He finished games with Chandler. The team won 47 games with Curry leading the team in scoring. The team also finished 2nd in defense, in spite of playing Curry and Gordon lots of minutes.
Mike, As to your Noah/Point Center comment. I think Jo played point guard until the age of 14 or 15 when he had a signficant growth spurt. Having that skill base developed at a young age no doubt never leaves you irrespective if your're 7 feet tall. Thunder, Yeah ... I'm as bipolar as you with Omer Asik. But, I do tend to be more glass half full with him then half empty if you know what I mean. I just feel with him that once his game intel matures a bit more and he gets a couple of season under his belt he could be a real surprise. He is quick - his reactive timing, lateral foot speed. Love the way he moves , and , he is very athletic. Wiry strong to it seems. Even if he only develops a quick spin move on either block and then brings his hook on each hand along .. I would be more than happy. But dude needs to shoot his free throws like Rick Barry because as he gets court time he's going to get mugged everytime he gets the ball.
This also could be Jo's year for the AllStar team . With Bogut having his limitations this will be a good chance for Jo to have a real good crack at it , and yeah , I'll back him on a stronger Bulls team than Al Horford on a faltering Hawks team ( as I think they will ) We could conceivably send 3 guys to the Allstar game ...Rose, Noah and Boozer ..although it will be harder for Boozer to make it against KG, Amare, and Bosh
I think it all depends no how many centers the East coaches want to put on the roster. In 2010, there were three, Horford, Lee and Howard. In 2009, Howard was the only center. I don't think Horford gets another nod. He's just not good enough to deserve multiple all-star experiences. Brook Lopez may give Noah a run for the money. Noah dropped 15 and 13 in the playoffs last year, and 10 and 13 the year before. That's something coaches care about, and his comments attacking Cleveland last season to the press also raised his profile. If Noah can up his game by a couple points and a couple of rebounds, which is certainly a reasonable expectation given how well he is playing and Boozer's early injury, I think he could beat out Lopez.
Lopez is in the conversation , sure , but fans won't vote for him in big numbers an when it comes down to the Coaches vote I reckon the majority of them go with Jo. Lopez needs to win first
