Lucky? Maybe. Luol Deng's timing was awful good, too. He grabbed a shot that had been blocked and put it in the basket just before the buzzer sounded Saturday night, rescuing the Chicago Bulls and giving them their NBA-leading 40th victory. Teammate C.J. Watson drove for the basket but his shot was partially blocked by Toronto's James Johnson and Deng was there for the winner. After officials reviewed the play to make sure Deng's shot beat the buzzer, the Bulls had a 102-101 overtime victory on a night in which they were often outplayed by the 16-win Raptors.
Interestingly, Boozer and Deng had nearly identical stats. Boozer had 24 points, 10 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 steals. Deng had 23 points, 10 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 steals. Deng did play 49 1/2 minutes to Boozer's 37. Deng shot 10-24 from the field, Boozer 11-19. We basically beat them without 3/5 our starting lineup (Rose, Rip, Noah ejected after 12 minutes). Bring on the Heat!
Bulls keep winning, but this is getting ridiculous. How on earth are they 40-10 when Rose has missed 16 games, Hamilton 34 and Deng 9? Honestly, thank God that Boozer has been an ironman this season, playing in every damn game. He's gotten beaten up by Bulls fans (me included) for lots of reasons. One of these was being injury-prone. Overall, he's having a very good season and maintaining his health when damn near everyone else around him are dropping like flies has been huge. Denny's been giving him love all season. It's time for the rest of us to join in.
My "love" for Boozer isn't me being a fanboi. It's that the Bulls rightfully dedicated a MAX salary slot on the guy, he's got all-star talent, and I want to see us exploit his abilities as best we can. If we had signed Amare instead, I'd have the exact same attitude toward him. If our guy isn't performing up to snuff, the idea is to demand he perform up to snuff. The fan base getting down on him (and Noah, too) early on could not have helped him feel welcome or encourage him. In the offseason, it appears he worked his ass off, and lost 20 pounds. He reported to camp in excellent shape, and his ability to play every game is the result, IMO. I am a big fan of Taj. I'm glad he's on the team, and I surely want the team to re-sign / extend him. I don't see him as a starter on a championship team, but I do see him as bringing energy when we need it, and he has quality games often enough for the time he does play. Early in the season, there was talk among the fans of dumping Boozer and Noah. Sheesh. The alternative would have killed us. That would be playing Asik and Taj as starters. Those two might anchor a tough defensive unit late in games when opponents are tired, but we'd have a real tough time getting 30 point quarters on offense. And in spite of Boozer's bad reputation on defense, the stats say we do extremely well with him in there. 82games.com says he has an 18.9 PER vs. 17.2 for opponents at PF, and a 23.6 PER vs. 20.7 at C. If we win that PER battle at every position, we win games, as the record shows. Basketball-reference.com shows him as #1 on the team in defensive win shares, and 3rd on the team (behind Rose and Noah) in WS/48. He's 2nd in DRtg on the team as well. Last game, his counterpart was Bargnani, who went 4-18 from the field. Bargnani went 2-10 the game before. The game before (Orlando blowout), Anderson went 4-13. Against Philly, Brand went 1-2. Against Portland, LMA went 9-18 with 5 boards and 21 points (under his season averages, the guy's an elite PF and defender); Boozer went 9-14 for 22 points, 14 boards, and 4 assists (we won that match up). Boozer's PER is now standing at 20.1. I think we're getting our money's worth, big time. And any talk of amnesty or trading him for cap space is ... silly at this point. Cheers
Boozer's had a good season. Much better than last year, although it's not obvious from looking at the box score. To be fair, I don't think anyone on this board has been on the "he's useless, just amnesty him" bandwagon. He's clearly a useful player, but his biggest knock right now is that he's losing the expectations game. But that's probably because we had misconceptions about what kind of player he was in the first place. He clearly has his worts, but when I think about his situation, I'm usually left thinking 3 things: 1). If we lost him for nothing we'd have bigger holes than we have right now 2). The list of players that are clearly better than him and are available through trade is miniscule or non-existant 3). If we could replay the 2010 offseason again, I still would have signed him. So.......I'm glad Carlos is here. Go Bulls!
I think Amare might have been better, to be honest. But I'm not really complaining. And Amare is playing with fire with those knees and eyes. Go Bulls!
I mentioned Amare because we could have gone after him, and maybe he'd even have been a better signing. Both he and Boozer played very well with stellar PGs (Nash and DWill). But I think Amare has a bit of "I want to be THE man" in him and that might have clashed with Rose (who is THE man, no doubt). Boozer has adapted his game to basically do what the Bulls need him to do. At least to the best of his ability.
Good point. I have a hard time seeing Amare subjugate his game the way Boozer has. My view from the peanut gallery is that a Bulls/Amare marriage was never really in the works. He wasn't that interested in coming here, and the Bulls had no interest in giving him an uninsured contract. I think Boozer most definitely has a better attitude, but of course lacks the physical ability of Amare. However, it's worth noting that Boozer's having the better season so far, although I have no idea why Amare has regressed so much this year.
Chris Bosh was maybe the only other PF/C type FA available. He's had a really good season for Miami, but... 18.2 PPG / 8 RPG on .493 shooting with an 18.8 PER. In 36 MPG. Boozer isn't playing as many minutes, because we have Taj and Omer to find minutes for. 15.3 / 8 RPG on .533 shooting with a 20.1 PER. In 30 MPG. His per 36 numbers are 18.8/9.9.
Yep, Boozer's having a good season. The latter statistics you quoted should also come with the following qualifiers: 1). His defense is better than last year 2). He plays with two other excellent rebounders in the frontcourt 3). He's moved his game away from his strengths to accomodate the team 4). His play this year has coincided with good play from Noah, mostly due to him becoming more perimeter oriented 5). His offense is much better incorporated into the offense as a whole. No more awkward iso's. That doesn't take away from his warts, but I think Boozer's more or less doing what Boozer does....which is a good thing.
Man, what's up with Deng and lately Noah? Noah, last 5 games: 1-5, 1-2, 4-9, 4-12, 3-7 -- that's 13-35, or .371. With 11, 6, 8, 2, and 5 rebounds (6.4/game). Deng was good against Toronto, but in his last 10 games: 2-8, 10-24, 5-16, 5-13, 3-11, 7-18, 4-13, 1-9, 5-8, 5-13. 47-133, or .353. When 2/5 of your starting lineup is playing that poorly and you really don't get much from Brewer, either, it's tough to win games. We manage to go 7-3 in those 10 games.
