dunkside

There are small things that the Bulls didn’t do that if they did, they’d probably be up 3-1 and on their way to winning the series against the Celtics.

• Rose got lost in screens and didn’t fight enough through them. This allowed the Celtics (Ray Allen amongst them) to get open 3s.

• Gordon needed to move his feet more. He must have helped with defensive rebounding too, especially when the Celtics were killing the Bulls on the offensive glass. He also was tentative at times in getting after the ball – on more than one occasion I saw him hesitating to take a couple of steps and pick-up a loose ball only to have a Celtic player beat him to it. On another occasion on a fast break he stopped at the 3p line instead of filling the lane, and when Rose’s pass went a little bit in front of him, he tried to catch it without moving his feet and lost it out of bounds.

• Noah couldn’t keep Perkins off the offensive glass. Easier said than done, since he’s giving up a lot of pounds, but it was very frustrating to see Perkins grab offensive rebound after offensive rebound even when Noah had inside position and was boxing him out.

• Salmons wasn’t aggressive enough. Seemed that most of the time he shot the ball, he made his shots. But he hesitated to shoot it at times, even when he was open. He could also help more on defensive rebounding.

• Tyrus gets criticized for not boxing out his man all the time and not running more on offense, but what would have helped him most was if he could have finished better in traffic. He had a few dunks that he missed on which he was probably fouled, but you won’t get some of those calls against the denfending champions. Especially not on their home court.

• Hinrich kept taking bad shots off the dribble. He made some of those, but they were still bad shots. He took long 2s when he had a lot of room to penetrate and when he did penetrate he missed some easy layups.

• Brad Miller acted stupid and got silly fouls and dumb technicals. Not what you’d expect from a veteran. He also missed a bunch of passes that should have been easy to make for a passer like him. And he just fucked up a couple of FT that could have taken game 5 to a 2nd overtime.

Team analysis Chicago Bulls

Derrick Rose better be praying the Bulls listen to John Hollinger and DON’T pick him in the draft. Cause if they do, Paxson is getting ready to ruin his career Thabo Sefolosha and Tyrus Thomas style. Despite refusing to acknowledge that Rose is about to be the Bulls’ pick, Paxson already preaches patience with Rose (or Beasley).

“Deron didn’t jump into this overnight. His first year, he didn’t start most of the season. Utah had a little bit longer-range view on him. Whether it’s us or Miami, I think the same thing applies for Derrick.”

Yes, you read that right. Paxson is about to bench a 1st overall pick. Let me just say this again: Paxson is about to bench a 1st overall pick. We’re not talking about a weak draft here. This is a good draft with a few players with star potential. Has that ever happened in the history of the league ?

Has anyone before taken incompetence this far ? I mean other than Isiah Thomas, whose picture is now featured next to “incompetence” in the Encyclopædia Britannica. Paxson is so damn afraid of making a mistake or taking a risk that he’s hurting the team more than if he was to take a calculated risk. He’s so damn cautitous that I suspect he’s wiping his ass before taking a shit. I don’t think I need to mention again how when getting enough play time Tyrus and Thabo put up really nice numbers. And the high picks that did not get play time usually didn’t develop that fast, if at all. Yet, despite all historic evidence to the contrary, he’s about to commit perhaps the biggest mistake so far.

And how does he explain his plan of “we’re not going to play the rookies/young players lots of minutes until they turn 35″ ? He preaches patience. PATIENCE ?? You fucking moron, patience is what YOU should show by insisting your 1st overall pick plays at least 30 minutes per game while allowing him to learn from his mistakes. THAT is patience.

Yet instead of him showing patience with a rookie, he’s asking for patience from the fans. But he might soon find out that the fans patience has run out. Not with the players, but with his ineptitude.

At first it looked as if Skiles was the one who didn’t want to play the rookies. Than, strangely, same thing happened with Boylan, despite Paxson’s public comments about young players getting more playing time in order to develop. If the same thing happens with Vinny Del Negro, there can only be one culprit. I wonder if his contract includes bonuses depending of the number of wins in a season or making the playoffs. If it does, then the Bulls are fucked, cause they have a young team which needs to be developed but the front office guy’s interest would be to sacrifice development for a few extra meaningless (for the team in the long term) wins.

General managers Chicago Bulls, Derrick Rose, John Paxson

Lost on Garnett

Lost on Gasol

Lost on Kobe

Lost on D’Antoni

Making it worse, the last 2 named the Bulls as their prefered destination.

Nuff said.

General managers Chicago Bulls, John Paxson

Finally, Jim Boylan was let go. Some of the Bulls fans, and probably some of the players as well, wish he was let go sooner. Maybe from a plane flying really really high.

Jimbo, you were a sorry excuse for a coach. Your failures are many, and well documented. Not only did you suck as a coach, but you also had the players this close to mutiny. Jimbo, you idiot, you’re lucky they didn’t make you walk the plank – the appropriate punishment for a butt pirate like yourself. Chris Duhon and his almost 30mpg know what I’m talking about.

Now that this has been taken care of, we’ll have to see if Paxson will disband the rest of the circus. The midget and the half man-half woman will probably regret not taking those 10 mil per season they were offered. The juggler who over-juggles way too often should be shopped, cause he’s paid as a lead act but his performance went from passable to horrible. Perhaps he should be packaged with one of the pinheads that never stop from shooting even when they’re shooting blanks. Those 2 could team up with Jamal Chuckford and write a book called “The only bad shots are the ones you DIDN’T take”. And if he’s at it, Paxson should try to trade the rather normal guy with an OK contract but who’s not really bad but not quite good-en . The problem with him is he’s been eating the minutes of the young bigs.

Coaches Chicago Bulls, Jim Boylan, John Paxson

I said I would address the Bulls later today so here I am. All season long, my beef with Boylan and Paxson was the young players not getting enough minutes. So what does Jimbo the Clown do even with the season mathematically over ? He keeps refusing to play Tyrus Thomas. I don’t care he had 5 fouls. Let him play till he fouls out. Especially since he had 12 points (on 6-8 shooting), 8 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 blocks with no turnovers in those less than 18 minutes. This would amount to 26.7 points, 17.7 rebounds, 6.7 assists and 4.4 blocks per 40 minutes. There is absolutely no fucking reason to play Nocioni more than him.

And why was Noah on the floor for just 20 minutes ? Is Jimbo the Clown saving him for the playoffs ? Let the kid play and develop. Let him make mistakes and learn from them. Let him foul out, let him blow defensive assignments, let him miss passes, miss shots, make turnovers, whatever. Then, after the game, show him the game tape and explain to him where he made mistakes AND how to correct them.

And yes, Thabo got 34 minutes against the Bucks, which is ok, but he could have gotten even more, especially considering he had 6 points on 3-5 FG, 8 reb, 7 ast, 2 stl, 1 blk and 0 TO. And just 2 games ago, agains the Cavs, Thabo received less burn than Duhon. This is absolutely inexcusable at this point in the season when the Bulls have nothing to play for. Yet somehow I suspect Boylan hopes that by winning a few more games (and possibly ruining the Bulls chances in the lottery) he can land that head-coaching job. And he does this the only way he knows: by playing the veterans. Not only should he not be offered that job, but he should be banned from the NBA and forbidden to get within 100 yards of any young NBA player under the penalty of death. If Jimbo really thinks he has a shot at being a head coach, he’s either completely delusional or just hoping Paxson is blinder than a masturbating bat with glaucoma.

What’s so damn annoying is that this has been going on for the entire season. Of course, Skiles, and then Boylan, always had an excuse: first, they wanted “the best product on the floor” which somehow meant for them playing Ben Wallace instead of Tyrus Thomas. This despite the fact that Wallace just didn’t give a shit and Tyrus, who’s production when given minutes was already arguably better than Wallace’s, if he got the minutes, would have improved enough to make this debate look ridiculous.

When Skiles was fired and replaced with Boylan and the Bulls kept sucking, the goal changed from (presumably) reaching the finals to making the playoffs. Boylan, a regular Mini-Skiles, thinking making the playoffs might land him a full time job as a head coach (this would have been worse than wathing Shaq in a free throw shooting contest), kept playing the veterans. In itself his inability to see that playing the young players gave the team more chances of winning should disqualify him from any coaching job.

Then it was time to showcase Wallace apparently. At least that’s what some Bulls fans believed. Although I really have to ask what’s the point of showcasing him if when you’re trading him you have to take back an equally awful contract. If you trade a player you don’t want and has a bad contract for a player the other team doesn’t want and who has a similarly bad contract, all you are doing is trading a piece of crap for another piece of crap. You don’t need to put your piece of crap in the window prior to that. Nobody is going to think that’s some tasty chocolate cake. Well, anyway, this showcasing meant the turd stayed in the window, while the good stuff was left to rot on the shelf in the closet.

So Wallace was traded and Boylan was forced to play Tyrus. And he delivered. Of course you wouldn’t expect a sophomore who played less total minutes that some rookies at that point to suddenly become Mr Consistency, but he had a few nice games:

And the result of him having few nice promising games was Boylan giving the starting job to Drew Gooden. Using the same retarded logic that playing the veterans gave him more chances of winning (and thus landing that head coaching job), he kept playing the veterans. Gooden had a few nice games, indeed, but he is NOT the player drafted as a project by the Bulls using the 2nd pick in the lottery (yes, technically he was picked 4th, but had the deal with Portland not been in place, the Bulls would have picked him straight up with their 2nd pick). I can only assume that the Bulls did not receive that memo informing them that when you pick a player who’s considered a project you should actually “develop” him. In case they know the meaning of the word, which I sincerely doubt.

So even if it was not Gooden the one who desperately needed minutes to develop, he got them nonetheless, while Tyrus found himself glued to the bench again. He received more than 20 minutes of PT only twice in March, but he got less than 10 minutes on 4 occasions, playing 9, 4, 7 and again 4 minutes. Not even in blowout losses did Boylan manage to find more than 15 minutes for him.

During the course of the season, Boylan basically ignored the franchise’s best (long term) interest in order to promote his own agenda. Again, speaking volumes about how qualified he is for a head-coaching job, was his sheer ineptitude of understanding how to better promote his own agenda. He continued with Skiles’ policy of claiming minutes are earned in practice and on the court while giving the veterans entitlement minutes, he lost the respect of all the players (if they ever had any for him), and, of course, he kept losing games.

Some people like to give him credit for “discovering” Thabo, but the truth is that Thabo would have stayed buried at the end of the bench had the guards that were ahead of him in the rotation not been injured. In fact what happened Boylan was forced to play Thabo, and the moron didn’t even realize what he got, or else he would have made it a point not to giveThabo less than 30 minutes in any given game.

So with all these in mind, in theory at least, there should be no chance that Boylan is retained as a head coach. But I wouldn’t be too shocked if Paxson thought that the blame rests more with the players than the coach, and for the 1st time in NBA history decided to change the players and keep the coach and “give Boylan a fair chance”. Which, of course, would mean he’d just give Boylan another roster to fuck-up with. But, at least, the disaster that would ensue would at least have Paxson fired and, hopefuly, replaced by a GM that is more able to build a champion.

Coaches Chicago Bulls, Jim Boylan, Joakim Noah, John Paxson, Thabo Sefolosha, Tyrus Thomas

Celtics @ Bulls

• Gooden is injured so I get the opportunity to watch Tyrus Thomas some more and hopefully he’ll show again that he can produce when given the minutes
• there’s still no one on the Bulls able to throw an alley oop pass
• hey, Bulls fans, does watching Tyson Chandler play well for the Hornets hurt ? Well, you gonna be in a world of pain as soon as Tyrus is traded to a team that knows how to develop and use his talents (besides being very athletic – which everyone knows about him, he has very good hands, good passing skills, and now, apparently, can hit the open J with some consistence)
• Deng keeps jumping on every single Paul Pierce pump fake. At one point not even Pierce was expecting him to bite on the fake anymore, cause he wasn’t ready to force the contact in order to get the call. Otherwise, he could have put more fouls on Deng and gotten to the FT line a few more times.
• Hinrich is still one of the dumbest PG in the league and at his age there’s no hope on him ever improving on that. His 18-20 feet off the dribble pull up jumpers on the fast break drive me crazy. How some (many) Bulls fans used to put his name in the same sentence as Nash or Stockton is beyond me.
• you can add Rondo to the list of players who abused Hinrich. Defense was supposed to be his thing, right ?
• Rondo has really good court vision. The more I see him, the more I like him. With all the talk about KG in the race for MVP and Paul Pierce’s transformation, Rondo’s part in the Celtics success seems to be a little underrated.
• Noah could do a better job recognizing when he’s defended by a shorter player so he can take advantage of the mismatch. He could have scored with ease a few times if he would have just shot a baby hook over the shorter defender. He had good position, he just wasn’t thinking about scoring, wanted to pass the ball. Altruism is a noble thing, but sometimes you have to look to score in order to help your team.
• Big Baby sporting a mohawk ? Better than Brad Miller with cornrows
• well, apparently Duhon can throw an alley oop pass. Too bad he can’t do much of anything else. Especially shoot the ball.
• when I’m opening my own restaurant, I’ll be serving Deng Pudding. It’s gonna be so soft and fluffy and after 3 quarters (of an hour) it will just disappear from your plate
• Hinrich hustles a lot on D. He even won a jump ball against KG. Too bad this does NOT make up for his dumb decisions on offense. Not on an offense starved team such as the Bulls. That’s the reason I’ve always been saying that Hinrich would best fit next to a superstar SG/SF with play making skills. A Lebron, Kobe or Wade would help his game a lot. So would a coach telling him what he’s supposed to do and what he’s not supposed to do.
• the Bulls play their young players substantial minutes and they stay close to the best team in the league ? Big surprise. NOT !!!
• when Hughes is about to take a bad shot, you can sense it in the air. Maybe it’s the stench of his decision making. It precedes the sound of the ball clanking on the rim just like lightning precedes thunder.
• Celtics’ announcers are just as homeristic and annoying as the Bulls’
• Tyrus keeps hitting those mid range J’s. Skiles must have been right when he implied Tyrus wasn’t really working on his jump shots. Right out of his fucking mind !!! And just as I’m typing this, he hits a nice turn around J on the baseline. Back to Skiles, some people decried him getting fired on Christmas. For as much of a jerk he’s been with Tyrus and others, this was nowhere near enough. Him getting fired on Christmas, then getting raped by the Grinch and then dumped by Chris Duhon would be closer to what he deserved.
• you can see Tyrus is not used to playing this many minutes. At the end of the 3rd he’s obviously tired and needs a breather. Too bad his coach (same one who’s responsible for keeping him too much on the bench) can’t see that
• Aaron Gray is the quintessential big slow white lug. He’s part of a long line of centers who’s only “talent” was being tall. Dave Corzine, Will Perdue, Luc Longley and Greg Ostertag watch him and reminisce of their young days.
• Sam Cassell couldn’t wait to get into the game and put up a few shots. He may be old, but he knows his trade. If, as expected, the Celtics make the finals, he’s able to win them a game, and it could make all the difference if the series gets to game 7.
• less than 7 minutes left, 8 points difference. Who’d have thought that the league leading Celtics would have trouble with a team that used to be scrappy, but now is just crappy ? Again, for all non believers, this happening when Tyrus is getting minutes is NOT a coincidence.
• Hinrich loves to dribble. I think he would have been happier on an And1 team. Although I don’t know why they’d want him, since his dribbling is not spectacular (like, say, Skip to my Lou’s), just boring.
• A little over a minute left and 10 points difference and Doc pulls his starters. If I was on the Bulls, I’d be pissed. That’s like saying “You morons can’t put up 10 points in 1 minute even if you were all alone in a gym”. Too bad he was actually right: the Bulls looked like they were past their bed time and couldn’t wait to go home.
• In the end, they were right. Why fight for a win ? To risk having Boylan the Clown as a coach next season too ? To mess up whatever chances the Bulls have for a high lottery pick ? No, thank you. I’ll take the L and be on my way. Which, for some of them, will be the way out of town. And it might turn out to be better for them to play for an organization who actually has a clue about managing its players.
• One last thing: Tyrus was the player of the game for the Bulls with 24 points on 9-16 FG and 6-7 FT, 7 rebounds, 0 assists (a little weird since he was passing the ball well), 1 steal and 2 turnovers in 37:22 minutes. He was also one in just 3 Bulls players who scored in double figures against the Celtics tight D. The other 2 were Nocioni with 19 points on 5-9 FG and Deng with a pathetic 10 points on 3-9 FG. Yeah, this is the guy Paxson wouldn’t trade for Kobe.

Game notes Boston Celtics, Chicago Bulls, Kirk Hinrich, Luol Deng, Paul Pierce, Rajon Rondo, Tyrus Thomas

When Skiles was fired lots of people (Bulls players included) said he was very similar in philosophy (or, as I like to call it when the term refers to Skiles, stupidity) to Scott Skiles. Of course he assured everyone that “he was his own man”. But so far it looks like when he cleaned up his stuff, Skiles left behind his coaching manual and Jim Boylan was happy to find it. The only thing he actually changed was to play Thabo Sefolosha more and Thabo proved he can actually play. In Boylan’s defense, he was forced to play Thabo because of injuries to the other G’s of else Thabo’d probably still be pinned to the bench while Adrian Griffin was getting 20 min per game.

Post game press conference in Chicago

Unfortunately, there’s one thing that hasn’t changed, not even with the trade of Ben Wallace and Joe Smith, which cleared the log jam at PF/C: Tyrus Thomas does not get enough play time. Not even after he has one or 2 good games, not even if he plays well in the few minutes he receives. And even when he plays well in limited minutes, Tyrus still manages to get thrown under the buss by the coach (cause, of course, just like his good friend Skiles, Boylan isn’t guilty himself – it’s ALWAYS the players’ fault).

For example, last night against Washington Tyrus had 2 points on 1-2 FG, 4 reb, 2 ast, 1 TO in 9 minutes. That would have meant about 7 points, 13 rebounds and 7 assists per 30 minutes. For most players that would have guaranteed more minutes during the second half. But Tyrus was yanked early in the 3rd and then left on the bench.

That apparently happened because “coach” Boylan (and I use the term “coach” very loosely) decided to play small ball. Which may not be such a bad decision if your guards were not named Larry Hughes (who had 5-16 FG and, of course, a website asking him to stop taking so many bad shots), Kirk Hinrich (3 ast, 5 TO) or Ben Gordon (2-9 FG, 3 ast, 3 TO).

Not to mention that going small against a team that shoots 11.1% from the 3p line is basically inviting them to beat you inside if they can’t do it from the outside. It’s like Boylan thought “These guys can’t shoot from the 3p line, so lets make things easier for them. Let’s go small so they have the size advantage”. And it worked. The Wizards said “Thank you for giving us the game” and then proceeded to kick the Bulls’ asses.

There are 2 things to say about this: First, when Tyrus is finally traded and blossoms into an all star and people will wonder “why didn’t this guy produce while he was with the Bulls ?” just remember: it’s Boylan’s fault. Second, considering Paxson already made a statement in which he endorsed Boylan by saying “Jim Boylan is an NBA head-coach”, don’t be surprised if in the summer you’ll see Boylan get the head-coaching job. After all, he’s cheap, just like Jerry Reinsdorf. That’s a match made in heaven.

Coaches Chicago Bulls, Jim Boylan, Scott Skiles, Tyrus Thomas

And now we get the the most interesting part: the block buster trade between the Cavaliers, the Bulls and the Sonics. Chicago got Larry Hughes, Drew Gooden, Cedric Simmons and Shannon Brown from Cleveland. Cleveland got Ben Wallace, Joe Smith and a 2009 second-round pick from Chicago and Wally Szczerbiak and Delonte West from Seattle. Seattle got Ira Newble and Donyell Marshall from Cleveland and Adrian Griffin (know around here as the mummy) from Chicago.

For the Bulls

I think that not even the Perdue for Rodman trade made the Bulls fans as happy as they are now. And considering that they are fully aware of how bad Hughes sucks (as documented here), it tells you just how much they wanted to get rid of Wallace. He’s been welcomed with open arms in Chicago and fans hoped he would be the one to lead the Bulls to the next level. But he only came to get the money while wishing he was still in Detroit with his buddies.

Joe Smith was a decent player for a decent salary – one of the few Bulls’ players who were actually worth the money they were paid (or they were seeking). Him being thrown in the deal should have meant getting expirings back instead of Larry Hughes. But even like this, it has the benefit of creating some more playing time for Tyrus Thomas and Joakim Noah.

At the same time the arrival of Hughes creates the same kind of problems for the back court. With Hinrich, Gordon, Hughes, Duhon and Sefolosha fighting for minutes and with Boylan’s idiocy well documented, it will probably be Sefolosha that will lose minutes. It should be Duhon but he’s always been preferred by Skiles as a starter and Boylan is just mini-Skiles. I can’t really explain why except if he’s been giving them great blowjobs. Oh, wait. I remembered: he’s a shooting star.

What this trade does for the Bulls except for opening time for the young bigs is give them a real shot at making the playoffs. Which would not be such a great idea since they would be destroyed by the Celtics, Pistons or Magic. So for this reason alone it would be good if Larry Hughes would continue to take a lot of bad shots. The Bulls need a superstar, and since John Paxson is unable to get one in a trade, their only chance is the draft. So the smart thing to do for the future of the team would be to tank the season.

For the Cavaliers

They replace Hughes with a guy that can actually shoot (Szczerbiak 46% FG this season, 49.1% FG for his career) and they also replace Gooden with Joe Smith. Joe Smith is actually outperforming Gooden for the season. Smith averages 11.2 ppg on 46.6% FG, 5.3 reb, 0.9 ast, 0.5 stl, 0.6 blk in just 22.9 minutes. Gooden averages 11.3 ppg on 44.4% FG, 8.3 reb, 1.0 ast, 0.7 stl, 0.6 blk in 30.7 minutes. Per 40 minutes Smith pretty much owns Gooden and now that he gets to play with Lebron look for his numbers to improve.

Delonte West will take Eric Snow’s minutes at back-up guard. And that is a good thing, considering Snow has been shooting 15.8% from the field this season. That’s right. 15.8%. That is a guy who even started 5 games this season.

Above all these, the Cavs get Ben Wallace. He won’t do too much these days. Certainly won’t play elite defense, won’t provide elite rebounding (31 in the NBA in rebounds per 48 minutes). He won’t provide leadership or advice to the younger players. He might provide some hair care tips to Varejao, but that is about it. Oh, yeah, I almost forgot: he will want at least 30 minutes of “action” per game (where “action” in his case means not giving a crap, not playing much D, killing the offense and taking the occasional fade away turn around jumper that hits the shot clock). And he might just reveal your team’s plans to his pals in Detroit if your team plays them in the playoffs.

If he doesn’t find his motivation the way Shaq did when he moved from LA to Miami and now from Miami to Phoenix, the Cavs might be better off buying him out so maybe Detroit wants him back from a minimum salary. If he does get motivated he should benefit from playing alongside Z, which would allow him to roam on D like he did in Detroit next to Rasheed. But my guess is Ben Wallace would only be happy back in Detroit.

In any case, the Cavs made a move that should improve their chances of reaching the ECF. If the playoffs were to start now, they’d have to beat Toronto, Boston and then Detroit or Orlando in order to make the Finals. This would be a very difficult path, but at least now they are better prepared to handle it. And with Lebron leading them, they might just pull it off.

For the Sonics

They get expirings for players with longer contracts – Szczerbiak had one more year after this one, at over 13 million). In the process they also improve their chances of winning the lottery. They just got rid of Kurt Thomas and now with Wally gone, they will give Minnesota, Memphis, Miami and New York a run for their money in the race for most losses.

Trades Ben Wallace, Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, Larry Hughes, Wally Szczerbiak

Wait. Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaa ? Chris Duhon, of all people, was selected to take part in the Shooting Stars competition during the All Star Weekend. Chris Duhon has THE WORST FG% of the entire Chicago Bulls roster. That roster (still*) includes Ben Wallace.

What’s next ? Steve Nash in the dunk contest ? Reggie Evans in the skills competition ? Erick Dampier and Adonal Foyle in the 3p shooting contest ? Having Chris Duhon in a shooting contest is an insult to scores of Bulls fans who cringe every time he takes a shot. No wonder Chicago’s team lost to San Antonio who had 2 centers on it. Centers, at least in theory, don’t have much range and should have no place winning a shooting contest against a guard. Well, I guess except if that guard is Chris Duhon.

This was the worst thing of the All Star Weekend. The best thing was that because of his Superman stunt, Dwight Howard may end up being nicknamed Superman. Which would piss off a certain fat guy with a well documented obsession for Superman. Shaq sure loves eating, just not humble pie. And this would be a big piece of humble pie shoved down his throat.

* well, not any more, but it did when I wrote that sentence

PS: Yeah, I know this post is a little late, but it took me a while to get over the fact that Chris Fucking Duhon was named to a competition that involves shooting

General All Star, Chicago Bulls, Chris Duhon, Dwight Howard, Shaquille O'Neal

Yesterday John Paxson denied the rumor* that Larry Brown was a candidate to become the Bulls’ next head coach. Said Paxson: “I have not begun the process (of evaluating coaching options for next season)“.

John Paxson doing what he does best: standing

So what the fuck ARE you doing then ?? You’re not evaluating coaching options, you sure as hell ain’t discussing trades (cause if you were, the Bulls might have had Kobe AND Gasol). The only thing you’re doing is denying that you’re doing anything. That’s gotta take like what ? 5 minutes per day ? What the hell are you doing to improve the Bulls the rest of the time ? Sitting on uncle Jerry’s lap** and counting his money ? Or did he hire you just part time so he can save some more cash ? At least that would help explain your activity (or lack thereof).

How else can you explain overpaying for Ben Wallace and trading Chandler for PJ Brown and JR Smith and then letting PJ expire without using his contract to trade for a star player ? Not to mention banishing JR Smith for two 2nd round draft picks. Incidentally, JR Smith (who may be certifiably insane), just dropped 8 tree-pointers in a game. Are you trying to tell me he’s not better than Chris “can’t make an open shot to save his own life” Duhon ? Especially on a team starving for offense.

* the rumor was published by the Philadelphia Inquirer, so you know it was Larry Brown (who’s currently a part of the 76ers organization) that planted it in order to test the ground and see if he has a chance to land the Bulls job. He’d love to clear his name (by taking a team and drastically improving it) and stick it to the Knicks. So the Bulls are perfect for his goals: they are clearly underachieving this season, so improving them would be easy for him, and they play the Knicks 4 times a year.

** for those of you who don’t know who I’m talking about, that’s Jerry Reinsdorf, who may be even greedier than Donald Sterling of the Clippers (and that’s saying something)

General managers Chicago Bulls, John Paxson, Larry Brown