Ken Berger on the Bulls

[Proven_Winner]

I firmly believe the Bulls have managed to put together a coach and a collection of players who are the whiniest, most fragile wimps I have ever seen compete in professional sports. They at the same time have the biggest egos yet most fragile psyches of any people I have ever seen. They could keep a psych class busy for a whole semester using them as a case study.

I'm sick of trying to decide who is at fault. Get rid of Hoiberg, Rondo, Butler, Wade, Niko, Portis, Forman and Paxson and start it all over. I added Portis just because he doesn't seem to give a damn about anything.

Bunch of entitled wimpy jack asses getting paid to play a kids game and whining and bitching the whole time.

Well damn Strat.

[johnnyvann840]

I mean... look at that list. WTF are GarPax even thinking with this ridiculous 2018 plan? It's destined to fail.

But, hey, it allows them to keep their jobs for a while longer.

[Stratmaster]

Oh, not to mention the internet gossipmongers who pose as reporters. When did we become a society that can't live without 140 characters sent to gossip and try to tear down people, organizations and institutions. Everyone wants to either be the media or be the subject of the media. I'm beginning to think the less I read about my favorite sports and teams the better because the discussion has gone into the gutter and the players and participants have now dipped down to the same level.

Thank goodness for the Cubs. A sport and players you can actually like.

You sound like an old man yelling at the clouds. However, I 100% agree with you. It's sickening and it's the beginning of the end, my friend.

That's because I am an old man YELLING AT THE CLOUDS DAMNIT.

[drosestruts]

Oh, not to mention the internet gossipmongers who pose as reporters. When did we become a society that can't live without 140 characters sent to gossip and try to tear down people, organizations and institutions. Everyone wants to either be the media or be the subject of the media. I'm beginning to think the less I read about my favorite sports and teams the better because the discussion has gone into the gutter and the players and participants have now dipped down to the same level.

Thank goodness for the Cubs. A sport and players you can actually like.

Just wait, the contract demands and divaish attitudes are coming to the Cubbies. You don't make it this far in any sport without an ego, and with that comes desire to be paid what your worth (not unfair yet routinely criticized by fans due to it being so much more than they'll ever make), and to be recognized as "the man".

Also important to note, winning cures all. With the Cubs, everything is all good. Madden makes bad bullpen decisions, doesn't matter, they won. When things start going the other way, your start looking more like the Washington Nationals.

i just haven't seen the level of soap opera as high in baseball. There is a player here and there who acts like a douche but not the majority like in the NBA. Reporters are always looking for a scoop but I don't see the same kind of destructive internet "journalism" like with the NBA.

I mean do you follow baseball as closely as you do basketball? You're here and have thousands of posts so I'm guessing you're really into basketball. The more closely you follow a sport, the more you get that look behind the curtain. There's drama and douchebags abound in every sport.

[Stratmaster]

I firmly believe the Bulls have managed to put together a coach and a collection of players who are the whiniest, most fragile wimps I have ever seen compete in professional sports. They at the same time have the biggest egos yet most fragile psyches of any people I have ever seen. They could keep a psych class busy for a whole semester using them as a case study.

I'm sick of trying to decide who is at fault. Get rid of Hoiberg, Rondo, Butler, Wade, Niko, Portis, Forman and Paxson and start it all over. I added Portis just because he doesn't seem to give a damn about anything.

Bunch of entitled wimpy jack asses getting paid to play a kids game and whining and bitching the whole time.

Well damn Strat.

Lord, I apologize for that one there, and please be with all the starving Pygmies down there in New Guinea! Amen!

[Stratmaster]

Just wait, the contract demands and divaish attitudes are coming to the Cubbies. You don't make it this far in any sport without an ego, and with that comes desire to be paid what your worth (not unfair yet routinely criticized by fans due to it being so much more than they'll ever make), and to be recognized as "the man".

Also important to note, winning cures all. With the Cubs, everything is all good. Madden makes bad bullpen decisions, doesn't matter, they won. When things start going the other way, your start looking more like the Washington Nationals.

i just haven't seen the level of soap opera as high in baseball. There is a player here and there who acts like a douche but not the majority like in the NBA. Reporters are always looking for a scoop but I don't see the same kind of destructive internet "journalism" like with the NBA.

I mean do you follow baseball as closely as you do basketball? You're here and have thousands of posts so I'm guessing you're really into basketball. The more closely you follow a sport, the more you get that look behind the curtain. There's drama and douchebags abound in every sport.

I can't find enough jackasses like all of us here to debate the Cubs or baseball in general :)so, no, I don't spend as much time on baseball.

[johnnyvann840]

Oh, not to mention the internet gossipmongers who pose as reporters. When did we become a society that can't live without 140 characters sent to gossip and try to tear down people, organizations and institutions. Everyone wants to either be the media or be the subject of the media. I'm beginning to think the less I read about my favorite sports and teams the better because the discussion has gone into the gutter and the players and participants have now dipped down to the same level.

Thank goodness for the Cubs. A sport and players you can actually like.

You sound like an old man yelling at the clouds. However, I 100% agree with you. It's sickening and it's the beginning of the end, my friend.

That's because I am an old man YELLING AT THE CLOUDS DAMNIT.

None of it matters anyway... the robots are taking over. Hawking was right, A.I./Robots are taking over the World. He predicted they would take our jobs and was right. Now we have self driving cars and sex robots. It's all coming to fruition. Won't be long now.

only half green

[Jeffster81]

So.........the Bulls are three years away from being three years away from saying they have a plan to compete in three years?

[DaBulls82]

Like hedge fund managers, they're counting on a crash after two straight summers of exorbitant contracts given out amid unprecedented spikes in the salary cap. And when other teams pull back, the Bulls believe they'll be ready to pounce.

[realEAST]

I think it is just a beginning

the beginning of what?

Of us hearing FOs delusional plans I am afraid.

[johnnyvann840]

Like hedge fund managers, they're counting on a crash after two straight summers of exorbitant contracts given out amid unprecedented spikes in the salary cap. And when other teams pull back, the Bulls believe they'll be ready to pounce.

Thanks, I needed that laugh. Hysterical.\


Thank God we have Bobby Axelrod and Gordon Gecko running things.

[transplant]

As always, I opened the forum and sought out a thread where a grouchy old **** might be able to contribute some bitter regrets over the current state of affairs. This topic looked promising.

However, it appears that Strat has this under control. Carry on.

[fudgie]

By then, Wade and Rondo will be long gone, and the Bulls will be banking on their ability to attract high-impact free agents in their prime—something they've never done. It's also something that will be even more challenging if the collateral damage from the Wade-Rondo experiment continues to mount.

This was GarPax's long term plan. Tread water for two years with Wade and Rondo and hopefully strike gold a year from now in free agency. Unfortunately it's blowing up in their faces (deservedly) and free agents are not going to want to come here.

Money talks and we'll probably overpay to sign a second tier free agent like Wallace and Boozer in the past. The top free agents are all going to have offers from other teams that look like better situations than the Bulls.

[stl705]

Back on track, mark me as opposed to this recycled "Have cap space improve through free agency" plan.

A) Because it has a low success rate

B) It's boring and wasteful to the present

C) These are the 2018 free agents:

Durant
Dirk
Wade
Brook Lopez
DeMarcus Cousins
Pau Gasol
Tony Parker
Rudy Gay
Derrick Favors
Trevor Ariza
Avery Bradley
Jabari Parker
Andrew Wiggins
Nick Young
Dante Exum
Julius Randle
Seth Curry
Doug McDermott
Rodney Hood
....other uninteresting names

I agree..... Every player on that list will be either too old, or not good enough to sign or overpay for. No chance of Durant coming here..... the rest of the list is a joke. We better hit on draft gold or we focked

I'd be fine with some of those guys (bolded), but ya - the draft is where the Bulls need to focus. Very important to get starters, not bench players, in the draft.

[kyrv]

So what non-Bulls idiot executive thinks the FA market is going to crash? Buried lead here.

[johnnyvann840]

Back on track, mark me as opposed to this recycled "Have cap space improve through free agency" plan.

A) Because it has a low success rate

B) It's boring and wasteful to the present

C) These are the 2018 free agents:

Durant
Dirk
Wade
Brook Lopez
DeMarcus Cousins
Pau Gasol
Tony Parker
Rudy Gay
Derrick Favors
Trevor Ariza
Avery Bradley
Jabari Parker
Andrew Wiggins
Nick Young
Dante Exum
Julius Randle
Seth Curry
Doug McDermott
Rodney Hood
....other uninteresting names

I agree..... Every player on that list will be either too old, or not good enough to sign or overpay for. No chance of Durant coming here..... the rest of the list is a joke. We better hit on draft gold or we focked

I'd be fine with some of those guys (bolded), but ya - the draft is where the Bulls need to focus. Very important to get starters, not bench players, in the draft.

Yeah, Wiggins isn't coming here. lol. The Wolves will competing for titles, you think he's coming to this shytshow. Rudy Gay is too old. Rodney Hood I like but he's not a franchise changing player. We are talking about getting a player of Jimmy's caliber. I don't want any part of Cousins unless he really shows me some maturity. Jabari Parker might be good but he needs to show he can stay healthy and he's probably not leaving. None of the players on the list are or have a chance to ever be the caliber of Jimmy, except Wiggins..

So, yeah. the list for the Bulls is a lot shorter than that when we factor in whether or not the player would even consider coming especially in light of the damage currently being done. The fact that GarPax run a perpetually toxic environment of mistrust and mismanagement.

No matter how we slice it, the plan is a sham. A joke. Only chance this team ever has of contending again is to bring in a coach who knows what he's doing and carries some cred, and we hit draft gold with a top 5 player/prospect. Also, we would need a change in that Gar and Paxson stay the the fock away from the team and locker room. Bottom line. It's a bad time to be a Bulls fan. We are realistically looking at a 6-7 year period of horrid basketball before we can even think about having something good to watch again.

[Wingy]

Berger, a long-time NBA writer, published a piece today on the Bulls. It covers a lot of what we've been discussing in other threads, but comes with his thoughts and information he's received from "sources"

Like hedge fund managers, they're counting on a crash after two straight summers of exorbitant contracts given out amid unprecedented spikes in the salary cap. And when other teams pull back, the Bulls believe they'll be ready to pounce.

"This market's going to shut down in 14 months," one executive within the league said. "And when it does and you have flexibility, it's a buyer's market and you'll have opportunities."

By then, Wade and Rondo will be long gone, and the Bulls will be banking on their ability to attract high-impact free agents in their prime—something they've never done. It's also something that will be even more challenging if the collateral damage from the Wade-Rondo experiment continues to mount.

Good article. I found the above section to be the most illuminating. Many have insisted the Bulls have no plan or acted confounded by the plan. A minority of us (Duck comes to mind) have taken the position that the plan is pretty straightforward and has been pretty obvious since this past off-season: It's to maintain cap space for 2018 in the hopes that other teams have spent all of theirs in 2016 and 2017 and that it's become a buyer's market. It's notable that Berger and his executive source also seem to find this plan relatively clear and intuitive. (Although Berger views the plan as being dependent on the Bulls landing superstars with the cap space. I think that the Bulls plainly understand that it's hard to land superstars and have contingency plans for the cap space such as getting assets back in exchange for taking on bad or at least big contracts.)

Posters are "confounded" due to the fact that it's a mind-numbingly, god awful plan. A how could any rational human being actually believe it's a good idea type of disbelief.

The 2018 FA class is terrible. Multiple posters have already highlighted that in this short thread. The marginal players we pick up will not be worth having burned a year of Jimmy's prime, and further tarnishing the org's reputation of recent dysfunction.

[Bandit King]

Like any good free agent would want to come here after Wade and Rondo leave.

[GetBuLLish]

Like any good free agent would want to come here after Wade and Rondo leave.

I see that gif all the time. What the heck is it from?

[d boy gentleman]

This is a dumpster fire. This team needs to pick a lane; either you're rebuilding or you aren't. At this point, the reset button needs to be hit and start from scratch. The coach and GM also needs to go. The problem is that a. Reinsdorf won't fire either guy and b. Seems as though Reinsdorf and the other owners are more concerned about profit and making money (rightfully so) over winning. It's difficult as a fan to be a fan of a team with no direction and owners that seemingly don't care...