Thoughts on Donovan right now

[samwana]

Well that hot streak did not change much, we're back to BD is making bad decision after bad decision. I still think he needs to go. Small ball is his game and it doesn't work.

My stance hasn’t changed in well over a yr

F I R E Billy

I damn near dislike this front office more than GarPax, which in itself is an amazing feat

I keep coming back to this as well.

He can be a great communicator all he wants, but if it doesn't win enough games, he needs to go.

I still would like to see how this team works with Zach when someone else coaches the team.

[dougthonus]

I keep coming back to this as well.

He can be a great communicator all he wants, but if it doesn't win enough games, he needs to go.

I still would like to see how this team works with Zach when someone else coaches the team.

Vs the Vegas odds:
21-22: Beat them by 13.5 games
22-23: Missed by 1.5 games (odds set when Lonzo's expected recovery was December)
23-24: O/U is 38.5 (currently on pace to beat by .5, but recent pace would suggest we beat it by more)

The team hasn't underachieved, the team has achieved at an anticipated level and probably a bit above that. If you ask whether I think Billy Donovan will add a bunch of wins to a team, I'd say no. I'd also say he won't subtract a bunch either. Your odds of finding a coach that will add wins over expectation are considerably lower than finding one who will subtract them IMO. Donovan's not in some elite category, but like all coaches he's getting a whole lot of scapegoating for a pedestrian roster.

[Stratmaster]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

[HomoSapien]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Milwaukee Bucks operate like they're the Chicago Bulls. The Chicago Bulls operate like they're the Milwaukee Bucks.

[Stratmaster]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Milwaukee Bucks operate like they're the Chicago Bulls. The Chicago Bulls operate like they're the Milwaukee Bucks.

Well put.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

[kodo]

It was always a long shot they'd actually get an upgrade over Budenholzer.
Well if anything, Doc Rivers coaching Giannis & Lillard will be entertaining.

[DuckIII]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Milwaukee Bucks operate like they're the Chicago Bulls. The Chicago Bulls operate like they're the Milwaukee Bucks.

1. I'm not going to look to a team who fires a head coach 43 games into his career as a guiding light. Particularly one that had just fired their NBA Champion head coach to hire the coach they just fired. Every situation is unique and for all I know Griffin is a massive cancer in the locker room and doesn't know an X from an O. But on the surface I don't look at this with envy at all.

2. I'm not convinced there's a good argument to be made that the Bulls would do better with a different coach. BD is whatever, but this team's (changeable) issues begin and end with the roster and FO.

These situations are very different.

[Stratmaster]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Milwaukee Bucks operate like they're the Chicago Bulls. The Chicago Bulls operate like they're the Milwaukee Bucks.

1. I'm not going to look to a team who fires a head coach 43 games into his career as a guiding light. Particularly one that had just fired their NBA Champion head coach to hire the coach they just fired. Every situation is unique and for all I know Griffin is a massive cancer in the locker room and doesn't know an X from an O. But on the surface I don't look at this with envy at all.

2. I'm not convinced there's a good argument to be made that the Bulls would do better with a different coach. BD is whatever, but this team's (changeable) issues begin and end with the roster and FO.

These situations are very different.

Yeah. The difference is Donovan was given multiple seasons to alienate the best player. Play Ayo over Coby. Start Williams despite him playing below MLE level.

Whereas at the first sign of their coach being a problem with their players, Milwaukee canned him. Despite the 2nd best record in the entire damned NBA. And yep. That's after firing a coach with a chip who they felt underperformed the following season.

All I heard is that Bobby Portis challenged Griffin. Pretty hilarious that not getting along with Bobby Portis and the front office steps in to clean it up and ends up firing their coach. But not getting along with a 2 time all-star, the Bulls just looked the other way and let Donovan run it into the ground and are trading the player.

Before you say it. I am sure it's more than Portis, although supposedly Griffin had the endorsement of Giannis.

As far as you not being convinced, aren't you the one who tried to tell me that taking crazy charges doesn't mean a greater chance a player gets hurt?

You're right about the front office, though. They hired a horrible coach and refuse to admit they made a mistake, even doubling down with the extension and being willing to shed the best talent they have on the team for him. It's kind of sad. They are like the abused spouse who keeps coming back for more. Donovan has them whipped.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

[Indomitable]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Milwaukee Bucks operate like they're the Chicago Bulls. The Chicago Bulls operate like they're the Milwaukee Bucks.

Their owners actually care unlike The Bulls owners.

[RSP83]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Bucks need to hear this new concept called "Continuity". In this concept you can't fire your head coach without giving them at least 3 years to build the team. Believe us, Continuity is good.

[HomoSapien]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Milwaukee Bucks operate like they're the Chicago Bulls. The Chicago Bulls operate like they're the Milwaukee Bucks.

1. I'm not going to look to a team who fires a head coach 43 games into his career as a guiding light. Particularly one that had just fired their NBA Champion head coach to hire the coach they just fired. Every situation is unique and for all I know Griffin is a massive cancer in the locker room and doesn't know an X from an O. But on the surface I don't look at this with envy at all.

2. I'm not convinced there's a good argument to be made that the Bulls would do better with a different coach. BD is whatever, but this team's (changeable) issues begin and end with the roster and FO.

These situations are very different.

I think our personnel issues (mostly a lack of size/lack of PF) are related to Billy. How could they not be? AKME might love small ball, but any coach who felt like they were too small to compete would presumably request some size. It’s a problem if Billy doesn't agree with AKME but is just following orders. At the end of the day, we desperately need a coach who can get his voice heard because our current roster has some obvious flaws that haven’t been addressed in three seasons.

[Stratmaster]

The 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach.

Here we sit with Billy gum-chewing, platitude-spewing Donovan. Who has managed to mis-manage a team about as badly as a coach possibly can, and got a secret extension for his efforts. Struggling to get a reasonably talented team close to .500.

And the 30-13 Bucks just fired their head coach mid-season.

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

The Milwaukee Bucks operate like they're the Chicago Bulls. The Chicago Bulls operate like they're the Milwaukee Bucks.

Their owners actually care unlike The Bulls owners.

This

Sent from my SM-S911U using RealGM mobile app

[coldfish]

The situation with the rotations is weird. Its hard to figure out where its coming from. In some instances, Billy pays attention to on/off metrics and sometimes he doesn't. The pattern is that Lavine, Derozan and Vucevic seem to be immune to being pulled for poor play whereas other players like Drummond get a quick hook.

My personal belief is that AKME has a hand in rotations and the fact that Billy cooperates is a big part of the reason why he is still here and got the extension.

I primarily blame AKME for there not being a quality PF on the roster to go with Patrick.

Going forward, I wouldn't be surprised if the team lets Derozan walk and then uses the money freed up to give Patrick an extension and get a PF with the MLE. They could stay under the tax like that while still getting to rake in Lonzo's sweet, sweet insurance money.

Next year:
Coby / Ayo / Carter
Lavine / Caruso
Patrick
MLE PF / Craig
Vucevic
+ draft pick, Terry, Phillips, Taylor

and no, that's not a contender. The Bulls seem to have no interest in pursuing that. I don't think they have a path for going that direction even if they wanted to.

[sco]

The situation with the rotations is weird. Its hard to figure out where its coming from. In some instances, Billy pays attention to on/off metrics and sometimes he doesn't. The pattern is that Lavine, Derozan and Vucevic seem to be immune to being pulled for poor play whereas other players like Drummond get a quick hook.

My personal belief is that AKME has a hand in rotations and the fact that Billy cooperates is a big part of the reason why he is still here and got the extension.

I primarily blame AKME for there not being a quality PF on the roster to go with Patrick.

Going forward, I wouldn't be surprised if the team lets Derozan walk and then uses the money freed up to give Patrick an extension and get a PF with the MLE. They could stay under the tax like that while still getting to rake in Lonzo's sweet, sweet insurance money.

Next year:
Coby / Ayo / Carter
Lavine / Caruso
Patrick
MLE PF / Craig
Vucevic
+ draft pick, Terry, Phillips, Taylor

and no, that's not a contender. The Bulls seem to have no interest in pursuing that. I don't think they have a path for going that direction even if they wanted to.

I agree. Billy seems to be a coach who caters to the big contract guys to placate them, and then tries to win by tinkering with the supporting cast rotations. If it hasn't become obvious this season that playing the big 3 together isn't best for winning, I don't know what will convince him.

To be a little fair, they did get Craig, who was a good fit before the injury.

IMO, this team does well when 2 of Coby, Zach, DDR and Vuc are on the floor with Pat, AC, Drummond (and Craig when healthy, maybe with a little Ayo sprinkled in for home games).

[coldfish]

The situation with the rotations is weird. Its hard to figure out where its coming from. In some instances, Billy pays attention to on/off metrics and sometimes he doesn't. The pattern is that Lavine, Derozan and Vucevic seem to be immune to being pulled for poor play whereas other players like Drummond get a quick hook.

My personal belief is that AKME has a hand in rotations and the fact that Billy cooperates is a big part of the reason why he is still here and got the extension.

I primarily blame AKME for there not being a quality PF on the roster to go with Patrick.

Going forward, I wouldn't be surprised if the team lets Derozan walk and then uses the money freed up to give Patrick an extension and get a PF with the MLE. They could stay under the tax like that while still getting to rake in Lonzo's sweet, sweet insurance money.

Next year:
Coby / Ayo / Carter
Lavine / Caruso
Patrick
MLE PF / Craig
Vucevic
+ draft pick, Terry, Phillips, Taylor

and no, that's not a contender. The Bulls seem to have no interest in pursuing that. I don't think they have a path for going that direction even if they wanted to.

I agree. Billy seems to be a coach who caters to the big contract guys to placate them, and then tries to win by tinkering with the supporting cast rotations. If it hasn't become obvious this season that playing the big 3 together isn't best for winning, I don't know what will convince him.

To be a little fair, they did get Craig, who was a good fit before the injury.

IMO, this team does well when 2 of Coby, Zach, DDR and Vuc are on the floor with Pat, AC, Drummond (and Craig when healthy, maybe with a little Ayo sprinkled in for home games).

https://www.basketball-reference.com/contracts/CHI.html

Craig makes $2.5m this year. Carter makes $6.2m. That was a serious misallocation of the limited funds available this offseason. People here will say that is hindsight but its the job of general managers to predict the future. When given the option, AKME has routinely put their money in guys 6'6" or smaller.

[dougthonus]

Craig makes $2.5m this year. Carter makes $6.2m. That was a serious misallocation of the limited funds available this offseason. People here will say that is hindsight but its the job of general managers to predict the future. When given the option, AKME has routinely put their money in guys 6'6" or smaller.

Outside of Craig being hurt, he seems like an ideal player for what the Bulls need, and at his cost, I don't think you could get better. He's very much a legit PF IMO given his strength, and his skillset was nearly exactly what we could use.

Carter seems like a luxury given we signed both Ayo and Coby, but would have made sense otherwise. He did help with the theoretical problem of 3&D, but then you shouldn't have signed three PGs to 3 year deals. In the end, you need to go two of 3 on those PGs IMO given that DeMar often acts as the PG, Zach sometimes acts as the PG, and Caruso also sometimes plays as a PG, and none of those guys are "true" PGs are either (to the extent anyone cares about true PGs anymore, which they probably shouldn't).

My real complaint with misallocating funds though is Vuc. We probably paid at least 8M more than we had to, no one was going over the MLE on him and Ayo. He was restricted and would have been restricted the following year. He was coming off a crap season, we could have just waited a year and got him on the same deal but only paid him 2M or whatever this year, and if someone offered him something else it still probably would have been less.

Probably between those two guys we unnecessarily spent somewhere between 5-12M dollars for no reason other than we're just scared to negotiate.

[coldfish]

Craig makes $2.5m this year. Carter makes $6.2m. That was a serious misallocation of the limited funds available this offseason. People here will say that is hindsight but its the job of general managers to predict the future. When given the option, AKME has routinely put their money in guys 6'6" or smaller.

Outside of Craig being hurt, he seems like an ideal player for what the Bulls need, and at his cost, I don't think you could get better. He's very much a legit PF IMO given his strength, and his skillset was nearly exactly what we could use.

Carter seems like a luxury given we signed both Ayo and Coby, but would have made sense otherwise. He did help with the theoretical problem of 3&D, but then you shouldn't have signed three PGs to 3 year deals. In the end, you need to go two of 3 on those PGs IMO given that DeMar often acts as the PG, Zach sometimes acts as the PG, and Caruso also sometimes plays as a PG, and none of those guys are "true" PGs are either (to the extent anyone cares about true PGs anymore, which they probably shouldn't).

My real complaint with misallocating funds though is Vuc. We probably paid at least 8M more than we had to, no one was going over the MLE on him and Ayo. He was restricted and would have been restricted the following year. He was coming off a crap season, we could have just waited a year and got him on the same deal but only paid him 2M or whatever this year, and if someone offered him something else it still probably would have been less.

Probably between those two guys we unnecessarily spent somewhere between 5-12M dollars for no reason other than we're just scared to negotiate.

I agree about Vuc but disagree about Craig. Craig is a pretty limited player. He might be a good stopgap but he is just a stopgap.

IMO, its pretty clear that AKME believes in the 4 small guys plus a center thing that BD frequently plays. BD agreeing with them is why BD is still here but its coming from the front office.

[MrSparkle]

BD's two biggest issues are rotational stubbornerness, and what I'd deem an irresponsible way of dealing with huge runs. He must consistently give up more big double digit leads than any other Bulls coach, and we've had some bad ones.

Lame-duck clutch play-calls (or consistent lack of execution) are the cherries on top.

[nanokooshball]

I think overall Donavan gets unfairly blamed for roster construction as well as bad luck with injuries. But, overall I think Donavan is a good hire. I think AK is trying to create a top - down system like Miami and SAS where the GM and coach can build a culture of good, hard working guys that play defense and work on their game. It may have no translated to a good fit of players on the floor thus far, but I see the vision and I think long long term it will work out.

Strenths
- Player Development - helped Shai blossom into a star; we've seen hard evidenced improvement w Coby, Ayo, Patrick. I wish Lauri and Wendell had more time with him, rather than shipping them out with the Vuc trade, because I think we would have seen them get better as well. Boylan ruined them. The first season, the team was too young it didn't translate to wins. I think if Derozan plus Caruso, Drummond, Craig, etc were here a year earlier we could have built around that young core.

- Relationships w Players (minus Zach) - the players really seem to love him; has a good rep around the league. Before, with Thibs (who I love, and is probably the best coach we've had minus Phil), Fred, or any other coach... it seemed like coming to the Bulls would be a turn off; I think it's underrated for a team to have a coach that players would enjoy playing for. At least now, in FA we are not handicapping ourselves with our coach.

- Defense - his teams consistently have been top 10 in the league; even with subpar defenders in the line up, he does get them to play the right way. He hasn't had a rim protector for 3 years and we're still a great defense.

Weaknesses
- X's and O's; his out of time out plays are pretty terrible
- Predictable - especially end game, loves to use Derozan as his crutch.... but he's had good results as well with it
- Lack of offensive creativity - he knows what creates higher efficiency offense and is trying to incoporate it, but it doesn't translate. I feel like he needs an elite level PG to really maximize his coaching ability
- Adjustments.... can't make the adjustments you see Carlisle, Spo, or Lue make in games.


In summary, Donavan isn't an elite top 5 coach. I think he's probably in 10-15 range.
- Likeable, good player development, and rock solid defenses consistently.
- I see him as a floor raiser, but might not be able to outcoach another team to win a championship.
- Would I want to replace him? Only if Pop, Spo, Nurse, or Carlisle available; otherwise no. I don't think change the coach would change our outcome at all. No one out there in the free agency is better than Donavan.

[madvillian]

BD's two biggest issues are rotational stubbornerness, and what I'd deem an irresponsible way of dealing with huge runs. He must consistently give up more big double digit leads than any other Bulls coach, and we've had some bad ones.

Lame-duck clutch play-calls (or consistent lack of execution) are the cherries on top.

I don't think we can fairly speak on the roster stuff, how much is BD and AKME and are both camps basically pushing for these strange small ball lineups that aren't really working given we don't have a Draymond Green type (few do).

But that stuff you mentioned? 100% stuff we can pin on BD. My main critique is that he doesn't seem to adjust to what he's seeing night to night and instead will stick with "his lineups". The decision to start AC and Demar on the wings when Zach was back is the perfect example. One of those guys had to go to the bench. But he'd rather demote a young player like Pat, even tho what Pat can bring into that starting lineup is more than Demar, given that White and Lavine and Vuc are all high usage players and Demar isn't really a shooter.