PG: Chokecago Bulls Part Deux

[FriedRise]

12+ hours later and I'm still annoyed that we dropped this game.

What's the likelihood that we bamboozle teams into thinking that Coby and Wendell have potential? I guess tout their age maybe?

They stunk it up with the starters and when moved to the bench, our bench went from one of the best to one of the worst. Two games in a row they just completely lost huge leads and needing - yet again - the starters and the vets to bail them out. Unlike the OKC game, this time the starters didn't get enough rest and ran out of gas because they had to check in with 10 minutes left in the 4th.

Coby couldn't run an offense to save his life and wilted under pressure. Wendell couldn't stop fouling and giving the other team free points. Four fouls in 18 minutes in 2 of our last 3 games going up against bench guys. C'mon man.

[FranchisePlayer]

I've written a poem: "When the bench killed you."

It goes like this *cough*:
"The Bulls had a nice lead.
They lost it".

[mtron32]

When they were starting to collapse in the 4th, that's when my wife decided to try to talk to me LMAO.

With our weak front court and lack of starting PG, I fully expect these kinds of losses.

[FriedRise]

When they were starting to collapse in the 4th, that's when my wife decided to try to talk to me LMAO.

With our weak front court and lack of starting PG, I fully expect these kinds of losses.

Dude. And they never could figure out why we're in a bad mood all of a sudden. I was all cheery in the first half, even going into the 4th when we were up by 13. And then I completely flipped when the bench gave all that up in 2 minutes.

[donaldtrump_00]

1. This pattern of terrible, one sided reffing is absolutely ridiculous. Why the Bulls never go to the line is beyond me. Perhaps the Bulls should explain to the fanbase why they are bothering to watch 5 on 8 games.

2. The lineup change just moved the issue from the starters to the bench.

3. I have no idea what BD is doing. That was beyond terrible coaching tonight. He seemed like he was trying to prove a point to someone in the organization and hanging the whole team out to dry to do it. A grade school level coach would have called a time out and changed the lineup. Whatever he was trying to do tonight, it was intentional.

4. When the starters came back in, they literally stopped running the entire offense. Again, I have no idea what the hell was happening. The initial move by the center wasn't happening. I'm not sure if Zach was calling them off or what but that's the first time I have seen the offense freeze up in quite some time.

I'm not saying bd is coaching right.but it's pointless to blame him. It's more the players. He's with them daily. I'm sure coby and wendell are in his ear saying they're going to fix those mistakes. Please give us the opportunity. Or saying we need more experience and more time to learn the NBA game. Bd is already knowing this team socks. He's here to help and groom them. Yes he wants to win but this season isn't playoffs or bust. It's evaluate who does what. He's doing what he's asked by AK and Marc. When the season is over is when the decisions are made. Coby, wendell,Lauri are all being strongly evaluated. There not going anywhere in a trade. Those are our lottery picks. Not throwing them away in one season because there premature. I can see all 3 of them being very good in 3 years of growth

[Ice Man]

I keep reading about how Wendell cost the Bulls this game, and yet the team was -17 after he left the game, with 10 minutes left to play, and the Bulls with an 8 point lead. Shrug. When there's a narrative, there's a narrative.

[SfBull]

Yeah they gotta tinker with the lineups so that you don’t have both Coby and Wendell playing at the same time for too long of a stretch. They’re so bad individually that playing them together for too long a stretch is pretty much a death knell.

Both should be traded but their value is probably low now.

[coldfish]

1. This pattern of terrible, one sided reffing is absolutely ridiculous. Why the Bulls never go to the line is beyond me. Perhaps the Bulls should explain to the fanbase why they are bothering to watch 5 on 8 games.

2. The lineup change just moved the issue from the starters to the bench.

3. I have no idea what BD is doing. That was beyond terrible coaching tonight. He seemed like he was trying to prove a point to someone in the organization and hanging the whole team out to dry to do it. A grade school level coach would have called a time out and changed the lineup. Whatever he was trying to do tonight, it was intentional.

4. When the starters came back in, they literally stopped running the entire offense. Again, I have no idea what the hell was happening. The initial move by the center wasn't happening. I'm not sure if Zach was calling them off or what but that's the first time I have seen the offense freeze up in quite some time.

I'm not saying bd is coaching right.but it's pointless to blame him. It's more the players. He's with them daily. I'm sure coby and wendell are in his ear saying they're going to fix those mistakes. Please give us the opportunity. Or saying we need more experience and more time to learn the NBA game. Bd is already knowing this team socks. He's here to help and groom them. Yes he wants to win but this season isn't playoffs or bust. It's evaluate who does what. He's doing what he's asked by AK and Marc. When the season is over is when the decisions are made. Coby, wendell,Lauri are all being strongly evaluated. There not going anywhere in a trade. Those are our lottery picks. Not throwing them away in one season because there premature. I can see all 3 of them being very good in 3 years of growth

Again, what happened last night was so far outside of what would be considered normal coaching that its difficult to grasp. IMO, the only rational explanation I can come up with is that BD was trying to send someone a message. Maybe it was the players as you note and he was trying to teach them to not let up when you are up big and how to play through tough spells. Maybe this was a message to AK that the team is critically flawed.

I'm not sure what happened or why but I just can't believe that BD was watching that collapse and thinking "this is fine".

[Dominator83]

1. This pattern of terrible, one sided reffing is absolutely ridiculous. Why the Bulls never go to the line is beyond me. Perhaps the Bulls should explain to the fanbase why they are bothering to watch 5 on 8 games.

2. The lineup change just moved the issue from the starters to the bench.

3. I have no idea what BD is doing. That was beyond terrible coaching tonight. He seemed like he was trying to prove a point to someone in the organization and hanging the whole team out to dry to do it. A grade school level coach would have called a time out and changed the lineup. Whatever he was trying to do tonight, it was intentional.

4. When the starters came back in, they literally stopped running the entire offense. Again, I have no idea what the hell was happening. The initial move by the center wasn't happening. I'm not sure if Zach was calling them off or what but that's the first time I have seen the offense freeze up in quite some time.

I'm not saying bd is coaching right.but it's pointless to blame him. It's more the players. He's with them daily. I'm sure coby and wendell are in his ear saying they're going to fix those mistakes. Please give us the opportunity. Or saying we need more experience and more time to learn the NBA game. Bd is already knowing this team socks. He's here to help and groom them. Yes he wants to win but this season isn't playoffs or bust. It's evaluate who does what. He's doing what he's asked by AK and Marc. When the season is over is when the decisions are made. Coby, wendell,Lauri are all being strongly evaluated. There not going anywhere in a trade. Those are our lottery picks. Not throwing them away in one season because there premature. I can see all 3 of them being very good in 3 years of growth

Exactly. I don't blame BD too much. News flash guys: there is no such thing as a good rotation with this roster. There's not enough good players to fill a team on it. Period. No matter what he's gonna have to play bad players. The new starting lineup is the best possible hand he can play, and he can't play it for 48 minutes. When he has to go to the bench, it's gonna suck no matter who he subs in.

I disagree though about our guys being good in 3 years. They suck. Coby is the only one that still has potential to be useful off the bench imo

[SfBull]

[tweet][/tweet]

Purtle averages 6 points 7 rebounds per game. He put up 20/16 tonight in crazy high efficiency just like every center we’ve faced so far.

Good god we need a huge upgrade at the 5.

We need a huge upgrade at the 5 for a long time.

[mtron32]

When they were starting to collapse in the 4th, that's when my wife decided to try to talk to me LMAO.

With our weak front court and lack of starting PG, I fully expect these kinds of losses.

Dude. And they never could figure out why we're in a bad mood all of a sudden. I was all cheery in the first half, even going into the 4th when we were up by 13. And then I completely flipped when the bench gave all that up in 2 minutes.

Yup, she always wants me to watch them out in the living room with her, but my team is Jeckyl and Hyde, I can't trust them on the big TV.

[Hangtime84]

I think carter is gonna be most serviceable for his entire nba career. Coby trains pretty hard it's gonna still take a while for him to improve

[Kukoc-Lauri]

I am more frustrated by lack of direction and plan, in my eyes. If we want to evaluate young players, Young and Sato, Temple should be dealt at trade deadline. If Bulls dont plan to pay market price for Markkanen then he should be traded before deadline. If goal is playoffs we need to aquire center and real pg and trade or play less White,Carter,Gafford even (playing less minutes for Williams). Drummond,Aldrige are very available and Bulls have Otto contract to match those expiring deals. Oladipo,Gordon,House,Wall,Ball,Bledsoe,Collins lot of players on trade market, Cousins,Thomas,Dedmon,Vonleh as free agents all without team. Basically all in on tanking for top 5 pick, playing youngsters, even trading Zach for haul or aquiring pointguard and center ready to contribute immediately and help Bulls for playoffs push.This stand still, play in ceiling and mid to late lottery pick is least attracttive way for me.

[GoBlue72391]

12+ hours later and I'm still annoyed that we dropped this game.

What's the likelihood that we bamboozle teams into thinking that Coby and Wendell have potential? I guess tout their age maybe?

They stunk it up with the starters and when moved to the bench, our bench went from one of the best to one of the worst. Two games in a row they just completely lost huge leads and needing - yet again - the starters and the vets to bail them out. Unlike the OKC game, this time the starters didn't get enough rest and ran out of gas because they had to check in with 10 minutes left in the 4th.

Coby couldn't run an offense to save his life and wilted under pressure. Wendell couldn't stop fouling and giving the other team free points. Four fouls in 18 minutes in 2 of our last 3 games going up against bench guys. C'mon man.

Of the two, Coby probably has more trade value, although that's not saying much.

From an outsider's perspective, Coby's raw basic stats are impressive for a 21 year old (16, 5, and 5) and he's an easy fit for any team as a bench scorer. He also has two and a half years of team control, as opposed to one and a half for WCJ. So when you factor those things in he's probably the easier sell.

Having said that, an opposing team is obviously going to do their due diligence before trading for anyone. If Coby is going to be of any value for a team, it has to be strictly as a scoring SG with no PG responsibilities whatsoever.

That's unfortunately not possible for us at the moment, because even coming off the bench Coby has to play some PG for us. The alternatives are overplaying Sato/Zach, a struggling Archi, and Denzel who's prone to make boneheaded decisions. Maybe when Temple returns he can play bench PG for us, which will allow Coby to play offball.

I view Coby similarly to Ben Gordon. He was a high draft pick who was an undersized scorer that we initially tried to convert into a PG. That didn't work, so we settled on combo guard. That didn't work either, and BG eventually became a pure SG. Coby's game is similar, he's been in a similar situation, and I expect his career will follow a similar path (PG -> combo guard -> SG). He obviously hasn't had the same level of success as BG and maybe never will, but there are similarities there.

I think it's time to completely abort the Coby as a PG or even a combo guard experiment. He's strictly a SG in my eyes, and I believe he can be an impactful bench scorer if he's not asked to do anything other than that. If we can trade him for anything of value, great, but if not, then ideally we can remove all of his PG responsibilities and hopefully he'll thrive as a pure scorer.

WCJ is dead weight as far as I'm concerned. He's been solid since being demoted to the bench, but solid bigs are a dime a dozen and it's unlikely any team will trade anything of value for him.

Being a dime a dozen solid bench big, he's also not a guy we should re-sign, as he can be replaced by cheap journeymen. So we're probably stuck with him until his contract expires and we likely let him walk.



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[Stratmaster]

I keep reading about how Wendell cost the Bulls this game, and yet the team was -17 after he left the game, with 10 minutes left to play, and the Bulls with an 8 point lead. Shrug. When there's a narrative, there's a narrative.

The Bulls were -15 in a 3 minute sequence before he left the game.

It wasn't all WCJ's fault though and he didn't cost the game in his own. He certainly was a part of it though. Still, Billy shouldn't have had the combination of players on the floor that he did. This one is on the coach.

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[Chi town]

So we lost two 20pt lead games and we have had two games taken by the refs via Dubs and Blazers.

We just changed starters and Thad is saying team wants 6th seed.

Seems like we are in the hunt.

[MrSparkle]

We've got 4 games until trade day. Knowing this crew, the young guys are gonna start playing with nerves as the rumor mill heats up.

At this point, I would hope AK knows who he wants to keep, but having Lauri miss over half the season again leaves a preposterously small sample size. He's shooting a ridiculously pumped TS% in 19 games with empty stadiums, which is a whopping 65% compared to his career 55%. I still don't really buy it. The nearly EXACT same thing happened to Niko - in his 25 Bulls games, he had a 64% TS compared to his career 57%. Then he came way back down to earth in NOP (54%), while actually competing with a superstar for a playoff berth. Good to note that he did help NOP make the post-season, and his PER and overall defense, rebounding were all incredible for the super Bulls stretch. He was playing like a man possessed.

If they want some deadline vets... Just a few names off the top of my head who might make a semblance of sense, laterally swapping some expirings and tossing in a sweetener of little consequence (Valentine, Arci, Gafford):

Patty Mills - expiring vet to teach this team a half-court press

Bjelica - cheap vet who fits

Dinwiddie - if they want a low-risk gamble with his ACL & player option

Or maybe Nasir Little? I honestly have no idea. It's slim pickings. Almost looking more forward to waiving Felicio and perhaps another guy, to make room for some locker-room vet who isn't gonna really play, but just talk to Wendell and Lauri. These guys are without contract:

Vonleh - waived by Nets

the other Noah (Joakim) - I seriously think a retirement min. deal will happen

Thabo, Gerald Green, Evan Turner, Troy Daniels, our old friend Shaq Harrison, Mario Hezonja

Honestly, if we buy out Felicio and Kornet, there's a 90% chance you can sign an upgrade, even if the guy nets 5 minutes for the rest of the season.

[kodo]

I keep reading about how Wendell cost the Bulls this game, and yet the team was -17 after he left the game, with 10 minutes left to play, and the Bulls with an 8 point lead. Shrug. When there's a narrative, there's a narrative.

The Bulls were -15 in a 3 minute sequence before he left the game.

It wasn't all WCJ's fault though and he didn't cost the game in his own. He certainly was a part of it though. Still, Billy shouldn't have had the combination of players on the floor that he did. This one is on the coach.

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The entire bench is a problem. It was 3 seconds left in the 3rd, 66-80. By the time Lavine & Markkanen came back in, it was 77-80 after only 2 and a half minutes. Bad defense is one thing, but then to score 0 for an entire run is another level. Starters got the lead back up to 87-81 by the next TO, but I think the tank just was empty after that.

Lavine was still +5 in a losing game. Markkanen was positive as well, although his boxscore wasn't impressive. Bench was -10 including Wendell.

The guards & wings are definitely part of the problem, some of the scores on Wendell result from just bad, dumb TOs caused by Coby and Otto. And this isn't just SA, this is almost every game.

The entire lineup of Coby-Wendell-Arci is too young and inexperienced. And Otto as the vet presence isn't helping, as he's been a disaster since re-hurting his back. We've just shifted our problems.

[Stratmaster]

I keep reading about how Wendell cost the Bulls this game, and yet the team was -17 after he left the game, with 10 minutes left to play, and the Bulls with an 8 point lead. Shrug. When there's a narrative, there's a narrative.

The Bulls were -15 in a 3 minute sequence before he left the game.

It wasn't all WCJ's fault though and he didn't cost the game in his own. He certainly was a part of it though. Still, Billy shouldn't have had the combination of players on the floor that he did. This one is on the coach.

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The entire bench is a problem. It was 3 seconds left in the 3rd, 66-80. By the time Lavine & Markkanen came back in, it was 77-80 after only 2 and a half minutes. Bad defense is one thing, but then to score 0 for an entire run is another level. Starters got the lead back up to 87-81 by the next TO, but I think the tank just was empty after that.

Lavine was still +5 in a losing game. Markkanen was positive as well, although his boxscore wasn't impressive. Bench was -10 including Wendell.

The guards & wings are definitely part of the problem, some of the scores on Wendell result from just bad, dumb TOs caused by Coby and Otto. And this isn't just SA, this is almost every game.

The entire lineup of Coby-Wendell-Arci is too young and inexperienced. And Otto as the vet presence isn't helping, as he's been a disaster since re-hurting his back. We've just shifted our problems.

It is pretty simple. Two of Thad, Zach, Lauri and Sato need to be on the court at all times. That isn't difficult to accomplish.

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[ZOMG]

This was such a deflating loss that I haven't been able to muster the energy to write much of anything. Oh well, some totally random thoughts:

- Ladies and gentlemen, this is what it looks like when you get outcoached. This loss was at least 50% on Donovan. I think enough people have butchered the incomprehensible decision to leave the scrub squad in until we'd lost the lead, so I'm not gonna keep at it... but man. I'm beginning to have serious doubts about Billy as a game coach. He doesn't react, doesn't challenge OBVIOUS blown calls, doesn't understand that at this stage, certain games simply necessatitate leaning "too much" on the Bulls' best players. BD managed to show all his flaws as a game coach in this one. Not very encouraging.

- Talking about coaching... can anyone explain why we started out defending Jakob Poeltl like he was Stephen Curry? Billy had people following Poeltl at the perimeter and staying connected to him at all times. JFC. This dude is the DEFINITION OF A NON SHOOTER. He simply WILL NOT SHOOT THE BALL. What happened to the scouting report??? Just dumb. I can't deal with this stuff.

Still, you need to take Poeltl seriously in other ways. Bulls fans seem to think he's some big, slow white stiff who doesn't do anything. Wrong. Poeltl is someone who plays to his strengths 100% of the time. Why the hell do you think a genius like Pop plays him so much? Because he's damn effective and efficient out there. He's huge, long, smart and physical. It can be hard to incorporate a dude like this into a modern NBA basketball framework because he doesn't give you any shooting whatsoever, but the Spurs have managed to do it.

- Coby White is becoming almost unplayable in the 4th quarter, certainly as any kind of a "lead" guard. I'm done with this guy. The way he misses cutters and open guys is nothing short of incredible. I'm thinking White may simply suffer from bad peripheral vision or something. He's been exposed in a horrible way.

- How many times did Markkanen have a small guy perfetctly sealed right under the basket and our guards just looked him off? I stopped counting when it had happened like 5-6 times. FFS! That's BASIC BASKETBALL. I know Thad is like our only good entry passer, but still. You make that play 10 times out of 10. And before the haters come in and say "He wouldn't have been able to score anyway" - yeah right. Before he got hurt, Lauri was super effective in these situations and it was actually one of the most obvious areas of improvement for him. But now we've gone away from it once again. I don't know what the hell it is with this team. If the guards don't make that play, Billy needs to hammer it into their heads.

- I wrote recently that relying on "Thadgic" to just make stuff happen out of a static situation is a very bad idea. He's not that guy. Thad needs continuous movement around him, he needs a scrambling defense, and he needs to do what he does without dribbling much. In this game, we did the opposite. People kept forcing him the ball and he kept turning it over when there wasn't any natural movement around him. Too often we look at Thad's playmaking as the CAUSE of having a humming offense, when actually it's just as much a RESULT of it. It's all about movement. Billy has been preaching the same from the start of the season, but for some reason he didn't really react to all the Thad-watching in this game.