Bulls vs Spurs 7pm CT Jan. 6 2025

[jnrjr79]

Read on Twitter

This can't be right. Everybody told me Billy doesn't make in-game adjustments.

[jnrjr79]

I'll be honest, I'm noticing almost no difference in Lonzo's quickness or athleticism. He looks like the exact same guy. The two things I am noticing is that he doesn't have the timing on his shot and his passes are slightly less accurate than they used to be. Both things will get better with time.

Lonzo definitely looks slower to me in the open court and has less burst, like that first dunk he had the other day, it looked like a huge effort for him to dunk and also a huge effort to even sprint for it. I think the difference is that doesn't impact his game so much, he's just an incredibly heady defender and he is incredibly long physically so has a lot of tools on the defensive end that don't rely on his speed, and he was never a 1st step player or open court finisher anyway, his open court value is how fast he passes the ball.

You are right about the timing/rust for him too though, I think there are slight gaps there. It's easy to see how if he can stay healthy these things will improve though and even probably some of the speed will get better over another year of playing on it, strength training and rehab.

There was a recent rumor from Marc Stein that we'd possibly be trading Ball. If the return is a 2nd round pick(s), I'd pass. We're unlikely to draft someone that's going to be better than him in the 2nd round. Ball is still only 27... at this rate, I'd like to lock him down to a value contract. More times than not, he's one of our biggest impact players despite being a minutes restriction.

I think I'd be okay with this plan too. A lot depends on what that next contract looks like, and he will be a UFA so every team will get to bid on him, but I said at the beginning of the year, if he makes it through this year healthy that they basically replaced everything in his knee that was bad, so he has a whole new knee. It wasn't the super athletic knee he trained his whole life and was born with, but it also isn't a knee that is prone to injury with meniscus shaved down and no cartilage. His injury risk going into next season if he emerges problem free from this season is probably much lower than people will think it is.

That said, if 10 teams reach the same conclusion, especially about his impact, maybe he's a 20M player again, and I'm less excited to take the risk. I'd probably be more excited to keep Lonzo than Giddey though.

Given his defensive impact, at this stage in his recovery, IMO he's already a better player than Giddey. The question would be if he and Giddey are going to command similar money, can you really stomach gambling on his health? If you could lock Lonzo up at $10M and let Giddey walk, based on what I've seen this season, I might risk it. At $20M? I'd be nervous.

[Stratmaster]

Read on Twitter

This can't be right. Everybody told me Billy doesn't make in-game adjustments.

Lol. He subbed in Ball. He made a substitution, not an adjustment. It is just even more damning that he is starting Coby and Williams in the first place.

He put in his best defensive player, who would easily be the starter if it wasn't for his minute restrictions. Gee... what a genius.

And I have never, ever seen anyone on here say "Billy doesn't make in-game adjustments"

[FriedRise]

Read on Twitter

This can't be right. Everybody told me Billy doesn't make in-game adjustments.

Lol. He subbed in Ball. He made a substitution, not an adjustment. It is just even more damning that he is starting Coby and Williams in the first place.

He put in his best defensive player, who would easily be the starter if it wasn't for his minute restrictions. Gee... what a genius.

And I have never, ever seen anyone on here say "Billy doesn't make in-game adjustments"

The adjustment here is to stop switching and blitz CP3 when the pick comes so he'd get rid of the ball. SA should've still been able to easily score with Wemby in the paint and Vooch out guarding CP3, but Wemby decided to pass to Sochan who bricked that 3.

Zo has been closing games a lot lately. Billy's been using him like how he used to use Caruso when he was coming off the bench. Billy's obviously capable of making in-game adjustments, which makes that Atlanta game that much more bewildering when he just stood there and watched a 20pt lead disappear without calling a timeout once.

[jnrjr79]

Read on Twitter

This can't be right. Everybody told me Billy doesn't make in-game adjustments.

Lol. He subbed in Ball. He made a substitution, not an adjustment. It is just even more damning that he is starting Coby and Williams in the first place.

He put in his best defensive player, who would easily be the starter if it wasn't for his minute restrictions. Gee... what a genius.

And I have never, ever seen anyone on here say "Billy doesn't make in-game adjustments"

I have! Not saying you, but it's certainly a sentiment that gets expressed from time to time.

BTW, how was that Bears/Pack game? Looked pretty chilly, but at least you got some excitement, assuming, you ended up going.

[drosestruts]

That Coby dunk will be replayed for a long time. What a great effort to get a come from behind win.

Bulls are 2-games under .500, next 7 games are:

@ Pacers
vs Wizards
vs Kings
vs Pelicans
vs Hawks
vs Hornets
@ Blazers

Kings are on a 5-game win streak and have been playing well. Pacers game will also be tough, but winnable.

We're already on a 2-game win streak. Let's see how far we can push it. These 7 games are all winnable.

If Coby's really breaking out of his slump that will be huge. So would getting Ayo and Craig back.

[Red8911]

That Coby dunk will be replayed for a long time. What a great effort to get a come from behind win.

Bulls are 2-games under .500, next 7 games are:

@ Pacers
vs Wizards
vs Kings
vs Pelicans
vs Hawks
vs Hornets
@ Blazers

Kings are on a 5-game win streak and have been playing well. Pacers game will also be tough, but winnable.

We're already on a 2-game win streak. Let's see how far we can push it. These 7 games are all winnable.

If Coby's really breaking out of his slump that will be huge. So would getting Ayo and Craig back.

There’s no such thing as winnable games for the Bulls, they are capable of losing to any team.

I hope it’s different this time and they go on a winning streak but I wouldn’t bet on it. Every time they give us hope they go and fk it up.

[drosestruts]

That Coby dunk will be replayed for a long time. What a great effort to get a come from behind win.

Bulls are 2-games under .500, next 7 games are:

@ Pacers
vs Wizards
vs Kings
vs Pelicans
vs Hawks
vs Hornets
@ Blazers

Kings are on a 5-game win streak and have been playing well. Pacers game will also be tough, but winnable.

We're already on a 2-game win streak. Let's see how far we can push it. These 7 games are all winnable.

If Coby's really breaking out of his slump that will be huge. So would getting Ayo and Craig back.

There’s no such thing as winnable games for the Bulls, they are capable of losing to any team.

I hope it’s different this time and they go on a winning streak but I wouldn’t bet on it. Every time they give us hope they go and fk it up.

That's fair. We are the team that lost to the Pelicans, Wizards, and Jazz already this season.

[kodo]

Read on Twitter

I love Noh.
But Lonzo didn't change much on CP3 because CP3's primary goal was to get Vuc on him on defense, not Lonzo/Giddey/Lavine/Coby. He just made 3 tough shots with Vuc closing, then he missed some shots with Vuc closing. Lonzo was still screened off just like the other defenders.

This is basically blaming Vuc for when CP3 hit on him and then not crediting Vuc when CP3 missed on him.

TBH I think what changed the game was the Spurs putting Sochan in and Wemby out. This allowed Chicago to blitz the P&R, left Sochan wide open in the corner 3 which he bricked badly. On the other blitz possession Bulls had both corners defended while blitzing the pick because we ignored Sochan. And subbing Wemby OUT with only 5 min left in the game and only a 4 point difference was puzzling.

On the Spurs reddit they're all blaming the loss on the coach.

[OldSchoolNoBull]

Every time we play the Spurs I am reminded of the single worst decision AKME has made during their tenure here.

It wasn't the Vuc trade. It wasn't giving Zach his contract. It wasn't taking Pat at #4 in 2020.

No, it was signing Pat Beverley and making a push for the playoffs in 2023 in the year Wemby was coming out. At some point in February or March we had something like the sixth worst record in the league, and weren't too far behind the fifth and fourth(the bottom three were out of reach).

All we had to do was nothing - maybe milk a few injuries, pull the starters a little earlier than usual - to have a non-zero shot(like a 20-35% chance) at Wemby and instead we made a stupid push for the playoffs that didn't even work - we lost in the play-in.

Even if we hadn't won the lottery, we still had a great shot at our pick being Top 8(which would've put it in the protected range and stopped it from going to Orlando that year).

And that's not a hindsight opinion. I hated the decision at the time.

Anyway, good win for the Bulls, and Wemby is incredible.

[kodo]

There’s no such thing as winnable games for the Bulls, they are capable of losing to any team.

I hope it’s different this time and they go on a winning streak but I wouldn’t bet on it. Every time they give us hope they go and fk it up.

Agreed, Bulls are probably the most unpredictable team in the league.

We have more wins against winning teams than all EC teams other than Boston or CLE. More than NY, Orlando, Milwaukee, Indy.
More than all WC teams other than OKC & HOU. More than Denver or Memphis.

But we'll go ahead and lose to Washington, the Jazz, Nets, Pels, Memphis' B-squad.

And we're terrible at home, but have a strong away record that's better than 4th/5th/6th seeds. So we have the opposite of a HCA.
Never know what you'll get with a Bulls game, so it's been an entertaining season.

[RSP83]

That Coby dunk will be replayed for a long time. What a great effort to get a come from behind win.

Bulls are 2-games under .500, next 7 games are:

@ Pacers
vs Wizards
vs Kings
vs Pelicans
vs Hawks
vs Hornets
@ Blazers

Kings are on a 5-game win streak and have been playing well. Pacers game will also be tough, but winnable.

We're already on a 2-game win streak. Let's see how far we can push it. These 7 games are all winnable.

If Coby's really breaking out of his slump that will be huge. So would getting Ayo and Craig back.

This Bulls team somehow always finds a way to never get pass or let alone reach 500.

[FriedRise]

That Coby dunk will be replayed for a long time. What a great effort to get a come from behind win.

Bulls are 2-games under .500, next 7 games are:

@ Pacers
vs Wizards
vs Kings
vs Pelicans
vs Hawks
vs Hornets
@ Blazers

Kings are on a 5-game win streak and have been playing well. Pacers game will also be tough, but winnable.

We're already on a 2-game win streak. Let's see how far we can push it. These 7 games are all winnable.

If Coby's really breaking out of his slump that will be huge. So would getting Ayo and Craig back.

This Bulls team somehow always finds a way to never get pass or let alone reach 500.

They're always 1 step forward, 1 step back, sometimes 2. I'd like to be proven wrong, but I'm expecting:

Pacers - L (we never beat these guys)
Wizards - W (payback)
Kings - L (DeMar finds a way)
Pelicans - L (Zion's back)
Hawks - W (both teams on a b2b, but Hawks are the road)
Hornets - L (close game, but Lamelo will spam enough 3s to take it)
Blazers - W (Portland on b2b)

So after this "easy" stretch, they'll still be 3 games behind .500