Coby to miss, at least, the first 6 games.

[Chi town]

Billy giving lots of details about Coby. Actually positive.

https://youtu.be/0Ei1BYDlD3M?si=HLN_vg8ClYk_YEMb

Also seems like Billy knows they won’t be getting off to a good start.

[Red8911]

Well that sucks. It’s going to take Coby a lil while not only to return but to get to the level he was at last season. Before this setback he also missed some time not playing in the offseason. Hopefully he returns sooner rather than later.

Bulls did fine without him in preseason but they are obviously going to need him and all their guns at full strength for most of the season in order to win games.

2 injuries off the bat isn’t good news but not the end of the world since both are for a short amount of time. Tre and Ayo will get more time for now and maybe we even see Carter get minutes after his solid pre season performances.

[sco]

Billy giving lots of details about Coby. Actually positive.

https://youtu.be/0Ei1BYDlD3M?si=HLN_vg8ClYk_YEMb

Also seems like Billy knows they won’t be getting off to a good start.

Great find. Thanks!

I feel vindicated in saying that he reaggravated it. I'll be optimistic that this isn't a repeat with Zo's knee and his inability to ramp up, but it feels like that. We've all seen how calf injuries can result in Achilles problems. Glad to see they are being smart about it.

IIRC, Coby noted that he was trying to lose some fat over the summer by eating better, but he looked thicker to me at media day. I'll give him credit for adding muscle, but I wonder if the added weight contributed to this occurring.

[Indomitable]

The Bulls always lie about injuries. I'm almost expecting the 2 week update to be that he's out for 3-4 months.

My money is on failing to accurately diagnose/predict than on lying, but in any event, yes, they have a track record for under-reporting the severity of player injuries.

As to this specific injury, given how sometimes "calf strain" means "Achilles issue" and seeing what happens when guys try to play through that, I wonder to what extent Coby might just be wanting to be super cautious in a contract year. If he goes out and snaps an Achilles, the impact on him financially would be massive.

They always down play injuries.

[Indomitable]

So, lineup to start the season should be?

Giddey/Jones
Ayo/Okoro
Huerter/various
Matas/PWill
Vuc/JSmith

Depth helps A LOT-we have a solid 9 man rotation, plus White/Collins to work back in-and Noa/Terry/Carter/Phillips for depth and development

It will be interesting to see who gets the nod. I could see Jones beating out Ayo. Jones has been phenomenal during the PS. But regardless, Ayo/Okoro/Huerter will likely split the Coby mins.

What games are you watching? I like Tre but no

[Stratmaster]

Its not the worst news fans could get but between this and the Collins news its hard to avoid feeling like a little bit of a wet blanket has been thrown on my enthusiasm for the season start.

Coby is supposed to miss 6 games. Collins is supposed to miss a month but it was announced almost two weeks before opening night. Unless things go sideways, neither is going to miss much time at all.

Collins will miss at least 20% of the games this season before he plays his first game. If Coby is back after 6 I would be pleasantly surprised but I doubt it.

[jnrjr79]

Its not the worst news fans could get but between this and the Collins news its hard to avoid feeling like a little bit of a wet blanket has been thrown on my enthusiasm for the season start.

Coby is supposed to miss 6 games. Collins is supposed to miss a month but it was announced almost two weeks before opening night. Unless things go sideways, neither is going to miss much time at all.

Collins will miss at least 20% of the games this season before he plays his first game. If Coby is back after 6 I would be pleasantly surprised but I doubt it.

It almost makes you wonder whether AK wouldn't particularly mind a lottery pick this year before next year's big potential cap space/potential significant roster shake-up.

[Evil_Headband]

Coby is supposed to miss 6 games. Collins is supposed to miss a month but it was announced almost two weeks before opening night. Unless things go sideways, neither is going to miss much time at all.

Collins will miss at least 20% of the games this season before he plays his first game. If Coby is back after 6 I would be pleasantly surprised but I doubt it.

It almost makes you wonder whether AK wouldn't particularly mind a lottery pick this year before next year's big potential cap space/potential significant roster shake-up.

I think he'd prefer to make the playoffs.

[jnrjr79]

Collins will miss at least 20% of the games this season before he plays his first game. If Coby is back after 6 I would be pleasantly surprised but I doubt it.

It almost makes you wonder whether AK wouldn't particularly mind a lottery pick this year before next year's big potential cap space/potential significant roster shake-up.

I think he'd prefer to make the playoffs.

Ahem, play-in.

All history with this front office would support your view on this. But it will be interesting to monitor over the season whether we see other instances that look like "let's be really cautious with that injury and not rush you back."

[Evil_Headband]

It almost makes you wonder whether AK wouldn't particularly mind a lottery pick this year before next year's big potential cap space/potential significant roster shake-up.

I think he'd prefer to make the playoffs.

Ahem, play-in.

All history with this front office would support your view on this. But it will be interesting to monitor over the season whether we see other instances that look like "let's be really cautious with that injury and not rush you back."

Oh, yeah, I agree with that if the season starts poorly. Likely not as much as a truly tanking team would do though.

[boozapalooza]

Everyone saying the Bulls will go 2-9 at best without Coby the first 2-3 weeks. Hogwash. This is October/November NBA. Half these teams arent trying or in game shape. There should be a high level of volatility in outcomes. We are hardos and will be going max effort every night, with little defense and lots of offense.

Who knows. I think we’ll be fine with Giddey, Ayo, Tre, Huerter in the backcourt. Not going to win a lot but should go 4-8 at worst imo.

[Bulliever2020]

I think it's going to be real ugly the first few weeks. I just don't think we have enough scoring and can't stop anyone. Lot of injuries. And the schedule is not easy at all. I don't have a record prediction but I'm pretty sure we are going to be stacking Ls early on.

4 out of the first 5, and 5 out of the first 7 games to start at home will hopefully help a bit.

[sco]

I think it's going to be real ugly the first few weeks. I just don't think we have enough scoring and can't stop anyone. Lot of injuries. And the schedule is not easy at all. I don't have a record prediction but I'm pretty sure we are going to be stacking Ls early on.

4 out of the first 5, and 5 out of the first 7 games to start at home will hopefully help a bit.

We talk about how Coby isn't a true #1 option, but without him we are very stoppable on offense.

IMO, this will be a great opportunity for Ayo to show he's a legit player. I'm rooting for him. Also, I often forget we have Huerter, who is another guy who could be a guy to pick up the slack.

[Stratmaster]

Coby is supposed to miss 6 games. Collins is supposed to miss a month but it was announced almost two weeks before opening night. Unless things go sideways, neither is going to miss much time at all.

Collins will miss at least 20% of the games this season before he plays his first game. If Coby is back after 6 I would be pleasantly surprised but I doubt it.

It almost makes you wonder whether AK wouldn't particularly mind a lottery pick this year before next year's big potential cap space/potential significant roster shake-up.

And/or whether he will get one whether he minds it or not.

[jnrjr79]

Collins will miss at least 20% of the games this season before he plays his first game. If Coby is back after 6 I would be pleasantly surprised but I doubt it.

It almost makes you wonder whether AK wouldn't particularly mind a lottery pick this year before next year's big potential cap space/potential significant roster shake-up.

And/or whether he will get one whether he minds it or not.

Ha, agreed - that's a distinct possibility!

[Ice Man]

Everyone saying the Bulls will go 2-9 at best without Coby the first 2-3 weeks. Hogwash.

Agree, although not for the reason that you write. My reason is simpler -- no single player is *that* important. A team doesn't fall very far from its normal status because it loses only one player, even if that guy is great. OKC was 5-1 without SGA last year, for example.

Or Steph. "The Warriors have nobody like Steph!" Well true, he's not only their best player but GS is otherwise a bad 3 point shooting team. Yet the Dubs were 7-5 without Steph last season.

Coby helps us, sure. But he's not the difference between, say, going 4-6 during a 10-game stretch and going 2-8. He might be worth 5 games per year. (That's pretty generous, in truth.)

[Stratmaster]

Everyone saying the Bulls will go 2-9 at best without Coby the first 2-3 weeks. Hogwash.

Agree, although not for the reason that you write. My reason is simpler -- no single player is *that* important. A team doesn't fall very far from its normal status because it loses only one player, even if that guy is great. OKC was 5-1 without SGA last year, for example.

Coby helps us, sure. But he's not the difference between, say, going 4-6 during a 10-game stretch and going 2-8. He might be worth 5 games per year. (That's pretty generous, in truth.)

I'm not so sure they would have done better than 3-7 with Coby, so 2-8 doesn't sound outrageous to me. But, I hope I am wrong. Should be a lot of fresh legs so maybe they will be able to outrun the superior talent and steal a couple games. Problem is....they aren't the only team who can run fast.

[dougthonus]

The Bulls always lie about injuries. I'm almost expecting the 2 week update to be that he's out for 3-4 months.

My money is on failing to accurately diagnose/predict than on lying, but in any event, yes, they have a track record for under-reporting the severity of player injuries.

As to this specific injury, given how sometimes "calf strain" means "Achilles issue" and seeing what happens when guys try to play through that, I wonder to what extent Coby might just be wanting to be super cautious in a contract year. If he goes out and snaps an Achilles, the impact on him financially would be massive.

They always down play injuries.

I think some concerns are:
- No one talked about the injury until media day, could have easily updated people earlier
- On media day no one said when the injury occurred, it's believed to be early August, no reason to not be transparent about that timeline
- Given the timeline, it was obvious the season opener was at risk given the injury was 6+ weeks old and he still wasn't at full speed, no reason to say we expect him to be ready for the opener based on where he was at combined with the variance on this type of injury

What the Bulls could have done is give a statement like this on media day: "Coby White is dealing with a calf injury he suffered on <insert date>. This is a soft tissue injury with an undefined timeline. We hope to be have him back by opening day, but the timeline for this type of injury is unknown. We will have to see how he progresses and will give updates as he ramps up.".

Then throughout preseason, you could note that Coby has still not been able to practice at full speed. The fact that he didn't even try to go full speed until Saturday when he reaggravated this should have already been a red flag that there is a good chance he won't be ready, and it would have been easy to message that he hasn't been at full speed yet and there is still some risk here earlier based on that.

Even their current "We'll re-evaluate in two weeks" has left a lot of room open for debate and wasn't really spoken of with enough variance. Not to pick on anyone, but I read DuckIII (a really intelligent dude) take the statement to mean Coby should miss six games, when I think the reality is that Coby has been dealing with this injury for eight weeks now and can't go full speed, and we're just going to rest him for two more weeks and see what happens, but we don't really know or have any feeling about it and also (assumption on my part) is that there will be a minimum ramp up period even after the two week re-assessment. Assuming that second part is true, then the statement: "We will re-evaluate Coby in two weeks, but there will be a minimum conditioning period after the re-evaluation and he will miss at least three weeks" would almost certainly be a more accurate statement.

In the end, the lack of transparency on the real risks here, especially when the risks are highly likely, is what gets the Bulls in trouble again and again.

[Ice Man]

This is sounding a bit like the Caitlin Clark situation, where she had a soft issue injury, at first it was thought to be not much, she came back and got reinjured, the team talked about re-evaluating over a short term period, and then that re-evaluation just stretched out and out ... until eventually she cancelled her season.

Not saying that will happen with Coby -- I certainly hope not! -- but it does suggest that this could linger quite a bit longer than the two week time frame that the Bulls gave for re-evaluation.

[jnrjr79]

My money is on failing to accurately diagnose/predict than on lying, but in any event, yes, they have a track record for under-reporting the severity of player injuries.

As to this specific injury, given how sometimes "calf strain" means "Achilles issue" and seeing what happens when guys try to play through that, I wonder to what extent Coby might just be wanting to be super cautious in a contract year. If he goes out and snaps an Achilles, the impact on him financially would be massive.

They always down play injuries.

I think some concerns are:
- No one talked about the injury until media day, could have easily updated people earlier
- On media day no one said when the injury occurred, it's believed to be early August, no reason to not be transparent about that timeline
- Given the timeline, it was obvious the season opener was at risk given the injury was 6+ weeks old and he still wasn't at full speed, no reason to say we expect him to be ready for the opener based on where he was at combined with the variance on this type of injury

What the Bulls could have done is give a statement like this on media day: "Coby White is dealing with a calf injury he suffered on <insert date>. This is a soft tissue injury with an undefined timeline. We hope to be have him back by opening day, but the timeline for this type of injury is unknown. We will have to see how he progresses and will give updates as he ramps up.".

Then throughout preseason, you could note that Coby has still not been able to practice at full speed. The fact that he didn't even try to go full speed until Saturday when he reaggravated this should have already been a red flag that there is a good chance he won't be ready, and it would have been easy to message that he hasn't been at full speed yet and there is still some risk here earlier based on that.

Even their current "We'll re-evaluate in two weeks" has left a lot of room open for debate and wasn't really spoken of with enough variance. Not to pick on anyone, but I read DuckIII (a really intelligent dude) take the statement to mean Coby should miss six games, when I think the reality is that Coby has been dealing with this injury for eight weeks now and can't go full speed, and we're just going to rest him for two more weeks and see what happens, but we don't really know or have any feeling about it and also (assumption on my part) is that there will be a minimum ramp up period even after the two week re-assessment. Assuming that second part is true, then the statement: "We will re-evaluate Coby in two weeks, but there will be a minimum conditioning period after the re-evaluation and he will miss at least three weeks" would almost certainly be a more accurate statement.

In the end, the lack of transparency on the real risks here, especially when the risks are highly likely, is what gets the Bulls in trouble again and again.

Re: the "reevaluated" point, isn't that pretty much universally used now by teams to mean "this player will be back no sooner than," but not predicting that the player will likely be good-to-go upon that reevaluation? It's sort of a best-case scenario rather than a projection/prediction, IMO.

On the timing/transparency issue, I'm not really sure what to say. I think the Bulls legitimately thought that Coby was more likely than not to be ready for the opener. Then, he aggravates the injury in practice and that becomes impossible. I don't really take particular issue with how the Bulls handled things, though obviously their track record in this department means people will be understandably annoyed when this stuff happens.