Reality: this team is dysfunctioned from top to bottom

[Tetlak]

Rose is the problem man. For years and years, our team took on his persona. He was tough as nails. He played hard. He was always working to get better. Played through injuries. Just wanted to weeeeiiin. Even when he was out with his major injuries, he worked hard to get back, and the team took on the persona of Noah, which is much the same.

Now Rose is back, and he's soft. He doesn't play smashmouth ball anymore. He lollygags on both ends, and takes the easy way out. He cares about his post-basketball life. He gets special treatment in practice from some woman who has powers over Thibs. He is still our franchise. This is problem number one.

Leaders always rub off on their teams. Its why the Bears have been a mess even with so much talent. It's why we have been historically scrappy for the past 4 years. Making a trade won't fix this for this season. Firing Thibs won't fix this. Our only hope is Derrick quitting his **** and manning up.

Aren't you essentially arguing that it's the non-Rose players' fault for being spineless followers? They had no trouble playing hard the past two seasons when we were just treading water. Do you really think Rose was orchestrating that behind-the-scenes?

I don't give any merit that the team has lost their powers like the players in Space Jam because Rose isn't "leading" well. Leadership doesn't always equate to wins. Chris Paul is one of the best leaders in the NBA and he's never come close to an NBA championship.

There was no drop off from Rose to Noah, as I mentioned.

Also, there is a difference between losing "powers" and losing the mentality and the airs which makes you successful. Im also going to disagree with you about Chris Paul. He is mister king flopper and complainer. His team is soft just like him. We are soft just like Rose. At least CP3's teams play hard for him because he himself plays hard. Rose takes it easy, our team takes it easy.

[Red Larrivee]

There was no drop off from Rose to Noah, as I mentioned.

Also, there is a difference between losing "powers" and losing the mentality and the airs which makes you successful. Im also going to disagree with you about Chris Paul. He is mister king flopper and complainer. His team is soft just like him. We are soft just like Rose. At least CP3's teams play hard for him because he himself plays hard. Rose takes it easy, our team takes it easy.

Just for reference the Bulls, who haven't tried hard much, if at all this season are 30-20.

Last year's try-hard Bulls were 32-26 after February.

The team could certainly try harder, especially given that there's now 32 games left and they have slid out of homecourt advantage in the East, but if they need 1 player to do it, then they are soft as ****.

[kodo]

The other problem is that our starting line up has no spacing. We have two slashers and a post player that have no room to get into the paint. Too add insult to injury, since the paint is so packed, we can't even offensive rebound. Noah is absolutely worthless on offense. Kirk and Snell are virtually useless. You're playing 3 vs on 5 for most minutes. Here is last night.

Off topic, i think it's hilarious Harden is the rim protector on that possession.

But then sad that we had two 7 footers out there and we pull up for a long 2.

sigh.

[Rerisen]

I think the problem starts with offense, and trickles down to the team's defensive intensity.

Yea, people said the offense was fine for so long, but it has major problems.

You've got your 2 leaders and one main sub under .500 TS%

Rose: 49.7
Noah: 47.3
Hinrich: 46.9

Then you've got all your bench wing options under .500 TS%

Snell: 49.6
Moore: 48.9
Doug: 48.8

Half the rotation can't put the ball in the hole. And Noah and Kirk aren't even close to passable, just putrid. It's amazing our offense is ranked where it is, but its only because offensive rebounding bolsters it up.

[dice]

Off topic, i think it's hilarious Harden is the rim protector on that possession.

by design i'm sure

[GimmeDat]

I'm not trying to say Dunleavy is the answer to all our problems, but it goes to show the importance of his role as a shooter on our roster.

If we make a trade to aid the roster balance, they need to either be a great shooter, or we need to make sure we keep Dunleavy.

[tomacorandom]

Pau ruined this team. Which means the front office ruined this team. Should have brought in Mirotic and then a vet like Speights or someone for a lot cheaper. Bringing in Pau took Tajs starting spot away which could have affected him. Pauthen comes in and says he wants to finish games, being a me first guy. Absolutely horrible at D. Boozer is a better defender than him.

Butler not going as hard on D, but I am ok with that because his offense is a huge step up. Rose being out 2 years. He isnt going hard on D at all and it gets annoying.

But everything goes back to Pau and the FO made a huge mistake signing him to 3 years.

Yes, signing an allstar starter for 7M$ is a huge mistake.
His defense is way better than boozer's. I would point out overall defense and Noah specially. We were raped by Houston while he was out btw

[Manili84]

Blaming Pau is BS. Bulls haven't won since MJ, so I don't think this situation is on Pau.

Almost a 20-10 All Star guy with High IQ and passing skills for 7M$. Noah and DRose are the problem. Both combine for half of our payroll. Noah is a shadow of what he was last year and DRose is shooting 3s like if he is Steph Curry.

[vvgotgame19]

There are so many issues with this team right now, it's pointless to point fingers. It's the accumulation of everything at this point (the disconnect between GarPax & Thibs, the health, integrating new pieces, the rust, Pau's low energy/lack of communication, Rose's play in general, Thib's stubbornness, the leadership, Jen Swanson, THE LIST GOES ON AND ON AND ON AND ON). It's the general momentum of everything that one bad thing leads to another, which in turn leads to another and so on. The evidence is right in front of our faces if we'll all take a step back, stop pointing fingers and look at everything as a whole. We started the season ok and as the problems go up, our play goes down. It's really as simple as that. No team is perfect and you can hide small problems here and there, but once they start piling up you can't hide them all and you get exposed. That's exactly what we 're seeing now.

How do we go about fixing all that? In a perfect world, everyone involved (GarPax, Jen Swanson, Thibs, all the players) would get together hash out their problems with everyone manning up to their part, no one pointing fingers and collectively get on the same page. Sadly we all know that's not happening. It's so sad and disappointing too because theoretically this should be our best year since 98. We absolutely need some type of change to swing that momentum back in our favor. Once that happens I think one by one a lot of these issues will start resolving themselves. It has to be the right move tho. A move everyone can get behind. If it were up to me, Gasol would be on his way out because I don't think anybody would be sad to see him go. Not happening tho. Taj is the obvious candadite to go, unfortunately. Depending on what we get in return, I'm skeptical about moving him tho. He's buddies with our core guys and he's been here a while. I'm afraid moving him could increase the disconnect. The other choice: get rid of Thibs. I hate even writing that. He doesn't deserve to go and he's a top notch coach IMO. With that said, it's hard to imagine anyone being too upset if he left. Shouldn't be like that at all, but it is what it is. It's really turned into a s***** s***** situation.

I know I said not to point fingers, and I'm not exactly going to, but I think it kind of started with GarPax. They pretty much started the disconnect by not backing Thibs 100% despite his amazing track record. They should really be the ones to go, but FFS we know that ain't happening. FWIW idk why I guess it's just a hunch, but I feel like it's more Gar than Pax. I don't like that guy and would love to see him go.