Butler calls out Hoiberg / Update pg 33: KC releases negative report on Jimmy

[Stratmaster]

I want this guy gone. I don't really like or respect him. Lots of players have played well for a year or two. Jimmy thinks his **** doesn't stink. I just don't really enjoy his role on this team. He really hasn't accomplished that much. Dude is nut hugging a 20 year older movie star. Wtf? Remember his lame ass **** with the stuffed animal? He's not cool but he's dumb enough to think he's as cool as they come.

He's at an absolute all time high trade value. Playing great and locked up for 5 years.

Joakim noah is and should be the vocal leader of this team. Even if he plays 20 mpg for the next few years.

I'm not a huge fan of hoiberg though I'm not going to go against him yet.

No doubt about it, what jimmy did is just stupid. It's low IQ stuff. Doesn't he realize that he's now put fred in a position of losing the rest of the team by following jimmys public suggestions, or lose jimmy by ignoring him?

This bs isn't going to galvanize the team. Also, the team isn't playing with poor effort. #2 defenses don't do that. Yes rose and pau do things we don't like but they're playing to win.

I'll 2nd that thought. For the first time in my life I am suddenly soured on even watching the Bulls, and Jimmy Butler is the reason why. The guy who appears to be listening to the coach the least shouldn't be the one calling him out for not making the team listen to him. One freaking big season and he has made a complete turnaround in his attitude.

I'm not usually a fan of blockbuster trades. In this case, it is time to make one that includes Butler, a big, Snell, and picks for the two best talents you can get who play the 1 through 3.

[pb-ceo]

I think you're right about his style of play. but he's iffy at this point. and they aren't going to move the starting pg this year. I think they try to draft a pg and maybe look for one in fa that fits hoiball a bit better. this might turn into a good year to bust out the tank if things continue to go south. but there are so many bunnies on the schedule nowadays that it would be hard for this group.

[bennjuiced34]

I don't see why people are twisting their panties over Jimmy's comments.

The Bulls have blown out 1 team this season; the freaking Sixers. Otherwise, they've been treading water and losing a lot of games they should've won. Fred is running a loose/friendly rotation, giving everyone except the rookie multiple chances. No one is playing heavy minutes. Yet the effort consistently is sub-par.

And people are moaning about Jimmy stirring things up and calling people out? Are you ****ing kidding me?

Does this board ever make any sense? You're pissed about the team's performance, but now you're pissed that the leader is trying to get everybody to step up their game? Absolutely absurd.

It's not like he's having verbal altercations with Fred. He's pointing things out with subtle hints of different issues.

You see no problem with his comments? Seriously?

He's pointing fingers at everybody except himself. How is that being a leader? First of all, going to the media is the easy way out. Has he bothered to go to his teammates and/or to Hoiberg to discuss any of this?

Do you think Jimmy would want Hoiberg or one of the other Bulls going to the media to complain about his atrocious defense in the last 2 games? Or his continual assistance on refusing to run any offense in favor of ISO plays for himself?

Jimmy is a fantastic player, but he needs to STFU and attempt to solve his problems privately, not by running to the media

wrong. he said "including me".

Self preservation.

Sent from my LG-H811 using Tapatalk

[coldfish]

Thibodeau's coaching declined significantly and his stubborness contributed to the team losing games. Thibodeau's rotations were awful and the team was clearly no longer motivated by him. Not to mention what occured behind the scenes, where Thibodeau somehow turned an entire organization AND ownership against him.

I give Hoiberg credit for adapting to each game, while Thibodeau's rotations are set in stone from Day 1. I expect his schemes and game preparation to be very good for someone who apparently has no life outside of basketball.

Thibodeaus rotations weren't set in stone. You are completely wrong on this. His rotations in the first 3 quarters basically were, but he rode hot hands in the 4th and he had a fantastic record in doing so. People often are player fans and would get angry because their guy wasn't getting more minutes but as we are seeing with Mirotic and Snell, Thibs was more correct than the fans in most of these cases.

https://www.teamrankings.com/nba/stat/average-4th-quarter-margin
Chicago 19th in the 4th quarter after being 2nd last year. Hoiberg has absolutely been poor in the 4th in picking who to play and making in game adjustments.

And yeah, Hoiberg personally lost that Detroit game and probably a few others. His inability to deal with what Detroit was doing in the 4th lead to the overtimes which may have lead to the NY loss.

Gasol clearly can't defend the high pick/roll, but he was also really big for us offensively and hit a number of key shots. Not much you can do there and Thibodeau dealt with the same things. Personel problem, sure. Hoiberg flaw? Absolutely not.

Should have switched who Rose was guarding and tried more Noah. See the above stats. The Bulls are a bad 4th quarter team and a lot of that is on coaching.

[TheStig]

Hoiberg is probalby wishing he went with the TWolves. Right now he would be coaching them to the playoffs with a core of Towns, WIggins, Lavine. The best young core in the league.

I agree, I would have rather gone with the Wolves but they're not making the playoffs this year.

The expectations are way too high here. This roster is the same as last year with a worse coach and a better east. It will be a 1st or second round exit before Gasol leaves and is replaced with Portis as the 4th big and a Loul Deng signing in the offseason.

[Stratmaster]

That was soo wrong of Oakley. Players shouldn't call out coaches. Charles was eventually proven to be completely incorrect.

You can't possibly be equating these scenarios.

Completely equal? Of course not. No two situations are exactly the same. That said, Oakley ended up being proven correct and its quite possible that Butler will be too in the long term. There is a potential parallel.

Kudos to Jimmy here for doing what Thibodeau should have done, Fred should be doing and what the front office should have understood!!!!

I still don't understand this POV. As someone mentioned, it's like applauding Brandon Marshall for calling out Marc Trestman after losses, though Hoiberg's coaching flaws have not translated to losses like Trestman. Regardless of the flaws of your coach, you don't throw him under the bus to the media, especially when the team played 4 OT's the other day and a drag was expected.

I'll again bring up that everyone is quick to look for Bulls players to point fingers at, but there's a reasonable angle to look at the 180 in personality change Butler has gone through since last season. I still have trouble believing players like Noah, Rose, Gibson, or Hinrich ( ) are tearing the locker room apart, when they were significant pieces on those 60 win Bulls teams that had a real brotherhood.

There are clearly two camps in this fanbase and they don't seem to have any overlap. As I said somewhere today, the Bulls metrics right now point to them missing the playoffs. That would be an awful waste. IMO, something drastic needs to change and this type of public comment tends to lead to that, which is why I applaud it.

As far as players? I think its Rose, Pau and maybe a little Mirotic. Rose really seems to be a different person than he was before the injuries and quite frankly, I'm not sure I blame him.

As far as Hoiberg? His claim to fame so far is changing the starting lineup. People need to realize just how low Thibodeau set the bar on that though. What he did in that regard was ridiculous. Outside of that? Schemes, game preparation, in game adjustments and rotations (particularly in the 4th), player motivation, etc. Hoiberg is starting to look like a really crappy coach. He is only 25 games in so he deserves some time but there are some signs that the Bulls just locked themselves into a sub par coach.

And yeah, Hoiberg personally lost that Detroit game and probably a few others. His inability to deal with what Detroit was doing in the 4th lead to the overtimes which may have lead to the NY loss.

What in the world would make you think he is referring to Pau? I think it is mostly Niko. He keeps referring to "coaching the team up". Pau Gasol doesn't need coaching up. Maybe Niko sat so much last season for more reasons than we think. Regardless, bush league, BS unprofessional, whiny behavior from our new #1 primadonna.

[CharityStripe34]

This season just got more interesting, lol.

I get that Butler is competitive and he wants guys to play hard like he does but he has to realize (like Fred does) that a game in NY in December is less important than that same game at MSG come crunch time in March or April. The team, coaches included, was exhausted after Friday's marathon game. Not surprising that the effort wasn't there the very next night. I love Jimmy but he's going to go through some growing pains about being a team leader and star. I applaud his competitiveness and honesty, but those sentiments should've been relayed directly to Hoiberg if he wanted to vent, not to the media.

[League Circles]

I want this guy gone. I don't really like or respect him. Lots of players have played well for a year or two. Jimmy thinks his **** doesn't stink. I just don't really enjoy his role on this team. He really hasn't accomplished that much. Dude is nut hugging a 20 year older movie star. Wtf? Remember his lame ass **** with the stuffed animal? He's not cool but he's dumb enough to think he's as cool as they come.

He's at an absolute all time high trade value. Playing great and locked up for 5 years.

Joakim noah is and should be the vocal leader of this team. Even if he plays 20 mpg for the next few years.

I'm not a huge fan of hoiberg though I'm not going to go against him yet.

No doubt about it, what jimmy did is just stupid. It's low IQ stuff. Doesn't he realize that he's now put fred in a position of losing the rest of the team by following jimmys public suggestions, or lose jimmy by ignoring him?

This bs isn't going to galvanize the team. Also, the team isn't playing with poor effort. #2 defenses don't do that. Yes rose and pau do things we don't like but they're playing to win.

I'll 2nd that thought. For the first time in my life I am suddenly soured on even watching the Bulls, and Jimmy Butler is the reason why. The guy who appears to be listening to the coach the least shouldn't be the one calling him out for not making the team listen to him. One freaking big season and he has made a complete turnaround in his attitude.

I'm not usually a fan of blockbuster trades. In this case, it is time to make one that includes Butler, a big, Snell, and picks for the two best talents you can get who play the 1 through 3.

Yeah I'm starting to sour also, and I didn't even sour through the post dynasty dark times.

I'd say we should trade Butler, Snell, picks and 2 bigs for a C and a wing though.

Hell even Gasol seems way more into the team than Jimmy.

We could probably get a lot for Jimmy, Niko, Snell and picks. Man that's a nice package.

[JasonFTW]

Jimmy be professional and keep those things in house. If you think a coach should get on players more go talk to your coach don't make those comments to the media. No matter what clarification is used in the days afterward you don't open up that can of worms. He has to know better than that. Some in the thread of brought up offense. Definitely Rose and Gasol need to play better but Jimmy himself needs to play different. He's turned into an efficient but ball stopping player. People ask what Hoiberg's offense is or what its supposed to be doing and you can see the execution and idea in the the 2nd unit.

Yeah, he needs to keep it private and talk to him, don't make it public. I'm sure Jimmy is regretting on what he did. Frustration would do that to you, like us Bulls fans. Hopefully Jimmy can get himself out of this situation and start focusing on getting better as a player and a teammate. Keep trying to work hard as a team.

[Red Larrivee]

Thibodeaus rotations weren't set in stone. You are completely wrong on this. His rotations in the first 3 quarters basically were, but he rode hot hands in the 4th and he had a fantastic record in doing so. People often are player fans and would get angry because their guy wasn't getting more minutes but as we are seeing with Mirotic and Snell, Thibs was more correct than the fans in most of these cases.

This is just wrong. Let's not pretend that Mirotic was playing like this last season with an 18 PER and 56% TS. Mirotic was very good last season, but ultimately misused down the stretch by Thibodeau, who was dead set on making the three-big lineup work. That lineup dug the Bulls into a lot of holes in the first half and Thibodeau brushed it off.

Hoiberg played the lineup one time, it sucked, and he stopped using it. Simple, but effective.

https://www.teamrankings.com/nba/stat/average-4th-quarter-margin
Chicago 19th in the 4th quarter after being 2nd last year. Hoiberg has absolutely been poor in the 4th in picking who to play and making in game adjustments.

Hoiberg's rotations haven't been perfect either. There have been a lot of times when I believed Gibson should have been closing instead of Mirotic. His decisions have been much better lately.

Should have switched who Rose was guarding and tried more Noah. See the above stats. The Bulls are a bad 4th quarter team and a lot of that is on coaching.

The issue is in the personel. The Bulls don't really have a two-way big. You can sub Noah in, but then that removes the Rose-Gasol pick/roll that's been consistent for us this season.

Regardless of the flaws, there remains zero reason for Jimmy to throw a coach or teammate under the bus. Why would anyone be sparked by Jimmy? Because he was an all-star last season? I don't understand.

[pb-ceo]

The timing of Jimmy's comments makes it abundantly obvious what he's talking about.

Jimmy stunk it up last night since he played 56 minutes the night prior. Rose stunk it up even worse since he played 54 minutes the night prior. And Gasol didn't even make the trip to New York. So what does that mean? That means the team was relying on its younger guys, aka the "future" of this team, to compete with and beat the Knicks, who aren't a great team. So what did our young guys -- Niko, Snell, and McDermott -- do? Well they proceeded to play their varying degrees of putrid defense and inept offense, leading to a non-competitive game at MSG.

Then combine what happened in NY with what happened the night before. Against Detroit, Jimmy and Rose basically laid it all out on the floor only to lose in 4OT. And why did they lose? Because the "future" of the team shot a combined 3-16, while all playing varying degrees of bad defense (with Mirotic and Doug playing laughably bad defense).

Then combine the theory that Hoiberg was brought in to coddle the fragile mental states of our young future players after Thibs had destroyed their confidence (which almost this entire board believed), and it becomes clear to me what's going on.

gasol is in his mid 30s and is going straight to hall of fame. no one has ever questioned his effort and passion and they won't start now. he deserves time off. and he really deserves better than this bunch. he came here because he thought this team gave him a good chance at a ring. he's usually really smart but he whiffed on this one. watch the chemistry between the starting guards on this team. how much interaction do they have? how close do they look? how is the fit? the starting guards are mid to late 20s. they aren't mid to late 30s. yet many here were telling hoi to give the starting pg a night off at 27 years old.

[Dajody10]

The Bulls kept things in house last year and they had the same issues, it just wasn't out in the public. Who cares, just make a move for christ sake - enough already, it's not like we're blowing up a dynasty, which is how a lot of fans & Bulls management seem to see it.

[Stratmaster]

I never, ever, ever thought I would be wishing the media would interview Rose more and Butler less. SMH.

[MrSparkle]

Lol, to quote Kobe, this team would be "soft as charmin" without Jimmy.

He's got a championship attitude. Rest of the guys have a "I'll take my time" attitude. Good old Bulls FO; the "5-year window". Next year's always better; except in reality, it's not. But it sure sells those tickets.

A lot of things aren't working for this team, except Jimmy is playing all-NBA ball on both ends. He's frustrated with his team.

[the ultimates]

The Bulls kept things in house last year and they had the same issues, it just wasn't out in the public. Who cares, just make a move for christ sake - enough already, it's not like we're blowing up a dynasty, which is how a lot of fans & Bulls management seem to see it.

Kept things in house? So those reports by Cowley and Isola that came straight from Thibs was keeping it in house? Thibs moaning about sensible minutes management and Swanson was keeping it in house? Nobody thinks team is a dynasty but too many people on this board somehow think the team is dumpster fire which it isn't as well.

[coldfish]

Thibodeaus rotations weren't set in stone. You are completely wrong on this. His rotations in the first 3 quarters basically were, but he rode hot hands in the 4th and he had a fantastic record in doing so. People often are player fans and would get angry because their guy wasn't getting more minutes but as we are seeing with Mirotic and Snell, Thibs was more correct than the fans in most of these cases.

This is just wrong. Let's not pretend that Mirotic was playing like this last season with an 18 PER and 56% TS. Mirotic was very good last season, but ultimately misused down the stretch by Thibodeau, who was dead set on making the three-big lineup work. That lineup dug the Bulls into a lot of holes in the first half and Thibodeau brushed it off.

Hoiberg played the lineup one time, it sucked, and he stopped using it. Simple, but effective.

Obviously, I disagree. Mirotic was one hot month last year. Some people took his hot month as evidence that he was being misused. I just thought it was a statistical aberration. His other months look a lot like this year.

Should have switched who Rose was guarding and tried more Noah. See the above stats. The Bulls are a bad 4th quarter team and a lot of that is on coaching.

The issue is in the personel. The Bulls don't really have a two-way big. You can sub Noah in, but then that removes the Rose-Gasol pick/roll that's been consistent for us this season.

In general, I agree that the fundamental issue with this team is the roster, not the coaching. I just don't think that gives Hoiberg a free pass. His coaching has not been impressive.

......

Side note, my biggest concern here isn't what Butler's comments do in the locker room. IMHO, the Bulls locker room atmosphere is already trash and has been for a long time. My concern is that the front office gets angry about their guy getting called out publicly and they get rid of Butler like they have done with so many other people who didn't toe the company line.

[League Circles]

I wonder if Jimmy skipped the team vinyard outing to quick fly to LA to spend QT with old man Wahlberg, sipping wine with him instead.

[Dajody10]

The Bulls live in a world so far from reality it's scary, and it's starting to collapse:

Pau Gasol is a future HOF player, but has only truly succeeded when Kobe was there to push him daily, that is no longer with him so he is back to his Memphis days of being a very productive player, but not a winning player.

Derrick Rose is a former MVP, who is so mentally fractured it's hard to even relate to him as a player. He looks engaged maybe half the time, otherwise it looks like he would rather be anywhere but the basketball floor.

Jimmy Butler is a guy who worked his way all the way up from the bottom and it's gotten to his head and he thinks he is better than he is. Butler is a good player, but far from great - but he thinks he is great.

Joakim Noah is actually the guy who is actually the most mentally strong, and his game looks to be coming back to him. Noah is a real leader, a great team guy but has always been an offensive liability. I have nothing but the absolute utmost respect for Jo.

McDermott / Snell / Mirotic - Young guys who have been told so many times by upper management how good they, yet none of them are rotation players on a good team. Maybe McDermott, but the other two are so beyond overrated its scary.

Taj Gibson is a role player, looks like he's lost some spark after the ankle surgery - solid player, but nothing more than a role player.

Hoiberg is a good guy, and could probably be a good coach but was fooled by his best fried Gar Forman who continues, with help of Paxson, to fool people into thinking this team is talented and prime to make a run.

In short, the Bulls are a mess, starts from the top (Ownership & Management), the players are nuts, the new coach has no idea how to handle at this - just a total and utter disgrace of an organization.

[GetBuLLish]

gasol is in his mid 30s and is going straight to hall of fame. no one has ever questioned his effort and passion and they won't start now. he deserves time off. and he really deserves better than this bunch. he came here because he thought this team gave him a good chance at a ring. he's usually really smart but he whiffed on this one. watch the chemistry between the starting guards on this team. how much interaction do they have? how close do they look? how is the fit? the starting guards are mid to late 20s. they aren't mid to late 30s. yet many here were telling hoi to give the starting pg a night off at 27 years old.

Reread my post...

[League Circles]

Joakim Noah is actually the guy who is actually the most mentally strong, and his game looks to be coming back to him. Noah is a real leader, a great team guy but has always been an offensive liability. I have nothing but the absolute utmost respect for Jo.

I agree and disagree with various parts of your post, but this is key. Noah frankly is the only true leader the Bulls have had since Michael Jordan. He's still an effective player, so I'd like to see him continue to be our leader. I'm fine with Pau starting while he's here, though noah should probably close most of the time IMO.