Cowley: Bulls have poor reputation among NBA coaches

[Bulls69]

Not surprising. Coaches are scapegoats for front office mistakes in assembling talent and teams, not to mention a massive entitlement culture among NBA players that makes it generally very hard for coaches from other professional sports leagues (dealing with somewhat less rich grown men), much less college, to deal with.

And this is especially true of the Bulls.

You nail it

[The Evidence]

Kingpin leaked this to Cowley

[Michael Jackson]

Jackson - Plucked out of the Puerto Rico league, they fired Collins for losing to the NBA champion Pistons which Jackson did the next year with a more experienced team.

Your post was excelent but let's just add information here... Collins on his second season with the Bulls did worse in the regular season than what he did the year before.

And the justification for the change was the style of play of the team and I think that is something important... oh, and that thing with Krause that was championship caliber or bust (in this case worked fine but not on the Elton Brand to Chandler trade).


From your post it is funny that we had some coaches that actually were good calls with some background work... Some failed (Tim Floyd, but I guess that he was doomed to fail after the dynasty) and some succedded (Thibs). But the majority were shots in the dark although the situation of the team was ideal for that.

About the reputation... I see lots of things on the Bulls being bad due to reputation. Well... Krause isn't here, Paxson isn't here... we keep on pushing with the reputation narrative but let's face it... the teams we have aren't that appealing (except when we went for Thibs) and some choices were just bad at the start... nothing to do with reputation about the coaches.

New regime, but they have treated coaches poorly. Since Jerry runs a business as hands off as I have seen, both Bulls and Sox, you know he hasn’t changed and we know he never interfered with his GM and a coach, so until we see how AK is, to see how he is. The whole idea is a big makeover of this organization, but we can only go off what they were and speculate that their is change. That being said coaching for NYK is way worse with Dolan breathing down your neck.

[nitetrain8603]

IMO, the Bulls have done a bad job of hiring coaches, and a reasonable job of severing ties with them. I guess that grades out to something like a C- grade on coaching.

See - I think it's the exact opposite. I think they've mostly done a reasonable job hiring (I feel they failed with Hoiberg and Floyd), but they've been bad at maintaining and hiring coaches. C-/D+ is where I would grade them at.

[MrFortune3]

IMO, the Bulls have done a bad job of hiring coaches, and a reasonable job of severing ties with them. I guess that grades out to something like a C- grade on coaching.

See - I think it's the exact opposite. I think they've mostly done a reasonable job hiring (I feel they failed with Hoiberg and Floyd), but they've been bad at maintaining and hiring coaches. C-/D+ is where I would grade them at.

I don't even think Hoiberg was a bad hire. They gave him the opposite type of team needed to run his preferred offense.
He did himself no favors in managing the team the way he did but you don't hire a coach who needs shooters and ball movement only to give him play makers and non shooters.

[Payt10]

I'd think with a new regime change, their reputation can't do anything but go up from where it was before. Krause and GarPax all earned their criticism after their lengthy tenures. Arturas hasn't done anything yet to ruin his reputation, so I'm not sure why he would be affected by this.

[chitownsalesmen]

Tim Floyd and Fred Hoiberg may actually have been their most deserving head coaches resume wise.

- Was an assistant for 29 years

really?

[dougthonus]

Tim Floyd and Fred Hoiberg may actually have been their most deserving head coaches resume wise.

- Was an assistant for 29 years

really?

Not sure what your really is asking, but I believe both those statements to be true, which is why coaches are actually really hard to figure out.

[chitownsalesmen]

Tim Floyd and Fred Hoiberg may actually have been their most deserving head coaches resume wise.

- Was an assistant for 29 years

really?

Not sure what your really is asking, but I believe both those statements to be true, which is why coaches are actually really hard to figure out.

Thibs was a far greater known commodity in the NBA then Floyd/Hoiberg as far as his x's and o's. Thibs was the architect of the Celtics defense and had a lot of respect around the league. Now obviously the game has changed tremendously in the 10 years since Thibs got hired and IDK if his X and O strategies have kept up, and he had two blow outs in Chicago(which wasn't entirely all his fault IMO) and Minny, but at that time Thibs was a sought after coach and I feel like a lot of people outside of Chicago felt the Bulls made a good hire.

[dougthonus]

Thibs was a far greater known commodity in the NBA then Floyd/Hoiberg as far as his x's and o's. Thibs was the architect of the Celtics defense and had a lot of respect around the league. Now obviously the game has changed tremendously in the 10 years since Thibs got hired and IDK if his X and O strategies have kept up, and he had two blow outs in Chicago(which wasn't entirely all his fault IMO) and Minny, but at that time Thibs was a sought after coach and I feel like a lot of people outside of Chicago felt the Bulls made a good hire.

He was an assistant for 29 years and signed a cheap deal in his first tenure with the Bulls in terms of both money and years. I don't think he was that sought after or neither of those things would be true. Fair enough of course that all three guys had very different sets of experience, so weren't directly comparable though.

[Dominator83]

https://nba.nbcsports.com/2020/06/11/rumor-bulls-have-poor-reputation-among-coaches/

I thought this was worthy of its own topic, since we have so few topics on the board.

I was looking back at the Bulls coaches, and the Bulls MO around coaches is this:

Hire someone whom is very questionable to deserve an opportunity for the job at all that for relatively cheap and not be afraid to get rid of them. It would seem like, overall, the Bulls don't think coaches make that big a difference and treat their hires that way. Ironically, of the Bulls coaching hires, Tim Floyd and Fred Hoiberg may actually have been their most deserving head coaches resume wise.

Jackson - Plucked out of the Puerto Rico league, they fired Collins for losing to the NBA champion Pistons which Jackson did the next year with a more experienced team.

Floyd - Was a legitimate hot shot college coach whom had success everywhere he went.

Cartwright - Only an Interim, so not sure how much I'd count him, but was given his only opportunity to do this.

Skiles - Pulled off the scrap heap after an epic flame out in Phoenix

Boylan - Only an interim so doesn't really count, but clearly not a deserving guy

VDN - Taken with just a little broadcasting experience and no coaching experience

Thibodeau - Was an assistant for 29 years before getting a shot, don't think many assistants wait that long and ever get a shot, if it doesn't happen early then it usually means you have something in your rep IMO.

Hoiberg - Not really a spectacular college resume in length or quality, had NBA work prior to that which also wasn't that high in quality with the Wolves

Boylen - Was an interim but given the full time job, long time assistant, maybe reasonably deserving of a chance

Negative things:
Jackson - Underpaid for years, in massive public feud with management.
Floyd - Fired on Christmas Eve
Cartwright - Nothing real negative IMO
Skiles - Fired on Christmas Eve, though he also reportedly walked in and said he couldn't do it anymore, so I don't think this one is real negative either.
Boylan - Only an interim so nothing real negative
VDN - Literally choked him
Thibodeau - Owner went on a rant against him after letting him go
Hoiberg - Nothing particularly negative comes to mind
Boylen - Seem like we're treating him with respect so far

If you look at how reasonable they ultimately were with everyone, I'd say:
Jackson - Unreasonable and stupid, should have paid him, no reason this relationship should have been bad.
Floyd - Reasonable, he got way longer of a leash than warranted
Cartwright - Reasonable, they probably shouldn't have kept him on at the start of that next season though
Skiles - Reasonable, he walked out on the team mostly and was burntout
Boylan - Reasonable, only an interim
VDN - Unreasonable, shouldn't have to be said, but you don't choke a guy, though reasonable to let him go otherwise
Thibodeau - Unreasonable, he was great in Chicago and even if it was time for a new voice, no reason to publicly run over him on the way out.
Hoiberg - Reasonable, he underperformed for a long time, nothing really acrimonious or unfair happened
Boylen - Reasonable, was questionable to give him full time gig to begin with, and being fair so far on the way out.

Great post but needs a correction: Bill Cartwright was the full time HC. He was a interim for a few games in 01-02, then Krause signed him and removed the interim tag. He coached the entire 02-03 season, and was fired early in 03-04 due to bad start after high expectations coming in ( history in the making campaign! Everything can change in the blink of an eye!! Remember those ads? Lol)

Jimbo part 1 was the only interim who never got the tag removed