Highlights from Chicago Bulls bubble

[Chicagoat]

According to a rumour I allowed to be told to me, Lauri is genuinely hyped about Billy Donovan.

In other news, I didn't have a chance to see Lauri this summer (I didn't even know he had visited Finland this summer, but then again, why should I have known that?), but he is said to be slimmer and faster, having focused on his lower body strength (instead of pumping iron, as he was told by Boylen the previous two summers), as per the discussions he has had with AKME in April/May. According to this same source, Lauri seems to really look up to AK as a basketball guru, while also regarding the words of ME as sage advice.

Yet in other rumours I couldn't help hearing, Lauri and WCJ seem to have come to terms with each other. Lauri doesn't anymore think WCJ is digging the ground under him, though it is pretty obvious they'll never be buddy-buddies after how WCJ behaved.

This is the first I'm hearing of any rift between them. What did WCJ do?

WCJ has said publicly that he wants to play the 4 next year and that he isn't a natural 5. People took it as a shot towards Lauri.

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[sco]

According to a rumour I allowed to be told to me, Lauri is genuinely hyped about Billy Donovan.

In other news, I didn't have a chance to see Lauri this summer (I didn't even know he had visited Finland this summer, but then again, why should I have known that?), but he is said to be slimmer and faster, having focused on his lower body strength (instead of pumping iron, as he was told by Boylen the previous two summers), as per the discussions he has had with AKME in April/May. According to this same source, Lauri seems to really look up to AK as a basketball guru, while also regarding the words of ME as sage advice.

Yet in other rumours I couldn't help hearing, Lauri and WCJ seem to have come to terms with each other. Lauri doesn't anymore think WCJ is digging the ground under him, though it is pretty obvious they'll never be buddy-buddies after how WCJ behaved.

Swuul. I just wanted to say thanks for passing along what you hear. It means a lot to me (and many others on this board)!

I couldn't be more excited about Lauri focusing on being slimmer and faster - just what he needed to do!

[FriedRise]

According to a rumour I allowed to be told to me, Lauri is genuinely hyped about Billy Donovan.

In other news, I didn't have a chance to see Lauri this summer (I didn't even know he had visited Finland this summer, but then again, why should I have known that?), but he is said to be slimmer and faster, having focused on his lower body strength (instead of pumping iron, as he was told by Boylen the previous two summers), as per the discussions he has had with AKME in April/May. According to this same source, Lauri seems to really look up to AK as a basketball guru, while also regarding the words of ME as sage advice.

Yet in other rumours I couldn't help hearing, Lauri and WCJ seem to have come to terms with each other. Lauri doesn't anymore think WCJ is digging the ground under him, though it is pretty obvious they'll never be buddy-buddies after how WCJ behaved.

This is the first I'm hearing of any rift between them. What did WCJ do?

WCJ has said publicly that he wants to play the 4 next year and that he isn't a natural 5. People took it as a shot towards Lauri.

Sent from my SM-A715F using RealGM mobile app

If he's been watching the playoffs like the rest of us, I hope he sees a lot of himself in Adebayo, who clearly plays the 5 full time in Miami. They're both pretty similar in talent, and if WCJ can slim down to 250-260 lbs range, they'll look pretty similar physically. Bam is obviously more athletic, but under the right coach I think WCJ can match him defensively and he DOES actually have a jumper.

My take is Boylen just didn't know how to use his bigs outside of being a floor-spacing PF (the roles he assigned to both Lauri and Thad) or a garbage man screen-setting C (WCJ, Gafford, and Felicio playing the exact same role). Donovan should immediately correct that if he's to cater to the strengths of his personnel.

[ZOMG]

According to a rumour I allowed to be told to me, Lauri is genuinely hyped about Billy Donovan.

In other news, I didn't have a chance to see Lauri this summer (I didn't even know he had visited Finland this summer, but then again, why should I have known that?), but he is said to be slimmer and faster, having focused on his lower body strength (instead of pumping iron, as he was told by Boylen the previous two summers),

I actually wanted to point out that this is the first offseason where it didnt look like Lauri was trying to be Ivan Drago's stunt double. He does look alot trimmer this time around and I think that is what he needs.

While I've always agreed that Lauri should stay light, focusing on his body above everything else is very foolish. He should've started devoting his offseasons to skills work years ago instead of fine-tuning his BMI. Being 10 pounds lighter doesn't suddenly grant him the half court ballhandling ability he so desperately needs, nor does it give him the ability to shoot threes on the move.

[kodo]

My take is Boylen just didn't know how to use his bigs outside of being a floor-spacing PF (the roles he assigned to both Lauri and Thad) or a garbage man screen-setting C (WCJ, Gafford, and Felicio playing the exact same role). Donovan should immediately correct that if he's to cater to the strengths of his personnel.

For sure. The 4 is our system spaces the floor, if a defender is on him his job is to keep passing the ball and stay at the 3 point line.
OKC did a much better job of utilizing their 4.

Spoiler:

Gallo was 31 and his OKC season was his 2nd highest career scoring per minute season. I do think Lauri can look forward to a new coaching system.

[PaKii94]

My take is Boylen just didn't know how to use his bigs outside of being a floor-spacing PF (the roles he assigned to both Lauri and Thad) or a garbage man screen-setting C (WCJ, Gafford, and Felicio playing the exact same role). Donovan should immediately correct that if he's to cater to the strengths of his personnel.

For sure. The 4 is our system spaces the floor, if a defender is on him his job is to keep passing the ball and stay at the 3 point line.
OKC did a much better job of utilizing their 4.

Spoiler:

Gallo was 31 and his OKC season was his 2nd highest career scoring per minute season. I do think Lauri can look forward to a new coaching system.

That also shows better utilization of the 5 too. I'm excited to see Lauri and wcj being unleashed

[FriedRise]

My take is Boylen just didn't know how to use his bigs outside of being a floor-spacing PF (the roles he assigned to both Lauri and Thad) or a garbage man screen-setting C (WCJ, Gafford, and Felicio playing the exact same role). Donovan should immediately correct that if he's to cater to the strengths of his personnel.

For sure. The 4 is our system spaces the floor, if a defender is on him his job is to keep passing the ball and stay at the 3 point line.
OKC did a much better job of utilizing their 4.

Spoiler:

Gallo was 31 and his OKC season was his 2nd highest career scoring per minute season. I do think Lauri can look forward to a new coaching system.

That also shows better utilization of the 5 too. I'm excited to see Lauri and wcj being unleashed

100% agreed. Stephen Noh wrote in detail how Wendell's utilization can be better under Donovan.

Read on Twitter

[TeamMan]

This is the first I'm hearing of any rift between them. What did WCJ do?

This actually occured after the 1st game of the season. I noticed it right away.

i.e. They avoided making eye contact with each other. If one of them was shooting a FT then the other would not slap hands with him. If one of them made a good play the other would run the other way (no high fives etc.).

I wrote about it in several threads but no one would aknowledge it.

WCJ has said publicly that he wants to play the 4 next year and that he isn't a natural 5. People took it as a shot towards Lauri.

Sent from my SM-A715F using RealGM mobile app

There may be some element of this left over from when WCJ was forced to play center at Duke when he wanted to play PF. He went along with the program, but his mother came out and crtized the Duke recruiting process. So WCJ feels that he can be a better PF in the NBA than Lauri.

During the season I created a vote thread on this topic and something like 50% of the votes said that it should be tried. But the people that voted "No" were adamant that WCJ could never play PF in the NBA

Another development is that Gafford is going to probably be getting more time at center, so that would eat into WCJ minutes if he can't at least move over to PF when Gafford is in the game.

In one thread I suggested that our new FO trade one of them during the Draft if they can make a deal.

If he's been watching the playoffs like the rest of us, I hope he sees a lot of himself in Adebayo, who clearly plays the 5 full time in Miami. They're both pretty similar in talent, and if WCJ can slim down to 250-260 lbs range, they'll look pretty similar physically. Bam is obviously more athletic, but under the right coach I think WCJ can match him defensively and he DOES actually have a jumper.

My take is Boylen just didn't know how to use his bigs outside of being a floor-spacing PF (the roles he assigned to both Lauri and Thad) or a garbage man screen-setting C (WCJ, Gafford, and Felicio playing the exact same role). Donovan should immediately correct that if he's to cater to the strengths of his personnel.

When the NBA officially verified measured were released, WCJ was listed at 6-9, 255 lb. (before he'd always been listed at 6-10)

Losing weight would actually bring him down to 245-250 lb. most likely.

[ZOMG]

I dunno. This "there's a genius playmaker living inside Wendell Carter" thing is just so baffling. The ONLY evidence people have for any of it is the fact that the occasionally threw some passes in college.

But this is not college. The NBA game moves at a different speed, there's much less time to make decisions and college passing lanes often don't even exist in the League, particularly for guys who work in the cramped confines of the key area.

Hell, the NBA is literally full of players who did amazing stuff in the NCAA and promptly turned into mediocre journeymen in the pros. Why would WCJ be different? Lauri Markkanen was a near-unstoppable scorer at Arizona as a freshman and carried his team to the Sweet 16. But the NBA quickly exposed the problems with his skills and fundamentals.

People act like Carter playing second fiddle to Marvin Bagley at Duke was some kind of a preposterous mistake by Coach K. Like Krzyzewski isn't a living legend who knows more about the game than any of us will ever learn. You know... I'm just guessing that maybe he had his reasons.

Now, Im absolutely certain that Wendell would thrive in a more motion-based offense than what we've seen over the last few years. He would find more passing lanes and would generally make more plays. But that's true for the whole team. When everythig moves and all the players accept the system, good things happen.

But as for making him a designated "offensive hub"? Nah. The biggest problem is that Wendell's jump shot remains a rumor. Until he consistently shows it in actual NBA games, he won't be respected when he's standing in the high post with the ball and the passing lanes will dry up. He'll go back to pivoting like crazy and looking for Zach to hand the ball to.

He also has no ballhandling ability to speak of, which is an absolute killer for an undersized 5 these days. Lauri has rightly gotten a lot of crap for his awkward dribbling in half court, but in the rare instances where Carter has summoned up the courage to put the ball on the floor, he's looked like he was holding a live hand grenade. I think we can very safely say that him actually being an NBA 4 is a ridiculous pipe dream.

[TeamMan]

I dunno. This "there's a genius playmaker living inside Wendell Carter" thing is just so baffling. The ONLY evidence people have for any of it is the fact that the occasionally threw some passes in college.

But this is not college. The NBA game moves at a different speed, there's much less time to make decisions and college passing lanes often don't even exist in the League, particularly for guys who work in the cramped confines of the key area.

Hell, the NBA is literally full of players who did amazing stuff in the NCAA and promptly turned into mediocre journeymen in the pros. Why would WCJ be different? Lauri Markkanen was a near-unstoppable scorer at Arizona as a freshman and carried his team to the Sweet 16. But the NBA quickly exposed the problems with his skills and fundamentals.

People act like Carter playing second fiddle to Marvin Bagley at Duke was some kind of a preposterous mistake by Coach K. Like Krzyzewski isn't a living legend who knows more about the game than any of us will ever learn. You know... I'm just guessing that maybe he had his reasons.

Now, Im absolutely certain that Wendell would thrive in a more motion-based offense than what we've seen over the last few years. He would find more passing lanes and would generally make more plays. But that's true for the whole team. When everythig moves and all the players accept the system, good things happen.

But as for making him a designated "offensive hub"? Nah. The biggest problem is that Wendell's jump shot remains a rumor. Until he consistently shows it in actual NBA games, he won't be respected when he's standing in the high post with the ball and the passing lanes will dry up. He'll go back to pivoting like crazy and looking for Zach to hand the ball to.

He also has no ballhandling ability to speak of, which is an absolute killer for an undersized 5 these days. Lauri has rightly gotten a lot of crap for his awkward dribbling in half court, but in the rare instances where Carter has summoned up the courage to put the ball on the floor, he's looked like he was holding a live hand grenade. I think we can very safely say that him actually being an NBA 4 is a ridiulous pipe dream.

Like I said in my previous post...

...During the season I created a vote thread on this topic and something like 50% of the votes said that it should be tried. But the people that voted "No" were adamant that WCJ could never play PF in the NBA...

So, the board was split on this subject.

One of the mysteries about WCJ's time with the Bulls is that (after shooting 41% on 3Ps at Duke) he has shot 20% on 3Ps in the NBA over 2 seasons.

Normally, 3P shooting is one of the things that does carry over from college to the NBA. But shooting less than half of his college percentage is baffling.

Even stranger is the fact that the modern NBA is full of centers that can hit the 3P shot and are encouraged by their coaches to take them. Even RoLo was pushed to take 3Ps when in his final season with the Bulls, but WCJ seemed to be limited by Boylen's offense from taking them.

The point is that, if WCJ can't find his 3P shooting again, he's going to have a limited future in the NBA at either center of PF.

But yes, he would have no chance of playing PF.

[Dez]

He's a C and nothing but a C.

[ChettheJet]

People post Zach Lavine giveaway trades rationalizing that he's so unhappy with the Bulls and wants out. And they look like morons when you see that Zach is in the Bull's bubble for the voluntary workouts. It's not he has anything to prove to the new bosses, he's going to be on the team next year, he doesn't HAVE to be there, he feels like as a team leader he should be there. So he shows up. Think about that when you see some one sided giveaway trade get posted

[MGB8]

He's a C and nothing but a C.

At least in the modern NBA. Go back to the 90s and 00s and it was a different story.

That said, I don't even know if there's a difference between a "pf" and a "c" anymore - you just can only generally afford to have one of them on the court at a time.

[MrSparkle]

I don't think there's gonna be a dramatic upgrade in wins or player stock, but simple facts are that big men get better with a few years under their belt, and Donovan is gonna put them in better position to succeed than Boylen. I don't even expect Gallinari/Adams efficiency and impact, cause those are savvy veterans with plenty playoff experience, but if they can get on somewhat of the right track, I think we'll all stop worrying about their positions, contracts, and potential.

We all know they aren't gonna transform into perennial all-star players - it would be a ridiculous & unprecedented jump based on their 2y sample data. Even the eye test- Lauri would have to shoot out of his mind and Wendell would have to become a low-post scoring machine, which were the skills we expected when we drafted them, but haven't seen any evidence/results. Seeing as their hoped specialties didn't translate, we're banking on them becoming good players, not all-stars.

[ThisGuyFawkes]

My takes from the video:

1. I have a man-crush on Hutchinson's chin. He could be a Disney prince.

2. Could we bring in that old white guy dribbling around in circles? He could be our answer at PG.

Edit: Also, I love Coby's personality. He just seems like a good dude.

[FriedRise]

Watch on YouTube

[sco]

Watch on YouTube

LOL when Carter says to White when they are playing 2K and White has the Bulls, "Going to yourself over and over again isn't working" may be the most important lesson Coby learns during minicamp!

[wonderboy2]

Word is Lavine, Coby, and Markannan has been absolutely balling out in the Mini Camp.

[wonderboy2]

Geez, Sato looks so bad in all the clips I’ve seen. Getting beat off the dribble constantly. Shaq Harrison taking his cookies and White finishing over the top of Sato. Can’t believe this guy is making 11 million a year.

[sco]

Word is Lavine, Coby, and Markannan has been absolutely balling out in the Mini Camp.

Good to hear, but from this season, I think everyone looks good against the Bulls' defense - I guess that extends to the Bulls too?!?

On your Sato vitriol...I get it. I feel the same about Felicio, but you are just hurting your cred on this board...you have some still, don't waste it.