2018-2019 Official NBA thread

[bmags]

I love WCJ but My other take was bulls should have made big trade for luka and signed capela and had a lineup of Dunn LaVine luka lauri and capela and yeah I’d be through the moon

[SoxAce]

Loving Will Purdue's rant about the Bulls right now on CSN.

Edited December 15, 2018 by SoxAce

[Dick Allen]

I think this write up is spot on.

 

https://www.blogabull.com/2018/12/11/18133119/chicago-bulls-john-paxson-jim-boylen-mutiny

[Quin]

7 minutes ago, Tony said:

 

Kendall Gill has aged.

[Bananarchy]

I typically defend Paxson more than most because he's clearly very smart and capable as a GM, but he's responsible for the actions of everyone beneath him and he has continued to endorse Gar despite major shortcomings.  Everyone needs to go.

Edited December 15, 2018 by AustinIllini

[SleepyWhiteSox]

4 minutes ago, AustinIllini said:

I typically defend Paxson more than most because he's clearly very smart and capable as a GM

Nice try pax

[Dick Allen]

27 minutes ago, Quinarvy said:

Kendall Gill has aged.

I was riding my bike along the lake many years ago  back when Kendall took up boxing. He was running along the lake on the south side with no shirt on. He is a specimen. His waist looked like it was about 18 inches and his shoulders looked like they were about 80 inches. 

[Bananarchy]

15 hours ago, SleepyWhiteSox said:

Nice try pax

There's literally no argument to be made that Pax is a bad GM.  He finally acquired a superstar at the end of his GM tenure.  

Edited December 15, 2018 by AustinIllini

[bmags]

1 hour ago, AustinIllini said:

There's literally no argument to be made that Pax is a bad GM.  He finally acquired a superstar at the end of his GM tenure.  

Who is that?

[Balta1701]

2 hours ago, bmags said:

Who is that?

Derrick Rose I believe. Pax was finally smart enough to have his ping pong ball come up.

[Chisoxfn]

Wow...man talk about no luck on the injury front. Lavine out at least a few days, more likely at least a week, if not longer, with an ankle injury.  Would be great to see the actual core get a sustainable amount of time to play together, so you can get a picture of what they have.  

[bmags]

1 hour ago, Chisoxfn said:

Wow...man talk about no luck on the injury front. Lavine out at least a few days, more likely at least a week, if not longer, with an ankle injury.  Would be great to see the actual core get a sustainable amount of time to play together, so you can get a picture of what they have.  

The time frame for that seems so optimistic. I have a hard time believing he’ll only miss a week when he’s in a walking boot.

[Chisoxfn]

That was a nice win. Huge contributions from Dunn and Lauri. The energy they played with was great again. Defense has looked significantly better of late.

I had forgotten how athletic and strong Dunn is. His mid range game should be lethal as he continues to develop. 

Was very happy Lauri did something other then just jack 3s today and it helped. He had a lot more easy points by attacking. He still looks slower than last year...not sure if that is due to him still adjusting to missing so much time or what? 

[Chisoxfn]

5 hours ago, bmags said:

The time frame for that seems so optimistic. I have a hard time believing he’ll only miss a week when he’s in a walking boot.

Well technically Bulls are still evaluating but yeah...I presume it is more 2 to 3 weeks if I were to guess. 

[Chisoxfn]

I am going to give Pax credit. He backed Boylen and didn’t panick after last weeks disastser and I think it was that backing that helps get this ship turned in the right direction (sent a message to the players that the front office was behind him and thus if you want to play for Bulls you need to get with the program).

Boylen is nuts but I think the dude can coach and I like the fact that he isn’t backing down. Young teams, more than any other team, need to really be pushed. 

The d they played down the stretch tonight was absolutely stellar. Both the intensity but the fundamentals and how well they were switching, etc. 

The team is going to play much better with Dunn and Lauri back. I’m not saying they are great but they are going to win more games...good thing they lost so many early that no matter what they’ll get a good pick. But I’m totally fine winning more games if it is because the core is kicking ass. 

[Bananarchy]

On 12/15/2018 at 12:48 PM, bmags said:

Who is that?

Yes, Derrick Rose.  He stepped aside and replaced himself with a significantly worse GM.  He seems to sometimes take over like right now, but he's responsible for the actions of his replacement and it's time to move on from this FO.

[bmags]

16 hours ago, AustinIllini said:

Yes, Derrick Rose.  He stepped aside and replaced himself with a significantly worse GM.  He seems to sometimes take over like right now, but he's responsible for the actions of his replacement and it's time to move on from this FO.

Sorry, I did not stop to think what end of GM tenure meant. That makes sense.

[bmags]

On 12/16/2018 at 12:53 AM, Chisoxfn said:

I am going to give Pax credit. He backed Boylen and didn’t panick after last weeks disastser and I think it was that backing that helps get this ship turned in the right direction (sent a message to the players that the front office was behind him and thus if you want to play for Bulls you need to get with the program).

Boylen is nuts but I think the dude can coach and I like the fact that he isn’t backing down. Young teams, more than any other team, need to really be pushed. 

The d they played down the stretch tonight was absolutely stellar. Both the intensity but the fundamentals and how well they were switching, etc. 

The team is going to play much better with Dunn and Lauri back. I’m not saying they are great but they are going to win more games...good thing they lost so many early that no matter what they’ll get a good pick. But I’m totally fine winning more games if it is because the core is kicking ass. 

It really depends on how short term the thinking is on "the right direction".

With Dunn, Portis and Lauri back he has improved the Bulls win percentage up to .333.

To do so, he has developed the most antiquated offense in the league that will stunt the development of it's developing star PF and offense of its promising star C. It plays into all of the worst tendencies of it's PG and SG. 

It is a style that no top 30 player short of demar derozan would want to play in. And it may eke out just enough victories to pull bulls into the 6-8 range of draft.

The Bulls clownshow front office culture has ensured no big FA signings will occur, and may also ensure a worse chance at getting a big time, franchise changing draft pick.

 

[lostfan]

A guy on BaB said the Bulls are like Office Space: Pax and Forman are the management consultants who screw everything up, Hoiberg is Peter trying to get fired, Boylen is the guy who thinks the Jump to Conclusions mat is a great idea.

[southsider2k5]

1 hour ago, lostfan said:

A guy on BaB said the Bulls are like Office Space: Pax and Forman are the management consultants who screw everything up, Hoiberg is Peter trying to get fired, Boylen is the guy who thinks the Jump to Conclusions mat is a great idea.

They aren't wrong.

So what exactly is it that you do here Pax?

[Balta1701]

Just a great phrase for this season:

Quote

An otherwise ho-hum blowout by the Oklahoma City Thunder over the Chicago Bulls became suddenly tense Monday night when a squabble spilled over into courtside fans and players and coaches tried to separate the teams.

 

[Y2Jimmy0]

On 12/16/2018 at 12:53 AM, Chisoxfn said:

I am going to give Pax credit. He backed Boylen and didn’t panick after last weeks disastser and I think it was that backing that helps get this ship turned in the right direction (sent a message to the players that the front office was behind him and thus if you want to play for Bulls you need to get with the program).

Boylen is nuts but I think the dude can coach and I like the fact that he isn’t backing down. Young teams, more than any other team, need to really be pushed. 

The d they played down the stretch tonight was absolutely stellar. Both the intensity but the fundamentals and how well they were switching, etc. 

The team is going to play much better with Dunn and Lauri back. I’m not saying they are great but they are going to win more games...good thing they lost so many early that no matter what they’ll get a good pick. But I’m totally fine winning more games if it is because the core is kicking ass. 

The defense is better but he's purposely made the offense worse by taking it back to the stone ages. Stephen Noh has a scathing piece on The Athletic about it. Losing as many games as possible is the only thing that matters from here on out in my opinion. I'd be trying to deal Parker, Holiday and Lopez and I'd be willing to take on 2019 salary in order to add draft picks. Nobody is signing this offseason to play for this organization. 

[Chisoxfn]

6 hours ago, Y2Jimmy0 said:

The defense is better but he's purposely made the offense worse by taking it back to the stone ages. Stephen Noh has a scathing piece on The Athletic about it. Losing as many games as possible is the only thing that matters from here on out in my opinion. I'd be trying to deal Parker, Holiday and Lopez and I'd be willing to take on 2019 salary in order to add draft picks. Nobody is signing this offseason to play for this organization. 

Technically, the Bulls offense was already tragically bad, but Boylan has been misquoted.  He basically wants to get back to basics of half court basketball, etc, before starting to push the tempo and other aspects. The guy is fundamentally different than Hoiberg and with that, the transition into the role mid-season is different than a lot of other "interim" transitions.  

Either way, none of it will matter...this team is going to struggle to win many games. Injuries have certainly had a material impact on this, but it also has a lot to do with young teams and how hard it is to turn around a culture when you have young clubs. Its why I actually believe in what Boylan is preaching.  Historically speaking, young teams lose (and lose a lot of games) and that culture can quickly become toxic...losing habits spread like wildfire and it just gets ugly.  

Lakers had those issues a year ago, they had tons of locker room issues prior to Lebron coming in. 

[Chisoxfn]

Lavine out 2-4 weeks and given the tank, etc, I'll bet he'll be closer to the 4 week mark. Its a bummer because I am 100% okay with this franchise winning games, as long as it is driven by strong play and growth shown out of Dunn, Lavine, Laurie, WCJ.  I don't believe those guys have played even 1 game together yet and even if you remove WCJ, you are talking about, I believe less than 10 regular season games total.  

[southsider2k5]