2014-2015 NBA thread

[nitetrain8601]

Technically didn't he have James Johnson also?

 

As a rookie? I think not.

[Jordan4life_2007]

GOATbrook with another triple double with nearly 9 minutes left to go.

[thxfrthmmrs]

Anyone see the stat that despite his monster numbers, the last 2 games the Thunder are +21 without Westbrook on the floor, and -23 when he is playing.

 

Just saw this. 2 games. Sample size.

 

Also look at how terrible rest of their starters are, Andre Roberson, Kyle Singler, and Enes Kanter, who is notoriously bad on defense and whom the Jazz basically gave away for free.

[bmags]

I think I watched that Curry clip like 40 times, just mesmerizing. Really rooting for GS to make the finals, will just be too fun. Unless bulls miraculously make it, then hopefully like, the kings are there.

[southsider2k5]

I think some of what you see with the reserves is guys executing a really good gameplan. When you have super talented guys, you often will have a harder time getting them to do what you ask of them. To some extent, being a good NBA coach is about having loose enough schemes to keep the free birds happy without them leaving your "cage."

 

And it is much easier to put up numbers against second strings, and in limited situations.

[southsider2k5]

What's funny is people were questioning Thibs on not playing him. Now it looks like Thibs is right again; he simply isn't ready. I, for one, will never question Thibs when it comes to rookies. Only guy who has failed under him is Teague.

 

Yeah, he has earned the benefit of the doubt from me. If he keeps a guy around, he ends up being productive when Thibs decides it is time for him to play. If they get cut or shipped out, they were never going to be good anyway.

[fathom]

Why pull Snell after he went bonkers?

[Brian]

Why pull Snell after he went bonkers?

 

Wasn't passing the minimum four times.

[Jenksismyhero]

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-hous...at-thibs-built/

 

[Dick Allen]

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-hous...at-thibs-built/

Back to the DRose injury is all Thibs fault. Yeah, I'm sure DRose would be 100% healthy if he never met Thibs.

 

Thibs has won 65% of his games usually with a depleted roster. When he is gone, probably next year, we will not see improvement. But it's the old, it hasn't worked so try something else. If it didn't work because of the coach, that would make sense. But that is not the reality.How many years did Michael Jordan play for the Bulls before it really worked? I guess he should have been traded a couple of years before he starting winning every year. At least he could have researched his Thibs is killing the players again claim. 2 guys are averaging over 31 minutes a game.

Edited March 10, 2015 by Dick Allen

[farmteam]

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-hous...at-thibs-built/

Ha, Jake Johnson wrote that.

[Balta1701]

Back to the DRose injury is all Thibs fault. Yeah, I'm sure DRose would be 100% healthy if he never met Thibs.

 

Thibs has won 65% of his games usually with a depleted roster. When he is gone, probably next year, we will not see improvement. But it's the old, it hasn't worked so try something else. If it didn't work because of the coach, that would make sense. But that is not the reality.How many years did Michael Jordan play for the Bulls before it really worked? I guess he should have been traded a couple of years before he starting winning every year. At least he could have researched his Thibs is killing the players again claim. 2 guys are averaging over 31 minutes a game.

If Thibs is killing players I will never, ever, ever understand WTF happened with Luol Deng. In 2009 I hated his deal because he was always hurt.

 

Hell, I thought Boozer would always be hurt too because he was always hurt in Utah. He was dinged up in the first playoffs but then pretty much stayed on the court. Yeah his play fell off as we should have expected, but I probably wrote somewhere that we should expect him to miss 40% of the games we signed him for or something like that.

[Jenksismyhero]

Back to the DRose injury is all Thibs fault. Yeah, I'm sure DRose would be 100% healthy if he never met Thibs.

 

Thibs has won 65% of his games usually with a depleted roster. When he is gone, probably next year, we will not see improvement. But it's the old, it hasn't worked so try something else. If it didn't work because of the coach, that would make sense. But that is not the reality.How many years did Michael Jordan play for the Bulls before it really worked? I guess he should have been traded a couple of years before he starting winning every year. At least he could have researched his Thibs is killing the players again claim. 2 guys are averaging over 31 minutes a game.

 

I think he makes a decent point about the NBA changing and you either change with it or don't. Saying guys used to play 40 minutes a night in the 90's doesn't really apply anymore. I think the game is much more demanding now than it has ever been. There's more pressure to play every night. Little injuries becomes bigger injuries.

 

There's obviously a philosophical divide between Thibs and GarPax and it makes sense that demands on the players physically and mentally are a big part of it.

 

And no, I don't think you blame Thibs for Rose being a glass figurine. But I do think you can blame Thibs for guys like Deng, Butler and Noah being sidelined quite a bit with small, nagging injuries. They end up playing through those injuries which just creates bigger problems down the line.

[Dick Allen]

I think he makes a decent point about the NBA changing and you either change with it or don't. Saying guys used to play 40 minutes a night in the 90's doesn't really apply anymore. I think the game is much more demanding now than it has ever been. There's more pressure to play every night. Little injuries becomes bigger injuries.

 

There's obviously a philosophical divide between Thibs and GarPax and it makes sense that demands on the players physically and mentally are a big part of it.

 

And no, I don't think you blame Thibs for Rose being a glass figurine. But I do think you can blame Thibs for guys like Deng, Butler and Noah being sidelined quite a bit with small, nagging injuries. They end up playing through those injuries which just creates bigger problems down the line.

As Balta pointed out, Deng was far more fragile before Thibs. Noah missed 18 games playing fewer minutes per game the year before Thibs came on. Wasn't he the subject of the VDN/Pax fight? The Bulls are loaded with guys who cannot stay healthy. Blame genetics, blame the training staff (I really hate to do that), blame bad luck, but don't blame the coach. If these guys were playing 12 minutes a night, they still would get hurt. Jimmy Butler's injuries this season have nothing to do with exhaustion. Taj Gibson sprains his ankles all the time.The only way to keep them all healthy is never put them in the game. Gar/Pax needs to flip some roster and get guys who have a history of staying healthy. Boozer was hurt all the time before he became a Bull. Then he hardly ever got hurt except tripping on his gym bag with the Bulls.

Edited March 10, 2015 by Dick Allen

[southsider2k5]

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-hous...at-thibs-built/

 

That was pretty awful. I couldn't even get through it all. The credibility was gone when he said something about Deng playing nearly 48 minutes a game, and then I closed it when he started talking about the Wonder Years.

[Balta1701]

That was pretty awful. I couldn't even get through it all. The credibility was gone when he said something about Deng playing nearly 48 minutes a game, and then I closed it when he started talking about the Wonder Years.

I didn't even get as far as you.

[soxsoxsoxsox]

That was pretty awful. I couldn't even get through it all. The credibility was gone when he said something about Deng playing nearly 48 minutes a game, and then I closed it when he started talking about the Wonder Years.

 

well it is written by this guy:

 

It's more than just minutes with Thibs tho. He works his players too hard. How many coaches do you see players complaining about hard practices? Also this from earlier in the season: K.C. Johnson tweeted: #Bulls did have Sunday off. But players talked about first 2-day break since Dec. 21 as chance to recover. Instead, Thibodeau calls practice.

 

I don't think you can blame many of the injuries this season on minutes. There's no doubt he's a Taskmaster tho.

 

[Dick Allen]

well it is written by this guy:

 

It's more than just minutes with Thibs tho. He works his players too hard. How many coaches do you see players complaining about hard practices? Also this from earlier in the season: K.C. Johnson tweeted: #Bulls did have Sunday off. But players talked about first 2-day break since Dec. 21 as chance to recover. Instead, Thibodeau calls practice.

 

I don't think you can blame many of the injuries this season on minutes. There's no doubt he's a Taskmaster tho.

A team that won 6 championships had the hardest practices in the league. Besides, most of the guys playing heavy minutes don't practice that much. Don't you want the guys not playing much to play a little bit during practice?

 

I will just make the prediction that if the roster stays the same, and a new coach is brought in with minutes and practice restrictions on everyone, the Bulls will not will more games or a championship.

[southsider2k5]

well it is written by this guy:

 

It's more than just minutes with Thibs tho. He works his players too hard. How many coaches do you see players complaining about hard practices? Also this from earlier in the season: K.C. Johnson tweeted: #Bulls did have Sunday off. But players talked about first 2-day break since Dec. 21 as chance to recover. Instead, Thibodeau calls practice.

 

I don't think you can blame many of the injuries this season on minutes. There's no doubt he's a Taskmaster tho.

 

The flip side is why do you think the Bulls consistently outperform their talent levels?

[Jenksismyhero]

As Balta pointed out, Deng was far more fragile before Thibs. Noah missed 18 games playing fewer minutes per game the year before Thibs came on. Wasn't he the subject of the VDN/Pax fight? The Bulls are loaded with guys who cannot stay healthy. Blame genetics, blame the training staff (I really hate to do that), blame bad luck, but don't blame the coach. If these guys were playing 12 minutes a night, they still would get hurt. Jimmy Butler's injuries this season have nothing to do with exhaustion. Taj Gibson sprains his ankles all the time.The only way to keep them all healthy is never put them in the game. Gar/Pax needs to flip some roster and get guys who have a history of staying healthy. Boozer was hurt all the time before he became a Bull. Then he hardly ever got hurt except tripping on his gym bag with the Bulls.

 

http://espn.go.com/nba/player/stats/_/id/2429/luol-deng

 

Deng wasn't always 100% healthy, but I'd say the trend accelerated after Thibs. You really don't think those extra 3-4 minutes per game had an effect? Are Deng's injuries 100% on Thibs? No, absolutely not. Is it partially? Yes, IMO. Taj is a pretty good example this year. He had a bad ankle sprain and then rushed back and played more minutes than he should have, and then he re-injured it again. The 2nd time they're being much more cautious about it. If the Bulls had a Spurs-like philosophy about the regular season, is he playing through that ankle sprain, or is he letting it heal up 100? How'd they treat Kwahi's hand injury? Did he play through it? Or did they let him sit about a third of the season?

 

I'm not ignoring the fact that the Bulls have had some bad luck (and/or a piss poor medical/training staff, also a contributing factor). But I think we've all screamed at Thibs for keeping guys like Deng and Noah and Rose in games that either didn't matter or were already won/lost. I think it's a partial factor.

 

[Jenksismyhero]

The flip side is why do you think the Bulls consistently outperform their talent levels?

 

They don't. That's such a myth. Occasionally beating good teams in the regular season is great, but it doesn't mean much. What was the record against the Heat? Like 6-2 in the regular season? How'd that work in the playoffs?

 

The Bulls have (and have had) good, deep teams in a conference with about 4 solid teams. Thibs does a great job maximizing what he has, no denying that. They still haven't won anything though. One ECF appearance and one first round win isn't Hall of Fame worthy.

 

edit: for clarity, i'll say again that Thibs is a top 5 coach and the Bulls would be stupid to get rid of him. But that doesn't mean Thibs can't be criticized and shouldn't change with the league.

Edited March 10, 2015 by Jenksismybitch

[Balta1701]

http://espn.go.com/nba/player/stats/_/id/2429/luol-deng

 

Deng wasn't always 100% healthy, but I'd say the trend accelerated after Thibs. You really don't think those extra 3-4 minutes per game had an effect? Are Deng's injuries 100% on Thibs? No, absolutely not. Is it partially? Yes, IMO.

The 3 years before Thibs, Deng missed 19, 33, and 12 games. Then Thibs arrived. Deng then missed 0, 12, and 9 games the next 3 years (prior to being traded).

 

He got more minutes and missed fewer games. I have no idea what other conclusion you could draw.

[southsider2k5]

They don't. That's such a myth. Occasionally beating good teams in the regular season is great, but it doesn't mean much. What was the record against the Heat? Like 6-2 in the regular season? How'd that work in the playoffs?

 

The Bulls have (and have had) good, deep teams in a conference with about 4 solid teams. Thibs does a great job maximizing what he has, no denying that. They still haven't won anything though. One ECF appearance and one first round exit isn't Hall of Fame worthy.

 

Turning a mediocre talent team into a top regular season is improving the team. He doesn't have to win a title with a crappy team for it to mean that he gets a team to overachieve.

[Dick Allen]

They don't. That's such a myth. Occasionally beating good teams in the regular season is great, but it doesn't mean much. What was the record against the Heat? Like 6-2 in the regular season? How'd that work in the playoffs?

 

The Bulls have (and have had) good, deep teams in a conference with about 4 solid teams. Thibs does a great job maximizing what he has, no denying that. They still haven't won anything though. One ECF appearance and one first round win isn't Hall of Fame worthy.

 

edit: for clarity, i'll say again that Thibs is a top 5 coach and the Bulls would be stupid to get rid of him. But that doesn't mean Thibs can't be criticized and shouldn't change with the league.

So you are saying there are coaches out there that would have had a championship with the Bulls at least once the last 5 years?

 

When is the last time the Bulls have been healthy on opening night?

Edited March 10, 2015 by Dick Allen

[Balta1701]

So you are saying there are coaches out there that would have had a championship with the Bulls at least once the last 5 years?

So you are saying there are coaches out there where Derrick Rose would be healthy?