Look, sometimes in the NBA you lose badly to bad teams, like the Bulls did today. And it's not like it happens a lot. The last time we lost to a bad team was against Golden State the 2nd game of the season. It's more about how the Bulls lost that I'm writing a blame game.
CJ Watson- 40%
It's almost unfair to give CJ this much. While he's a better than average backup PG, he's not in the same league as Deron Williams, and it showed. It's OK to get beat by Deron Williams, but it's not ok to just get absolutely torched by him in the first half, and make dumb decisions on the other end. Even when he wasn't matched up with Deron Williams, he looked like the Bulls' fourth best point guard today, which is unacceptable. Especially since we probably aren't going to guarantee Mike James' contract.
TT- 20%
What the hell was going on with the rotations? Things started to look better in the 2nd quarter with the Taj-Asik-Butler-James-Lucas team out there, then they didn't see the floor again. And the small lineup with Deng at the 4 just doesn't work when you're not hitting shots. Taj is then the only one around the basket to rebound, as Neil and Stacey pointed out. And a blind squirrel could have told you the Boozer-at-the-5 lineup wasn't going to work, unless your goal is to see how many offensive rebounds Kris Humphries and Shelden Williams can rack up. This game could have been won if he had just been a little quicker with the hook a couple times. Every bench player ended up with a positive +/-, and every started was double-digit negatives.
Joakim Noah- 15%
I thought we were done with games like this one, Jo. We're too far into the season for you to just blatantly not show for games. If he had come out of the gate even remotely motivated (especially on the offensive end), maybe that game doesn't get away so quickly. Shelden Williams should be the type of matchup where Jo takes advantage of him inside. It's quite possible the game being in striking distance in the end was just a matter of giving Jo a quicker hook.
Luol Deng- 10%
Lu had more blame when I started writing this, but I brought it down a little with his effort at the beginning of the 4th. It's unusual, though to see him play that poorly at the beginning of games (and even the whole first half). Deng needs to be the number one option of offense with Derrick out, and he didn't really do that today.
TBN- 7%
I'll give him credit for his D on Deron Williams in the 2nd half, but he's got to play better offensively. It's probably more Rip's fault than Ronnie's that he's asked to do so much offensively, but that still doesn't excuse your starting shooting guard going 2-5 in 28 minutes (and a brutal missed layup that would've cut the lead to 10 late.
John Lucas- 5%
Well...he was better than CJ. But 2 points on 1-4 from the field in 14 minutes clearly wasn't made up for on the defensive end.
Carlos Boozer- 3%
It's very rare that I say Carlos played better than any other starter, but I still have to give him the leftover percentage points for a couple of shoe-polish-headed plays that hurt the Bulls during runs (like standing in the corner with the ball doing nothing while MarShon Brooks comes all the way across the court to strip the ball.
Absolved-
Mike James
I really wish Mike James could stay. I assume with Lucas' contract guaranteed the Bulls aren't going to shell out for a 4th point guard when Derrick comes back, even though James makes better decisions with the ball than either Lucas or CJ lately, and is clearly an upgrade defensively.
Taj Gibson
14 points, 9 boards, and way more contributed defensively. Not that Asik is bad defensively, but in games like this one (where Boozer is making shots but we need better D,) TT shouldn't be afraid to send Taj in for Noah. That could have changed the game early, too (or in the beginning of the 3rd quarter.)
Jimmy Butler
It was great to see Jimmy get some minutes early, and his energy clearly helped change the momentum (which shouldn't be too hard when you're down 22-3, but still.) Then he didn't see the court again. Don't make me relaunch the #freeJimmyButler campaign, TT.
No comments:
Post a Comment