Blame Game- Bulls-Heat 10/29

Before both of you fans out there get super-excited, you should not expect a return to 2011 posting form from me. This is a just a nice convergence of an exciting (at least on paper) Bulls game with a (semi-miraculous) 11AM start time for me tomorrow. Also, Calvin is going to sleep at 5:30 these days, which will probably not last forever. Anyways, let's have at it.

Before we start assigning blame, let's start here: I'm as excited for the Bulls season as anyone, but the hype the last couple weeks has been kind of insane. Grantland has them #1 in their preseason preview, TNT had a poll before the game that had 29% of respondents picking the Bulls winning the title, behind the Heat's 36%, and ahead of the Spurs, Thunder, and Other. (CSN had the same choices for their pregame poll, and I believe it was 88% Bulls, 12% Heat, and 0% anyone else. Good job, Bulls fans.) Fox Sports just as laughably has them seventh, just behind Brooklyn. I'm going to assume this is a shot at Obama.

I expect the Bulls to be one of the 4 best teams in the NBA all year, and anything less than the Eastern Conference Finals would be a disappointment, although I think a Bulls-Pacers 7 game series will be quite exciting. It's going to be super-important to get that one seed this year, although the Heat probably won't lose sleep over it. Hopefully TT won't pursue it at the expense of the Bulls health, though.

All that is to say, I think the Bulls will be good, but it's way too early to start acting like losing to the Heat in Miami is something we should be ashamed about. You can hate him all you want, and I will fully support your right to do it, but LeBron James is the best basketball player in the world (and for my money, athlete in any sport), and 2nd isn't even close. He still has two very good basketball players backing him up, as well as a bunch of perfectly round-peg role players (I wish Norris Cole played for any other basketball team so I could like him more.) It's OK to be disappointed, we all had high hopes. But the better team won tonight, and that's OK. It's a long season, and the Bulls have a lot more to gain over time than the Heat do.

Blame:
Fred Tedeschi- 50%
It is long past overdue for this man to make an appearance in this space. The "2013 Athletic Trainer of the Year" is a man I wouldn't trust to give me a band-aid for a paper cut. This is a man who sent Jo back on the court during the Sixers series two years ago to hop up and down the court on one ankle in a flipping playoff game. I have no stats right now to back this up, but I feel like the Bulls have more injured players get reinjured (or struggle with the same injury) than any other organization. Maybe all the Bulls injury problems the last few years isn't a coincidence, and there's an underlying reason they can't stay healthy? Like a trainer clearing players to play way too early? Like, say, hypothetically, Joakim Noah tonight?

Jo had no business being on a basketball court. It wasn't as glaringly obvious as the time in the playoffs where he was literally hopping around on one foot, but he quite clearly wasn't effective, and at least TT realized it sooner rather than later. Fred: Do your job. Stop clearing injured players.

Shane Battier- 10%
I submit that Battier is the smuggest player in the NBA. His whole game is just "Oh, I'm going to sit here and hit corner threes and slide under you when you go to the hole." I hate him so much.

Mario Balotelli Chalmers- 10%
Again, it's not Chitown Sports policy to blame the refs, so I'll blame the guy flopping around like a certain soccer namesake of his anytime anyone was within three feet of him, which Joey Crawford was more than happy to oblige. Speaking of which...

TT- 8%
I don't want to bash TT too much, I think he did an excellent job with rotations (which might have been a sore spot with me in the past, maybe), and he deserves all the credit for the Bulls being the type of team to not throw in the towel down 25 in the 2nd half, and cutting it down to 8. But I'm also used to a TT that also works the refs, and for some reason it seemed like he was letting them off pretty easy tonight, when some questionable calls (especially the 2nd on Butler) put the Bulls in early foul-trouble, and having JFB and Lu off the court early led to that huge Heat run.

Dunleavy- 7%
Would be higher, but he pulled it together at the end. I put this on Facebook earlier, sort of tongue-in-cheek, but I'll put it here anyway:

Of course, I think Dunleavy will put it together more and be a significant help going forward. Either that, or we'll come up with some nicknames comparing him unflatteringly with Korver.

Kirk- 7%
Not that Kirk did anything in particular bad, but...-19, dude. Not good.

Lu- 5%
I know foul trouble made it harder for him to get in a groove, but he was 0-5 from downtown.

Tony Snell- 3%
Not really his fault, I'm sure the gameplan did not call for Tony Snell to play 7 minutes tonight. I'm sure TT didn't really want to have his first NBA experience guarding and being guarded by LBJ. But them's the breaks sometime.

Absolved-
Boozer- Now THAT was a performance from a man who doesn't want to be amnestied. If he plays 81 (plus hopefully about 20 or so more) games like that one, the Bulls are going to be better than I thought.

Derrick- Yes, yes, 4-15 and 1-7 from downtown are not good. That will improve when some rust shakes off, and the things we saw from him in the first quarter were enough to truly convince me he still has the explosiveness that makes him Derrick.

JFB- 20 points, 5 steals, 3 boards, 3 assists, 1 block. All those numbers could have been higher without those BS foul calls early, too. I have made some not-great predictions on this blog before, but I feel completely justified with driving the JFB bandwagon since day one. Way to prove me right for once, Jimmy.

Pi Day Credit: Bulls-Heat 3/14

Stupid ESPN had to start the game late to accommodate their stupid doubleheader, so that's why this is coming a day late. I can't just let it go, though, the game was too good, and there's too much to say. So let's get to it.

John Lucas III- 37%
This is basically the opposite of the last JL3 shot chart I posted:

That's what streak shooters do. Stacey mentioned it last night, but you know you're a legit NBA player when the other team is switching LeBron on to you in the 4th quarter for key possessions...and you score anyway.
There were 2 parts of Lucas' game that impressed me the most yesterday:
1. His ability to get his shot off over larger defenders was great. I know it's something he's had to do his whole career, but the Heat are one of the better defensive teams out there, and he usually doesn't have 6'8" guys guarding him.
2. The Heat ran the Derrick Rose double team at JL3 a few times in the 4th, and he kept his head and made the right pass every time. I feel like it would be very easy for him to get rattled and turn the ball over, but he stayed calm and collected, which the Bulls desperately needed late.

TT- 20%
I was struggling with how much credit to give TT. On one hand, yes, he deserves a lot of credit for the xs and os, where he was constantly a step ahead of Spoelstra. It was pretty dumb of Spoelstra to run the double at JL3, considering how TT's 1-1-3 counter is usually pretty successful against it. Let's go to the BMo Harris Telestrator:

Derrick (or JL3) get's met at halfcourt, and Joakim (usually) comes out to set the pick, but rolls back to the 3 point line as soon as his man comes to double. Derrick (or JL3) retreats near halfcourt to give the other 4 as much time as possible for the 4-on-3. Joakim gets the ball near the top of the key, with Boozer near the basket and 2 of the 3 from Deng/Korver/Ronnie hanging out in opposite corners. Now Boozer's man has to either give Joakim an open shot from the paint, step up and hope Jo can't hit Boozer for a dunk, or hope the help gets there in time, which leaves one of the shooters wide open in the corner. Either way, more often than not the 1-1-3 results in an easy shot for a big man in the paint, or a wide open corner three.

I have to dock him some credit for some weird personnel choices in the 4th quarter, though. The Heat went small with Battier at the 4, and for some weird reason TT decided to replace Taj with Boozer at the 7:39 mark, despite the fact that Taj was playing his usual great help D, and Boozer had contributed nothing. Then at 5:35, TT makes the even weirder decision to put Korver in for Noah, leaving Boozer as the only big on the floor, which is basically like putting a giant welcome mat in front of the rim. The Heat then predictably scored 8 easy points on their next 4 possessions until TT snapped out of his daze and put Joakim back in.

Taj- 15%
Notice that Wade didn't even try to block Taj's monster dunk in the 2nd quarter? He remembers this:

Taj probably would have gotten more credit had he, I don't know, played more than 18 minutes, TT. Seriously, he was changing the game on both ends, and his dunking range on the pick and roll apparently extends out to about 12 feet from the basket. Boozer can't dunk on the pick and roll without a trampoline. There's no reason for Boozer playing 9 more minutes than Taj in a game like this.

Joakim- 10%
Gotta give a lot of credit to Jo for locking Chris Bosh down, which I know doesn't sound like a Herculean effort, but Bosh has had some nice games against the Bulls in the past. Solid
rebounding and help D late, too.

JFB- 10%
Official Chitown-Sports nickname: Jimmy Butler= Jimmy Fucking Butler (JFB for short, since I try not to swear too much.) JFB just makes plays that make you say "Jimmy...Fucking...Butler!" While I'd like to see him start actually passing the ball on the 2-on-1 fast break when the guy he's with has a better shot, but his defense on LeBron was better than Deng's in my opinion, and he makes the smart play on offense (most of the time). I hope he gets more of a shot than JJ did.

Fred0-5%
Defense wasn't great, but he made his clutch free throws late, which is worth something.

TBN- 2%
He didn't exactly lock D. Wade down (which is why Wade went 16-26 from the field.) But 5-10 from the field ain't bad.

Deng- 1%
I can't give Deng no credit, but the difference between him and JFB was almost as pronounced as the difference between Boozer and Taj. I know he wants to play the big games, and I admire that, but 4-13 from the field suggests maybe he should wait until the pain goes down.

No Credit
Boozer- Boozer is useless. I'm done with him again. Every minute Boozer plays in a close game is a waste of time when Taj could be actually helping the team. It's really stupid, and has got to stop.