Chad Ford, on placing Curry and Chandler on his 'out-of-excuses-team':
If Chandler and Curry blossom this year, the Bulls will be playoff contenders in the East. If they falter (again) this will likely be the last time you see both of them wearing a Bulls uniform.
That pretty much sums it up.
Meet your Chicago Bulls, through the magic of Q&A:
Mostly softball questions, but still some good reads in there, feel-good stuff all around.
On the other end of that spectrum, if you ever wanted to know why the Bulls traded Ron Artest, this article can give you a little clue. And just think how worse it would be if he wasn't on the team with the best record in the league.
Kevin Pelton (of Page23 fame, and now employed by the (super)Sonics) had the following to say[see what happens when you leave comments? -ed.] regarding my last post concerning the hoops community's fixation on Jerry Krause:
The "championship or bust" mentality is one of my least favorite things about American sports and just not a good way to think in my opinion. Only one team a year is going to win it all, so if you position anything else as not enough, you're setting yourself up for failure. There is a substantial difference between being a playoff team and being a 20-win team.
What I meant by highlighting Krause's singular aspirations for a championship was not necessarily 'championship or bust'. I'm assuming what Kevin is referring to is the attitude similar to that the New York Yankees have entering each season. In a team like that with an owner like that, not winning the championship every year is followed by roster overhauls that seem like the transactional equivalent of a temper tantrum. What Krause meant (and I'm guessing, of course) by trying to building a champion was not without a corollary knowing that it couldn't be done in a day. When evaluating your team, whether it is a 20-win or a playoff one, its not enough to question where the team is, but also look where it is going. And for that second question, Krause's target was a championship. I don't think he necessarily believed in that to the point that he lost sense of the intermediate goals (as in, say, making the playoffs for once) along the way.
Kevin offers up his usual superior (superior to me at least) writing in the Krause epitaph he wrote following Krause's resignation in spring 2003. One point in the article that I neglected prior was Krause's track record hiring coaches. It does serve Krause's legacy well that he hired Phil Jackson, but unfortunately I think he tried to use that same hiring philosophy (taking a chance on an unproven) to mangle his next hires: Tim Floyd and Bill Cartwright. I can't believe I forgot to mention Floyd as one of Krause's blunders, but that's probably because I've been trying my damndest to purge him from memory.
I didn't want my previous post to be a similar retrospective on Krause's career, which is why I didn't delve into the Jalen Rose trade. What I wanted instead was the opposite, for national coverage to focus on where this team is going, instead of picking on the surly, slouchy, fat man who was on the receiving end of ridicule even when the team he ran was winning 6 championships. Although I guess by devoting all these words lately to Krause, I have gotten sucked in to the same thing I was trying to stop :-) .
Step 1: Talk about how Jerry Krause's supposed ineptitude.
Step 2: Repeat Step 1.
This seems to be the theme in the post-dynasty era. It is hard to find anything written about where the Bulls are going, instead of rather where they've been. First it was the breakup of the Dynasty, and how former GM Jerry Krause caused it to end before its time. After that got tired (although obviously not for everyone), the new premise became bemoaning the breakup of a 20-win team featuring Elton Brand, Ron Artest, et. al. I guess its the fail-safe way for writers to get attention to their article. Most casual readers demonize Krause, so in a way it makes sense. I would just like to see once in a while that this team gets judged at face-value instead of dredging up past misfortunes.
The really disappointing thing about this particular article is that for the most part is actually very good, and not completely unfair to Krause like, say, a comparable Jay Mariotti column would be. Unlike most revisionist retellings of the post-dynasty years, this actually shows the method to what Krause's perceived madness was:
"Despite drafting the consistently solid, if unspectacular, Brand in 1999, Krause came to believe Brand wasn't a championship power forward, so he was traded. "
Well he' right about Brand so far, isn't he? Problem is Tyson Chandler (although some would say that the Brand trade was really for Curry) isn't exactly a championship power forward either.
"Despite acquiring the versatile Miller and drafting the defensive firebrand Artest, Krause thought a team of 20-year-olds needed a scorer who could drop 19 in his sleep, so both were dealt in a package for Jalen Rose (no longer with the team, either). "
Oh man, what a great team we had with Miller and Artest. Oh wait, that team was TERRIBLE. Even worse, it was boring and struggled to score 80 on a given night. Krause was right about that team needing a scorer, but was way off on Jalen Rose being that missing piece. That trade really was an interesting one from many angles, and deserves its own post one day.
"And despite initially showing the kind of faith in Crawford that helped him become a burgeoning scoring machine, Krause's impatience with his pet project prompted him to draft Jay Williams instead of Dunleavy. The alienation that set in with Crawford soon turned him into a shoot-first chucker bent only on piling up the statistics necessary to earn the type of moronic contract the Knicks just signed him to this summer."
First off, even though Jay Williams went Evil Kenievel on us, is Dunleavy setting the world on fire? And I don't think anyone could fault drafting Jay Williams at the time. Unlike Krause's 'projects', Williams was the first lottery pick available to the Bulls to be advertised as being an immediate star. (only Ben Gordon comes close) In fact I remember at the time there were fans dreading that the Bulls would win the lottery that year and draft Yao Ming instead of Williams. The worst part about this argument, though, is the implication that it was Krause's fault Jamal Crawford turned into a 'shoot-first chucker'. What's more likely is that Jamal turned into a shoot-first chucker because he is a shoot-first chucker. If the competition at his position really drove Jamal to act that way, then he obviously lacks the mindset to be a contributor on a championship team anyway.
Being a championship team, that was always Krause's one goal, and this is also correctly said in the article. Having your lineup as Miller/Brand/Artest/Crawford/Dunleavy is better than what the Bulls have now, but isn't going to get you any banners, and Krause knew that. What attributes he had in his vision though, were blemished by his poor (okay...awful) execution.
The REST of this season preview (you know, regarding this years team) is well thought-out and highly recommended for reading. There is a great point made about the potential problem with Coach Skiles' style, and for good measure some nice cheap-shots at Eddie Robinson and Chris Jefferies. (I won't comment on the line regarding Pippen's desire to stick it to Reinsdorf. No need opening that bag of cats again). In fact, if there's nothing much else to write about this week, I'll delve into these points in more detail.
Even though Krause left a little more than a year ago, there are only 3 players left from his tenure, proving that this is John Paxson's team now. Hopefully the upcoming season will cause next season's preview to focus not on Krause, but how Paxson turned it around.
As I have mentioned before, after the trades with the Knicks (2 for 4) and Houston (1 for 3), the Bulls have a serious stash of players on their hands. HoopsAnalyst broke down what he thinks the roster will shake out to, and he has it pretty close to what I think it will be. For my prognostications, I'm going to go with what I've read for the past few weeks over who I actually want on the team. (keep in mind there are 12 active roster spots, with 3 for Injured Reserve):
Definately Staying(11):
Hinrich, Curry, Chandler, Gordon, Deng, Nocioni, Davis, Robinson, Harrington,
Piatkowski, Williams.
No surprises, although Robinson and Davis are on that list for their contracts instead of their performance. HoopsAnalyst has Piatkowski and Harrington in the 'probably' pile, but these are guys with experience, a rare commodity on this team. After taking out the definites, there are 7 players remaining for 5 spots. Here are the pros and cons for their chances of making the team.
Adrian Griffin:
Pro: Good defender, Rockets are paying his salary this year..
Con: Injury-prone, Can't score, Can be waived with no financial consequence.
Bulls Blog prognosis: 50%, with the Rockets footing the bill, Griffin's camp will truly be an open tryout for this roster. Even with the glut of wing players the Bulls have, he could find room on the roster if he proves he can defend and at least hit an open shot.Chris Duhon:
Pro: Recognizable player, Proven leader coaches love, True PG.
Con: Can be waived, Can't shoot.
Bulls Blog prognosis: 20%: With the glut at pg, Duhon will have to do something special to stand out, and I don't think his intangibles will help much there. His agent is claiming he won't go to Europe, so the only way the team can keep his rights is by actually paying the man. His name, if anything, may give him more trade value than the others.Chris Jefferies:
Pro: Guaranteed contract
Con: Um...He can't play.
Bulls Blog prognosis: 15%: Quick, who lead the Bulls in +/- rating? Yeah it was Jefferies, but Neifi freakin Perez is hitting .500 for the Cubs in a handful of games, so what. Jefferies' contract is the only thing saving him from being cut right now. Its not outrageous though, so unless he unleashes his potential (or unleashes a trained lion on Paxson), he will probably be known as "the guy the Lakers traded for Kareem Rush". And that's especially sad considering nobody will even remember who Kareem Rush was.Jannero Pargo:
Pro: Can score
Con: Not really a true PG, Can be waived.
Bulls Blog prognosis: 30%: I really think his scoring ability makes him the best candidate to be the 3rd pg. The Coaches haven't even mentioned him though, and he may get a better shot on a better team.Mike Wilks:
Pro: True PG, guaranteed contract
Con: Undersized on Defense
Bulls Blog prognosis: 50%. I wouldn't have thought this initially, but the staff seems to be talking like he will make this team.Scottie Pippen:
Pro: He's Scottie Pippen!
Con: Well...he *was* Scottie Pippen
Bulls Blog prognosis: 5%: The Bulls or whoever he gets traded to will hope he retires. I'm sure Scottie wouldn't mind collecting his $5m to sit on the bench wearing fine suits though.Cezary Trebanski:
Pro: He's....tall?
Con: I'm not sure he actually exists.
Bulls Blog prognosis: 2%: I've never seen this guy play, and from what I've heard I'm not sure I want to.
Well this is actually turning out to be a pretty easy decision if Pippen
retires, since he and Trebanski would be the odd men out. But as the
Trib's KC Johnson suggested a few days ago, this supposed surplus of
players(none are signed beyond this year) can be used along with Pip's contract
to get a player of actual value. Keeping things in perspective though, if season
winds up hinging on the decision of keeping Duhon or Pargo and Griffin or
Jefferies, it truly will be a long year.