After getting lucky on Saturday night, playing the Mavericks without Luka, the Bulls headed on the road on Sunday night, to play the Hawks in Atlanta; they weren’t as lucky in this one. Actually, a pretty painful way to lose, after the Hawks hit a shot with 0.5 seconds left to win in OT. We’ve talked about how frustrating the Bulls have been this year; we’ve talked about Zach and the others on the court, but what about the coaching? When will Billy Boy have to start answering for the performance of this team?
Let’s start with the play where we lost the game on Sunday night. First off, with that little time left, it had to be a toss towards the rim and quick shot or tip, or in this case, little heave that went in. Yeah, it was lucky, I guess, but why wasn’t our tallest guy standing in front of the rim on this one? Instead, Vooch was guarding the inbounds pass, which didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me, since the pass was going to go up anyways. Derrick Jones Jr made a valiant effort, but why did it fall on him? Just as there are offensive plays in the arsenal to use with seconds left, I’m sure there are defensive sets; this one didn’t make sense. Coaching?
The other night after the Bulls lopsided victory over the Mavs, I was listening to the post game show on the radio. There is some woman on there, who talks a lot about betting, chatting with Bill Wennington. She said that one of the things Billy Donovan told his team to do was to shoot more three pointers; I hope she has her facts wrong and/or there is some missing context. If Donovan did in fact tell this Bulls team to shoot more treys, we got a big problem. In case you haven’t noticed Billy, we are NOT a three point shooting team. So… telling the guys to take more of the shots that we’re not that great at, doesn’t seem like a wise idea. Scarily enough, I kind of believe it. The reason I believe it is because how Vooch consistently shot three pointers last year, and continues that trend this year. I would have thought that the coaching would have instructed him to limit his time behind the arc, instead working on his 2 point game, while trying to get an offensive rebound every blue moon instead. But nooooo… coaching?
I like Billy Donovan. He’s certainly no Phil Jackson, or even Tom Thibodeau, but I thought he was good enough to be the coach of this team. He’s certainly no Tim Floyd, Fred Hoiberg, or Jim Boylen; memories… Yet, as we continue to try to figure out why this team has been so inconsistent, do we eventually have to question the coaching? I think that answer is yes, however, with the recent news of a “secret” extension signed before the season with the Bulls, does it really matter? Looks like Billy will be here for the long haul; I hope, unlike what some believe, that he isn’t part of the problem, and more so, is about unlocking the most from this roster. Speaking about Thibs… back to back home games with the Knicks await us next. Go Bulls!
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