Either VDN has fucked up by not playing the very players he was hired to develop, or Pax fucked up by taking stupid and lazy players with consecutive lottery picks. It’s one or the other. I can understand how a coach can be so frustrated with Noah that he’d want to bench him, but the only alternative is Aaron Gray.

Im a die hard Noce fan and I missed the game but reading up Noce playing at center made me gnash my teeth.

Talk about putting guys in a position to fail. Andray Blatche promptly took advantage of that match up and God knows what Okur, Shaq, Oden, Sheed Wallace and other actual NBA centers would have done to Noce had they been in there.

It may have worked this time but will VDN fool himself into believing it will work the next time?

But I think VDN’s first (and second, and third, fourth, fifth….) priority is staying employed. Vinny has zero prior coaching experience; this job dropped into his lap like manna from heaven. He knows that if he fucks up this opportunity, he won’t be sniffing another head coaching job for years to come.

If Vinny wins, he stays employed. Period. If he takes the Bulls to the playoffs, he’s getting his extension. But his contract doesn’t give him much time to make it happen, so Vinny’s not going to let something like player development get in the way. That’s the only way I can explain his line-ups, substitution patterns, etc. The guy seems to have no vision, no long-term strategy … he seems literally to coach game to game. In my mind, he’s giving up the long-term health of this team for his short term gain.

I thought that going into this season the philosophy was “wins be damned, we’re going to develop our players.” Instead, we seen a very B*$&%#esque attempt to do whatever works to win games. VDN is already grasping at straws as if his job was at stake. It’s alarming. I imagine/hope/pray Pax told him going into the season that his job was safe given basic competence and the development of Rose, but Vinny’s actions and rotations seem to suggest the mandate is otherwise.

might have a learning disability. I mean, if there’s a canidate for ADHD out there…sweet God this might actually be true. Just look at his style of play. Bouncy, manic, difficulty concentrating, boundless “energey.” Memory deficits. Watch him on the bench – can’t sit still. Paroxysmal effort but lacks the ability to “stay on task” – for instance with something like conditioning, or working on a skill set. If we could just find out whether he’d been like this when he was seven, we might actually be able to diagnose him.

Holy shit, call the pharmacy!

JOAKIM NOAH NEEDS MEDICATION!

There is no “developing players”. In this society we live in — it started with professional sports — there is no development anymore. Especially here in America. Since we get our information so quick and we’re basically programmed to have ADD, the saying, “What have you done for me lately,” has never been so poignant. People need wins NOW because if you don’t win, it isn’t just drunk Norm Van Lier talking about it for 5 minutes after the game. It’s Van Lier, it’s two talk radio shows, it’s ESPN, it’s Blog-a-Bull, it’s Rosenbloom, it’s K.C., it’s Sam Smith, it’s 16,000 media outlets. That whisper you used to hear is now a roar and you do things NOW because you have no other choice. So to think that any coach in any situation is going to work on “long term” is a joke. “Long term” these days IS six games. If you want stability, go watch the WNBA.

I was watching that game and I kept thinking, where are Noah and most especially Tyrus?

I actually aplaud VDN a bit for benching Noah. Joakim needs to regain that fire that we Bulls fans liked so much in him last year. Perhaps having him sit a bit will get him motivated to be that leader on the court he showed he could be last year….

Let’s just not make that consistent. I also see that with Haywood down, Washington doesn’t have that much more of a consistent C than we do, so VDN might have made a good call going with the small ball lineup….

But the really disappointing thing for me was the lack of Tyrus Thomas playing time. Tyrus did as youmention have a nice string of 5-6 straight solid outings. I didn’t even remember him being out there on Saturday….of course I saw that monster block in I think the 3rd quarter and was like, oh wow there you go Tyrus that was awesome….only to flip back to rewatch it on the DVR and see that of all people it was Ben Gordon…..

But yeah, I kind of understand the sitting of Noah….don’t like the idea behind it, but when we’re over a month into the season and Noah only looks ready to play 1 out of ever 4 games and still seems to have issues with transition D….it might not be a bad tactic to say you don’t get a golden plate to play if you play poorly even if it means more Aaron Gray….

But the Thomas benching AFTER a string of good T2 games is beyond disappointing….

Good news though for us is that Larry Hughes had another very good game….it’s like his 5th or 6th straight game of playing team basketball….something I’d hoped we would see from him when we acquired him (thinking he’d see that without a Lebron on our team he can do a lot of little things to help us and not force his game), but something he definitely did not play until very recently…..we may yet find some takers for Hughes next season. He’s a slightly lower paid version of this year’s hot expiring contract in Sczerbiak, and he’s a better player than Wally to boot….I like the effort.

Good to see Nocioni bounce back a bit with a good game. Hopefully the haircut helps…. I still like you say don’t understand why Nocioni gets all the minutes after truly atrocious veteran bball play and then see Tyrus who’s been doing a lot of little things out there gets relegated to almost an entire game benching, but whatever…..

It’s also great to see Gordon and Rose playing so well together, and Luol had a good 3rd straight game. If we can somehow keep these 3 together, use Hinrich, Gooden, Sefalosha and a pick to nab a decent 5….we could be building something once Tyrus gets his act together….

The young bigs’ career is a good test case for this “blame the players last, and blame them least” axiom. The first two years it was coaching’s fault for not giving them more minutes. This year it’s coaching’s fault for not getting consistent minutes. Then at the possibility that they just might not be that good, we stomp our foot and say, “Well then, stupid Paxson…how could you have drafted them in the first place?!?” Not saying coaching/management haven’t made some mistakes, but the urge to blame them first and foremost over the players is almost comical. We’re like overprotective parents.

I think Thomas deserves more time since he was starting to play with his eyes open recently. But screw Noah. There’s no excuse for an “energy” player to come into camp out of shape. Plus, he seems to have trouble learning the plays, which is especially concerning considering no plays are even run for him. If he’s so out of shape…that he cant contribute his typical energy, hustle and rebounding….then why should he play? It’s apparent he spent the entire summer walking the streets of Gainesville drinking and smoking the earth….but not working on his game. Now he’s getting called out for it. Mind you, the bulls are on their 19th game of the season….and he’s STILL not in shape.

I understand Noah not getting time due to conditioning…that is unacceptable, this is your job and being out of shape is totally unprofessional. Fine. i get that. But giving Tyrus’s minutes at the 4 to Nocioni is not cool….especially after 3 effective games and one double double. Tyrus was actually starting to cut down on mistakes, he deserved at least 25 minutes. He is actually a player who might be here in a couple years. So why are guys who are not in our long term plans getting all the burn(hughes, noc, gooden). It’s because Vinny wants to win as many games now as he can to save his job. Gooden can shoot 1-11 two games in a row, Noc have multiple shitty games but that’s ok…why do they get a longer leash than Tyrus.

We know what Gooden and Noc are….journeymen…

The team needs to be honest and realize we are REBUILDING. This team won’t be a serious championship contender until 2012 at the earliest and that’s assuming we snag one of the better FAs in 2010

At best now we are a 7th or 8th seed. I don’t care about making the playoffs, that’s not good enough. We now have a star to build around so let’s slow our roll and worry about how to build a permanent winner not just a low playoff team. A lot of teams build to just make the playoffs and waste a lot of money to field a team that will never make a deep run(for example the Wizards wasting serious $$$ on Arenas and Jamison)…that team is going nowhere…except gettting bounced from the playoffs by the Cavs.

I’m rambling but when your top 3 picks play a combined 5 minutes, then your organization has serious problems.

So please give Tyrus his 25-30 minutes even if he’s struggling. Try to work Noah back into shape slowly and as far as Thabo….i still like his intangibles and defense but he’s not gonna work out here. I don’t think he’ll ever be very good but he could be a Bruce Bowen/Posey glue-guy if he ever can hit the 3 consistently.