Here a few observations I've been wanting to make about the team.  In the past thesewould each probably have been a fanpost, but it's too hard to invest that kind of energy into this team.  I give Matt a lot of credit for the quality content he has produced this season.  Here's some observations about the Bulls backcourt.

Ben Gordon: I feel fairly vindicated with my choice in the Blogabull Hinrich/Gordon wars, not that it was a hard choice.  Gordon raises the team's TS% from 51.4% to 52.6%.  He's among the league leaders in raising a team's TS%.  His USG% is also the lowest of his career.  There's a solid argument to be made that Gordon should be shooting more, not less right now.  Gordon continues to be a slightly lesser version of Ray Allen.  Notice the similarities in the rates of their FGA, 3PA, FTA, and TO at age 25 (Both Cassell and Robinson had 20 PERs this season so Allen had a lot more help).  Ben's height will keep him from ever be quite as good as Allen for reasons that have very little to do with defense, but a player that shoots slightly better than Ray Allen and is nearly his equal on both ends of the floor is certainly good enough to be a member of a big three, but I realize an end to the 6th man nonsense and Vinnie Johnson comparisons is probably too much to hope for.

Derrick Rose: It's reached the point where I'm even starting to worry about Derrick.  He's having a strong rookie season, but it's also a little disappointing.  At this point he's doesn't even compare that favorably with the 06/07 version of Hinrich.  Derrick is getting to the FT line less frequently than Hinrich at this point, which is something I wouldn't have predicted based on his ability to get to the line in college.  This isn't just a case of the refs not giving the rookie calls.  Derrick isn't doing the things he needs to do to get to the line, but that's only one area I have concerns about.

Most people seemed to focus on concerns about Derrick's court vision or his shooting before the draft.  I was more worried about whether he would be able to reach his potential as a rebounder and a defender.  Before the draft I compared Derrick's college stats to the college stats of 20+ guards drafted in the last twenty years.  Derrick's college rebounding numbers left a lot to be desired given his athletic ability, and defensively  his steal and block rates were low in addition to the visual evidence of defense issues.  He's had the same issues in the NBA so far.  He's basically posted the same numbers as Ben Gordon as far as rebounds, steals, and blocks so far.  Derrick is also averaging a team low 1.6 PF/36 min.  That' simply further reinforces my belief that he's not being aggressive enough in the non-scoring aspects of the game.  With Hinrich and Deng back and likely to not be involved in a trade, I would think long and hard about scaling back on his offensive role and minutes so that he can concentrate on improving his defense and rebounding.  What happened to the focus on Derrick's development?  I still believe in Rose's potential, but the areas Derrick is struggling aren't areas that naturally see a lot of improvement like turnover or shooting issues.

Larry Hughes:  All I want to say about Larry is that for a few weeks he proved he could be a competent NBA player.  He did it by becoming simply a low turnover jumpshooter.  He stopped his futile attempts at driving to the basket, actually raising his efficiency by taking more jumpers.  His USG% was the lowest of his career and so was his TO% and AST% because he had stopped his ineffectual attempts to create on offense.  He took more 3PA/FGA than at any point in his career, foregoing his persistant desire to take long range 2P shots, which led to the highest TS% of his career.  By doing less Larry was actually being productive, but we all knew Larry wouldn't embrace that concept for long.  For a brief minute I even thought Larry might actually learn from this brief flirtation with actually being an efficient scorer for the 1st time in his life, but then of course as expected Larry reverted to being Larry.

Kirk Hinrich: I am happy to have Kirk back, especially if he continues to come of the bench.  At the beginning of the season he appeared to have at least a  solid shot at returning to his 06/07 level of play.  I would hope his return would mean eliminating Larry's minutes, a renewed focus on Rose's development, and the beginning of trading season.  Unfortunately, I can't realistically expect any of the above.