UPDATE: Noah is effectively suspended (officially he's just on the inactive list) from tonight's game after a verbal altercation with assistant coach Ron Adams at shootaround. Perhaps Noah was waving around a copy of his PER ranking at center. (hattip to Sue in the comments section) -Matt

Luol Deng's out for tonight's game. Boylan claims that to counteract Andre Iguodala (who, in these two teams last meeting, had a fine outing and Deng did, er, not) we'll see some hot Thabo action.

Poor Philly is in tanking-debate mode, which is far far worse than actually tanking. Marc Narducci says that it's a must-win for the Sixers to make a playoff push. Their record is pretty similar to the Bulls, so maybe we should feel the same.

But as to the discussion of whether the Sixers should tank: tanking's done by the GM, not the coach and players. New GM Ed Stefanski already dumped Kyle Korver's contract, and may do the same with Andre Miller (and would love to with Willie Green) before the season's out. Between that and playing younger players, the team can still try to win but just be not so good at it.

Meanwhile, the Bulls are tanking by playing their old dudes so much. (I crack myself up.)

Early 6pm start. The Bulls can make happy hour happier. Or much much angrier.