Bulls 'depth' has been explored, and exposed
losing to the league's worst as unable to mitigate injuries
In case you missed it (and judging anecdotally, you likely did), the Bulls continued their downward spiral with 2 road losses to the Hornets and Pacers.
How bad has this been? From John Schuhmann of NBA.com:
So the Bulls had a 4-game stretch against teams that had, prior to last Saturday, combined for a record of 9-53.
They beat the Wizards by 1, and then they lost to the Pelicans, Hornets and Pacers.
Dating back to the start of their road trip in Utah 8 games ago, the Bulls have played in 6 ‘clutch’ games and have gone 3-3. We’ve seen buzzer-beating winners for them and for their opponent.
That’s typically how the randomness will apply itself in these close contests, the existential question facing the Bulls is how come they are in close games with the dregs of the league in the first place?
We are still not quite at 20 games into the season, which is an arbitrary cutoff for determining what is real or not. So I don’t want to be unfairly negative when I wouldn’t do the same when they got off to the 5-0 (and 6-1) start.
But just as those wins still count and will put the Bulls in the East play-in tournament regardless of their actual quality, these recent losses will also put them in the play-in1. So we can try and derive some meaning from them even if not ultimate declarations.
I think it has at least shown us that the back end of the roster is not quality ‘depth’, and shows how terrible the Bulls have been at the ‘building’ part of their bullshit ‘competitive while building’ mission statement that they liken to a college hoops program.
After the Bulls went 3-0, I pointed out that one of the attributes of this roster was their ability to withstand absence or poor performance from a star, because they didn’t have any all-NBA level players but a lot of 4th or 5th option role players up and down the roster2. And there was even the thought (::hand raised:: I had it too) that behind those guys were the best 3rd stringers in the league, in the grand scheme of things a useless achievement but for a team trying to grind out 38-43 wins every season by using a gimmicky high-effort playing style, it can come in handy.
But while the Bulls have run into many injuries lately3, they’ve run into other squads that are either built to tank and/or have suffered several injuries themselves and look comparable or worse.
The lead bust is Patrick Williams, who is massively overpaid to be on this list but perhaps could’ve found an acceptable-if-still-overpaid slot on this team, where having giving up any notion of him being an on-ball threat or athletic/healthy enough to be on the wing much, at least he could play some small ball center? But with many Bulls actual centers being out4 and minutes desperately needed, Williams has played even worse than his typical. There is a difference between bust to overpaid to shouldn’t even be in the league anymore.
Dalen Terry has not improved enough to be relied upon, and it appears the front office knew that when they traded for the duplicative Isaac Okoro to play over Terry in his (finally) contract year. Terry was out of the rotation to begin the season, then had one good game in Portland, but that counter was re-set to zero versus Miami (13 minutes, 0 points, 5 fouls) then he hurt his calf.
Julian Phillips is perpetually forgettable, shooting 28% from three this year, and when minutes opened up suffered an illness.
It’s of course far too early to declare Noa Essengue a bust, but it’s certainly not a good sign that he can’t even get minutes. He would of course be getting some minutes lately but he also got hurt, in a GLeague game.
The two-way guys? Two of them actually played versus the Pacers5. I think Lachlan Olbrich only serves to further help the Bulls reach in Australia. Emanuel Miller is older than Okoro.
Again, for emphasis: not a big deal if the Bulls were trying to win anything of significance and shown any creativity or extra effort in roster construction. But for a team with their stated ambitions, plus actions like having an average of 1 draft pick every offseason and firing the head of player development, that’s an indictment that they can’t get replacement-level production, let alone the spasm of positive contribution like the Pistons employed when beating the Bulls with their B-squad, from recent draft picks and fringe free agency.
forever in the play-in…
with Giddey joining Coby White as a top-100 player, maybe even top-75 and it deserves more consideration on a separate post
always amusing that with injury designations such a relatively large story around the league, with the Bulls - since nobody cares - they can list everyone day-to-day even with soft tissue ailments that can take weeks
perhaps Jalen Smith is a counter here, he’s looked solid and has been missed when he’s not playing or having bad shooting night. He’s also on his 2nd contract like Williams, and will turn 26 this year, so it doesn’t really apply.
not really convinced it was necessary to go 10 deep in that game, Billy?
On the Patrick Williams front, he just shot 33% in November and had just 3 games in which he shot better than 37.5%. 6 games were under 30%. He's somehow shooting worse from 2 this season than last season (38.5%!!!). I know there are some awful teams with total bums playing real minutes, but Pat might be the worst rotation player in the NBA right now, at least on teams theoretically trying to win.
Pat Williams is getting worse. It’s inexplicable. He doesn’t seem to care. I think the worst part is that now he’s completely untradeable. He can’t even be a throw in. I swear to god he may get bought out and be out of the league this summer.
The rotations have been screwey last 5 or so games. The roster imbalance is really highlighted when you have injuries to big guys. The Bulls can’t afford 2 of the 3 of Collins, Vuc, Smith to be out. The Bulls habit of picking undersized and under skilled power forwards (Essengue, Phillips, Williams, Buz (?)) is starting to catch up. At least some of these guys need to be playing (not Williams) and getting minutes at the 3.
Also rebounding is a skill. AKME and BD really need to understand that. Yelling box out and stocking the team with guards won’t work.