Will Gottlieb at CHGO has been as emphatic as this site has - and he’s more measured, historically - that a starting lineup change was absolutely necessary given how the ‘sure, we expect they’ll be bad’ Bulls were playing historically bad basketball.
On Sunday, the Bulls played a competitive game and kept the final deficit under double-digits, and didn’t get down lower than 12 points all day1. And it started with, well, the starting lineup. Norm Powell was a late scratch and Isaac Okoro stepped in at starting shooting guard. Will liked what he saw, saying “I don’t know who gets taken out, but the Bulls need to keep Okoro in the starting 5”:
It’s a small sample, but not completely isolated to this last game. To open the first matchup between these two teams, last week in Philly, Splitter had a quick hook of Powell for Okoro and they looked better then as well. The whole season combined has seen 23 minutes of this versus 97 with the usual starters:
As the Bulls have an extremely limited roster, every proposed solution invites a tradeoff. And with Powell out, especially for someone delightfully nicknamed ‘NoScoreO’, it really reduces the shooting threat on the floor. That’s in theory. In practice, Powell has really struggled to shoot so far this season, entering the year with a career 55.8% eFG%2 and producing a 48.1% eFG% as a Bull. He is only tenuously maintaining his overall efficiency by really ramping up his free throw generation, with an attempt rate of .67 which is nearly two and a half times over his prior-to-Bulls career of .29.
Anecdotally, I haven’t seen it be the case where Powell is grifting for FTs to start games and throwing off the team, but more that he does it after “Splitter’s System3” isn’t producing: taking it upon himself to start generating offense in any way possible.
There is also the contrasting evidence in the face of offseason theory in the play of Jalen Smith. With him as an (apparently) absolutely-nails Stretch-5 instead of non-shooter Nic Claxton, that exchange can mitigate some of whatever shooting has been lost in swapping out Powell for Okoro.
What we’ve seen so far is too drastic a difference on both ends of the floor - and of course the extremely small sample - to believe it’s sustainable. So it’s likely not some silver bullet for the starting lineup, or Powell’s own play, to have Powell become the 6th man. BUT: maybe the defensive (including rebounding) improvement doesn’t slump, and the Bulls can lose by ten instead of thirty.
I’m becoming convinced that Tiago Splitter doesn’t care about winning games anyway, when he insists on these all-bench lineups, especially those that include mothballs-exhumed Patrick Williams.
Maybe Splitter is prioritizing player development over getting out of the relegation zone. As a reminder, I agree (if this is intentional…) with that hierarchy of goals this season:
Caleb Wilson playing real minutes
[giant downgrade in importance to where it’s inaccurate to call the next thing “2nd”]
Matas Buzelis improving
Increasing trade value for tradeable - not you, Giddey - veterans
Other 24-and-under - not you, Giddey - players improving
Priority #4 is harmed with Powell and Claxton remaining on the bench, but I don’t think too much. Would it be a bad sign that Bryson Graham used $45M in cap space on two players best suited for the bench of a 20-win team? Yes, though we should take that for what it is: maybe he’s not a good GM! But Graham can make up for it if other veterans like Smith and Okoro increase their trade value, plus to reemphasize: that Caleb Wilson is given competitive reps makes everything else Graham can do of lower concern. They couldn’t keep getting demolished like this, and in Sunday’s game they were decidedly not.
We’ll see what happens on Wednesday, as Splitter and the Bulls were somewhat conveniently incorporating injury into this starting lineup decision, and both Powell’s ailment and Claxton’s minutes restriction may not be a factor for much longer. They’re facing the Spurs, so, uh…also hope that they have some convenient injuries?
yes, it was a daytime affair, that might have had something to do with the star-laden Sixers’ performance.
it drops a tenth of a percentage point if you include his 8-game Bulls tenure
I really don’t care for the report from Bulls PR that Splitter has instructed the public address announcer to get rid of the traditional introductions (“the man in the middle”, e.g.) for a positional order to promote Splitter’s “egalitarian” or whatever ethos. It was funny to hear Gottlieb get asked this on the CHGO post-game podcast and he said he didn’t know, but assumed the coaching staff wouldn’t be concerned over such matters. TO THE CONTRARY.