Tuesday, May 24, 2011

On The Ropes - Instant Analysis

All the trends crumbled tonight. The Bulls were 31-2 when getting at least 6 points from Keith Bogans. They had not lost three straight all season. And in the end it still wasn't enough. The two guys who got the Bulls this far, Derrick Rose and Tom Thibodeau, were not as good as their counterparts, LeBron James and Pat Riley (the wizard behind the Erik Spoelstra curtain).

With regards to Rose, he's learning something that Kevin Durant is also learning this week: 22 year-olds don't generally lead teams to Championships. All the greats needed a few trips around the block before they knew the way. The Bulls jumping out ahead of the planned schedule this year made it look like it was possible to beat this historical NBA truism... and really the Bulls were one more shot away from re-taking control of the series in Game 4. But those are the slim margins of error you have to work with at this level.

Derrick is 22 years old. He's going to continue to hone his jump shot. He's going to hone his low post game so he can use his strength to impose his will on more traditionally built point guards who don't know how to defend on the blocks. He's going to learn to think 2 or 3 passes ahead to orchestrate an offense. He's not as good as he's going to get.

On numerous fronts, more troubling was the degree to which NBA Coach of the Year Tom Thibodeau has been exposed this series as basketball's answer to Dave Wannstedt: an elite defensive coordinator but at the highest levels, out of his depth when put in charge of the whole operation.

And let's not forget here: he's not just playing chess against Erik Spoelstra. This has been Pat Riley at Heat practice drawing up the schemes that have forced Derrick Rose to play basketball in the mud for much of the game. Riles has been Scotty Bowman to Spoelstra's Stan Bowman: the real brains behind the operation. And he's kicking Thibodeau's ass.

For three games, the Bulls continued to screen high for Rose, which played right into the Heat's desire to get a second defender to Rose high on the floor and make him give up the ball or at least re-route him. Everyone watching the game has been baffled by Thibodeau's unwillingness to flatten out and let Rose go to work in a 1-4 against Bibby or Chalmers - neither of whom could hope to keep Rose in front of them. When you do that, at least if/when the help comes it has to come from a much longer distance, giving Rose plenty of time to see the outlet if needed, and it lengthens the distance Miami needs to rotate to keep up with ball movement.

And when did Thibs finally just iso for Rose? The last two possessions of regulation, with LeBron James on him - perhaps the one player in the NBA who can stay in front of him. At 6'8" with top tier athleticism, James can give two full steps and still have the length to close out and bother a jump shot.

Not only could Thibs not devise an offensive set to give his superstar a little room to work, by the 4th quarter he could barely even draw up a play to get the ball in bounds.

While all year, Thibodeau seemed like a coach who would adjust to conditions on the ground, in this series he has been like an NFL coach who will insistently live - and if need be, die - by his game plan.

But on a more basic level, Thibodeau has failed as the leader of an organization this series, because he has betrayed the very foundation upon which this team has been built.

All season, no matter what else the Bulls did, the entire structure was built upon a foundation of defensive accountability - a coordinated, team effort of everyone knowing and doing their jobs. Yet in the final moments of this season, he has allowed Kyle Korver's lack of ability and Carlos Boozer's lack of interest in defense to compromise the structural integrity of the team. It's one thing if Korver is raining threes; you can tolerate his shortcomings because of the element he brings to the offense that one one else can. Ditto for Boozer. When he was a force in the low post earlier in the season and was averaging 20 & 10, he took immense pressure off of Rose and you could tolerate him being the newest statue added to the United Center proper, placed strategically on the defensive end of the court. Even with 20 points and 11 rebounds in Game 4, far too often he stood idly by and watched the Heat score easy baskets, not doing the most basic job of guarding the rim. And when he finally decided to make the extra effort, he picked up a flagrant foul. These are huge momentum killers in the flow of an emotional game. Two easy points allowed is more emotionally abhorrent to a team built on defense than a power forward knocking down a jump shot is energizing to the same team.

Yet when was Boozer playing his best - or at least his least unacceptable - defense? At a point in the season where Thibodeau showed he was willing to sit down his highest paid player for the entire fourth quarter if need be to send a message on how we do things here.

It looks a lot like Boozer has won the battle of wills with his first-year head coach. Which is why he needs to go immediately this offseason. You cannot have a player taking up 25% of your salary cap who needs to be subbed out offense-for-defense in the closing minutes of playoff games. This is an untenable state of affairs for a team that aspires to win a Championship one day soon. So he needs to be dumped off for anything you can get. You can see the earlier Memo for some possibilities on this. But honestly... I'd take an expiring contract at this point. Boozer was a mistake that you need to minimize and put in your rearview mirror, even if it means taking 40 to 50 cents on the dollar for him.

The Bulls are an unfinished product, and when you're in the building phase, the only thing worse than making a mistake is marrying your mistake. Cut bait and put another line in the water. You win some, you lose some. This was a mistake. Eat it. Own it. Fix it. It happens.

Once this series is officially over, we'll talk some more about how we approach this summer. Progress was made this year. The Bulls are undeniably closer to a Championship than they were. There is still some growth and reorganization that needs to happen.




No comments:

Post a Comment