Del Negro unable to control Bulls, fate in Chicago
NEW YORK -- If you want to get a read on the state of Vinny Del Negro's Bulls, don't look at the final score of Tuesday night's 88-81 loss to the Knicks. The frigid temperature of this desolate franchise was registered much earlier, and the startling numbers make it obvious where this is going.
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| If it weren't for the front office being so methodical, Vinny Del Negro's stay in Chicago might not last until Christmas. (AP) |
Think about that. For nearly 30 minutes of basketball time, the team that pushed defending champion Boston to seven games last spring -- overtime after thrilling overtime -- was three times worse than the Kings and Knicks on consecutive nights.
This isn't the same team, of course, and that's a big part of the problem. With visions of Chicago native Dwyane Wade dancing in their heads -- finally, another Jordan, yada-yada-yada -- the Bulls brain trust of Jerry Reinsdorf, John Paxson and Gar Forman let Ben Gordon go to Detroit and figured John Salmons would replace his scoring. Gordon masked a lot of flaws on this team, including the coach. Salmons produced seven points, no assists and three turnovers in 26 minutes Tuesday night, and got himself benched for the start of the third quarter along with Brad Miller (0 for 3, zero points, one rebound in 13 minutes).
"We definitely have a lot of soul searching to do," said Joakim Noah, who had 10 points and 21 rebounds in the Bulls' 13th loss in 17 games.
Soul searching doesn't begin to describe it. The Bulls are lost. They fail to compete for long stretches, run an offense that barely qualifies as a strategy and are getting nothing from the guys who are supposed to be their primary frontcourt and backcourt scorers.
"We have some things that we have to talk about as a team," Noah said.
It was hard to get a read on whether Noah agreed with the benching of Miller and Salmons or not. But you didn't have to be a mind reader to see this: With the exception of a brief spasm of effort in the second half Tuesday night, the Bulls have stopped giving effort for their coach. If this weren't the stubborn, methodical Bulls management, Del Negro would've been fired already. If it weren't the Bulls, you could bet everything under the Christmas tree he would be sent packing Wednesday, which would give the new coach three days to prepare for the next game at home Saturday against New Orleans.
As distasteful as that would be for Reinsdorf -- who owes Del Negro two more years of salary while still paying Scott Skiles after his Christmas Eve 2007 firing -- it's unavoidable. The plan to give Del Negro until mid-January or so to right the ship -- with a healthy Tyrus Thomas back in the lineup -- has become pure folly.
According to sources, there is strong reluctance in the organization to move assistant coach Bernie Bickerstaff into the interim job for the rest of the season. Bickerstaff is heavily involved in the in-game strategy -- which stinks, by the way -- and moreover, he's detached from the players. If you think the players have stopped competing for Del Negro, one person with knowledge of the Bulls' situation said, just wait until they got a hold of Bickerstaff.
Paxson? "Too thin-skinned," another person with knowledge of the situation said. This notion was supported by another person who said Paxson also is too high-strung to take over on the bench, given that he repeatedly storms out of the owner's suite during games because he can't bear to watch. Paxson with a front-row view of this mess, with the closest exit on the loading dock, wouldn't be a pretty sight. Putting Paxson within earshot of fans in the United Center -- who could remind him that he traded the rights to LaMarcus Aldridge for Thomas and gave $60 million to broken-down Ben Wallace -- wouldn't be great for business, either.
Two sources with knowledge of the team's strategy said a strong candidate to replace Del Negro is assistant coach Pete Myers, a Paxson favorite who is viewed in the organization as a lifelong Bull. "He's always been a house pet," one of the people said. To this point, his claim to fame was becoming the Bulls' shooting guard when Michael Jordan retired the first time in 1993. Replacing Del Negro should be a little easier.
But whether any of this solves anything is another story. After this dreadful back-to-back dose of embarrassment, the fractures in the Bulls locker room are too wide for any coach to heal.
"The thing is, if you were my friend, I would tell you a lot of things," Noah said to one reporter who asked about the Bulls' disjointed offense Tuesday night. "But I feel like if I say something, then it's going to make things really bad. We're going through hard times and I don't want to make it any tougher."
That wasn't the only indictment of Del Negro that emerged Tuesday night. The most troubling, to me, came during the layup line. Less than 24 hours after blowing a 35-point lead on their home floor, the Bulls were clowning around during warmups as though they were getting ready to play the Rockettes. Miller, who contributed nothing but a scowl after tipoff, exerted more energy blocking shots and throwing alley-oop bounce passes than he did in the game. I learned two things from watching the Bulls' layup drill: 1) Jannero Pargo can't dunk, despite a half dozen of his best efforts; and 2) The Bulls are an undisciplined mess, a team that lacked the conscience to be ashamed of what happened to them the night before.
Of course, it carried over to the game. It always does. Having cut a 22-point deficit to three with 31.8 seconds left, the Bulls ignored the sideline inbounds play that Del Negro drew up for Rose and instead concocted an ill-fated lob pass from Kirk Hinrich to Noah, who had the ball deflected out of bounds off the Knicks. Rose, who was supposed to have received the inbounds from Hinrich for an isolation play at the top of the key, tried to inbound from the baseline. But the ball was either deflected or otherwise eluded Luol Deng's grasp for Chicago's 15th turnover. So much for a reprieve.
"We're not very good mentally," Noah said.
At his locker near the entrance to the coaches' locker room, Rose was asked if the Bulls are running fewer offensive plays than they did last season, when they had Gordon. For anyone watching the Bulls now, it seems like last season's stirring playoff run never happened. For Rose, it's as though someone wiped it from his memory.
"To tell you the truth, I don't know what we ran last year," Rose said. "I just forgot. I tell you, I swear, I forgot some of the plays that we ran last year."
This season, I fear, will be more difficult to forget.
