WARNING!!!!!!!! THE PROCEEDING POST CONTAINS ANALYSIS WITH THINGS LIKE DETAIL AND STATLINES AND...... *BRACES HIMSELF* WORDS! YES I KNOW IT'S TOO LONG AND YOU DIDN'T READ. YES WE ALL KNOW I'M ON DRUGS. DO YOURSELF A FAVOR AND WHATEVER YOU DO DON'T READ THIS POST BECAUSE SERIOUSLY IF SOMETHING CAN'T BE SAID IN UNDER 3 SENTENCES WITH AN EMOTICON THEN IT SHOULDN'T BE SAID! OR MAYBE YOU CAN PRINT THIS OUT AND PUT IT UP ON YOUR FRIDGE TO WARN THE KIDS THAT IF THEY TRY DRUGS THEY COULD END UP BEING LIKE THIS. DON'T BE LIKE THIS. GO TO ANOTHER THREAD NOW! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!Nas wrote:
Something is going on with the Bulls. They've been bad all year.
did you mean defensively? in that regard there's no doubt about that.... otherwise i think we're just seeing what happens when the bulls start getting a little swag thinking they're an offensive juggernaught of a team (~102-103ppg!) and lately they've been caught with their pants down, offensively speaking, and they're being a bit lax on defense.
does anything stand out to you in tonight's team stat line?
Chicago Bulls 114 PT 41-84 FG (.488) 24-33 FT (.727) 8-27 3P (.296) 43/11 RB 25 AS 5 BL 6 ST 14 TO 20 PF (Final, Magic)
8-27 from 3 point land? THE BULLS ARE JACKING UP 27 THREES?!?!?! wtf is going on here? the magic dropped 120+ on them so let's see how they did it...
Orlando Magic 121 PT 48-81 FG (.593) 18-29 FT (.621) 7-18 3P (.389) 34/2 RB 28 AS 3 BL 10 ST 10 TO 25 PF (Final, Bulls)
aha, they did it with a borderline/crazy-shooting-night @ 59% and yet they didnt need to jack up 27 -3pointers to do it.
i know my words/thoughts/analysis are generally unwanted here, as i'll be told that i'm on drugs if i dare to eviscerate the 3-sentence/1-paragraph limit via boundless audacity brandished when i assume that anyone out there wants to read anything i want to say.... however anyone not hell-bent on perpetuating a meme to kiss nas' ass might actually dabble in a few of my sentences and notice that i tend to be pretty much spot-on with my analysis of this team. it's not rocket science.
in this case, i'd say that the bulls are feeling themselves a bit too much and the result is offensive masturbation. joking aside, when i see 27 3pt attempts the first thing that comes to mind is "kobe heat checks" (you know, where kobe launches up a ~27ft 3pt shot out of the blue to see if he's hot or not) and that the bulls had a whole lot of heat checks tonight. or maybe they wanted to prove to themselves that they weren't going to get scared away from teh 3pt shot even tho they missed a ton of them.... they kept chucking them up there knowing that at the very least the law of averages had their back.
Derrick Rose 18 PT 8-15 FG 1-3 FT 1-5 3P 2/0 RB 7 AS 0 BL 2 ST 3 TO 3 PF 30 MN (Final, Magic)
Jimmy Butler 17 PT 5-13 FG 4-4 FT 3-6 3P 2/2 RB 2 AS 0 BL 0 ST 1 TO 2 PF 42 MN (Final, Magic)
Nikola Mirotic 11 PT 2-7 FG 6-9 FT 1-4 3P 2/1 RB 0 AS 1 BL 2 ST 0 TO 2 PF 11 MN (Final, Magic)
Pau Gasol 28 PT 10-16 FG 8-10 FT 0-1 3P 14/0 RB 1 AS 2 BL 1 ST 4 TO 1 PF 34 MN (Final, Magic)
well everything looks pretty proper there.... holy shit it's nice to have a legit #4, eh? derrick only went 8-15, but 4 of those 7 misses were from 3pt range. jimmy butler hasn't been shooting well lately.... in fact i went to check on it and what did i see?
Jimmy Butler 14.8 PT .328 of 12.8 FG .800 of 6.0 FT .364 of 4.4 3P 6.0/2.0 RB 3.6 AS 0.6 BL 2.0 ST 2.0 TO 1.8 PF 39.1 MN 5/5 GS (last 5 games)
compare that to his season stats
Jimmy Butler 20.9 PT .464 of 14.4 FG .830 of 7.8 FT .342 of 3.1 3P 6.2/2.0 RB 3.36 AS 0.69 BL 1.64 ST 1.58 TO 1.89 PF 39.9 MN 36/36 GS
and yeah, remember when we were hailing jimmy butler as the savior of bulls basketball and talking about his for-sure max contract? he was shooting ~49% at the time those stories started running. these last 5 games have taken him down ~3% overall because he's 33% shooting in his last 5 games. he'll take his free throws, but all of a sudden we're starting to see the jimmy butler we saw last year when he first became a starter. in 13-14 he shot 39.7% in ~10 FGA/game, though he shot roughly the same # of 3pt shots per game, he just didn't shoot well enough to take much more than his ~10 FGA/game.
and at least for the last 5 games we're seeing more of 2013-14 jimmy butler than we are 2014-15 jimmy butler, and while that's been going on...
Derrick Rose 15.0 PT .357 of 16.8 FG .733 of 3.0 FT .190 of 4.2 3P 3.0/0.8 RB 4.2 AS 0.2 BL 1.0 ST 3.4 TO 1.6 PF 32.1 MN 5/5 GS (last 5 games)
he's hitting 19% of 4+ 3ptrs/game? nas was truly onto something when he said that derrick was falling in love with his shot a little bit too much, cuz while we've lamentably been conditioned into accepting that derrick is going to have those stretches where he shoots 33% (but hey to his credit at least he's got some magnum style going on out there! 357!) but you know what's messed up?
Derrick Rose 15.2 PT .335 of 17.6 FG .828 of 2.9 FT .213 of 4.7 3P 2.8/0.5 RB 4.7 AS 0.6 BL 0.8 ST 3.2 TO 1.1 PF 31.3 MN 10/10 GS (last 10 games)
he's actually toned down the # of 3pt shots he's jacking up there! and look at those scary free throw #s.... he isn't getting his star points by diving into the lane and getting into the line.... he's just jacking up long 2s/3s and by and large not making them.
so yeah TL;DR? I NEED MAH ST LOUIS BULLS MAN TO TELL ME THIS WAS TL;DR AND A DRUG-FUELED-RANT! cuz you know us drug addicts man.... we hit our veins/pipes/bowls/blunts/wickey-sticks and then it's like AWWWWW YEAH WHAT TEH FUCK MAN WHERE MY NBA STATISTICS AT?!?!!?
but i guess i could have saved a lot of words by simply saying "the bulls have gotten caught up feeling their offense a bit too much, assuming that they can ease up on defense because they're got the firepower to outscore you" -- which theoretically, yeah, they do. but as a team they're not used to playing games that way. they're used to grinding out tryhard wins with scores of ~92-86 or something, and when you start having those 121-114 games like you have tonight.... man you better hit your shots if you're gonna give up 121 damn points. and the bulls haven't been doing that lately and the result = losses like the last few where we can either call it growing pains or regression to the mean. the bulls weren't going to play 13-2 basketball from that point on through the rest of the season, granted, but at the same time it's frustrating to see them seemingly turn a corner offensively and figure out some new and exciting dynamics..... only to have them fall flat on their face to relatively/underwhelming opponents who now evidently have license to come into the UC and drop 120 on you.
methinks thibbs will have some sort of a "COME TO JESUS!!!" meeting with the guys at some point and stress the importance of defense first and foremost, and while that's not exactly going to transform this team into one with the defensive prowess/tenacity of the earlier iterations of the super-tryhard bulls (aka the thibodeau era). still, that's hopefully going to get their heads right and focused on what they need to do to win ballgames; because if the bulls go out there every night with a mindset like "we're going to shoot your asses off of the court" then they're going to lose a lot of ballgames that they ordinarily should win because you're going to have nights where your shots don't fall versus a CRAZY SHOOTING NIGHT by your opponents.
however if they go out there with a mindset like "we're going to make you earn every point and play hard for 48 minutes and if our shot's on you've got no fucking chance" then you can have that team that everyone's in a rush to call the best in the east, because let's face it after lebron and the cavs i dont think anyone on the national level really wants to wave pom poms for atlanta hawks and/or toronto raptors basketball. i've always said that the league is at its best when the knicks, bulls, and lakers are at their best.... so when any of them are looking like they can be pretty good go figure that the national hype train isn't far behind to pump pump pump pump them up into legit contenders, and when that kind of hyperbole gets in your head.... shit next thing you know you're the best 3pt shooter in the damn league! ask steph rose out there.
TLDR = lately the bulls have been playing like an offense-first/only team and what you're seeing is a reminder that this team needs to focus on defense and rebounding first and foremost. thibs will undoubtedly snap on them at some point and, god willing, they'll get back to basics.... that is unless ben wallace shows up to suspend joakim noah for something cuz then at point anything's fair game =D
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Curious Hair wrote:
Les Grobstein's huge hog is proof that God has a sense of humor, isn't it?
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