Plenty Of Terrible Options
Grant and MCW were both so awful that Hoiberg resorted to playing Isaiah Canaan for 34 minutes in Game 4. Canaan was a forgotten man in the rotation for most of the regular season. In fact, he had more DNP-CDs than minutes after the All Star break. Surprisingly, Canaan shook off that rust and contributed to a Bulls comeback in the third quarter. Unsurprisingly, he struggled to keep up with Isaiah Thomas the longer he stayed on the court. You can’t expect a player to go from months of inactivity to playing 30+ minutes in a playoff game without conditioning becoming a factor.
It’s crazy to think that Canaan (whom Hoiberg confirmed will start Game 5) will become an important role player for the Bulls as they try to bounce back in this series. But what other options does Fred have? Grant and MCW look completely useless. He chose Canaan over Cameron Payne and Denzel Valentine, whose combined 8 minutes of action in this series came in garbage time of the Game 3 blowout loss. Fred needs to fill the 34 minutes Rondo averaged in Games 1 and 2. He has five point/combo guards to choose from, but he doesn’t really trust any of them. As bad as Hoiberg has been finding a steady and successful rotation this season, having 5 dud guards on his bench is not his fault.
They Did That
That fault falls on Gar and Paxson, who constructed this roster.
They got Jerian Grant in the packaged trade of Derrick Rose and were excited for his potential as the point guard of the future. Removing a brief hot streak from behind the three point line midseason, Horace Grant’s nephew looks incapable of the simplest tasks. He can’t get the ball up the floor cleanly if he’s met with any defensive pressure. His entry passes to the post are sloppy and he’s not great at creating his own shot. So he’s not a pass-first point guard or a shoot-first point guard. Another way to identify that would be “not a point guard.”
They traded Tony Snell for Michael Carter-Williams. At the time, Bulls fans couldn’t believe management was able to get anything for Snell, a consistently disappointing draft bust. Fast forward to the present, and we’ve all realized we got fleeced on that one. Snell had a resurgent season with the Bucks and is giving them meaningful minutes in their playoff series as they try to upset the Raptors. Carter-Williams is getting stuffed on drives, throwing bricks off the side of backboards and proving that the “at least he’s a long and talented defender” theory was a hilarious falsehood.
They drafted Denzel Valentine with the 14th pick in the 2016 draft. It’s unfortunate that the rookie injured his ankle in preseason, but that excuse only lasts so long. Unless the Bulls PR team is hiding something, the kid’s been healthy for a while now. So why has he not been able to crack the rotation? Is Valentine actually worse than Grant, MCW and Canaan? Judging from Hoiberg’s rotation late in the season and against Boston, that’s the only logical answer. If Denzel is truly that bad, the front office deserves the blame for selecting him and over-hyping his NBA potential.
They brought Cameron Payne to Chicago at the trade deadline. This trade is so much worse than the Snell-MCW trade. At least that was a shot in the dark involving just two role players in need of a change of scenery. But at the deadline, unsure what to do in their “compete while developing young talent” season, Gar and Paxson gave two of their top six players and a draft pick to the Thunder for Payne. Joffrey Lauvergne and Anthony Morrow were contract-evening afterthoughts who will likely be gone next season.
From the Bulls’ perspective, this was all about getting something for Taj Gibson and Doug McDermott. What they got was a kid with a limited skillset that doesn’t fit either backcourt position. Hoiberg was so unimpressed with Cam in his first handful of meaningful minutes that the second year player spent most of March and April playing for the D-League Windy City Bulls. Despite the vomit-inducing play from Grant and MCW, Payne’s been inactive for 3 of their first 4 playoff games. But never fear, Gar and Paxson have high hopes for him being the “point guard of the future”, just like Grant.
…My eyes just rolled out of my head.
[USE ARROWS TO CONTINUE READING]
