The Bulls won their second game in January beating the Wizards 115-106 on Wednesday; however, they lost another player for an extended period of time.
Daniel Gafford, who was seeing increased minutes in place of the injured Wendell Carter Jr., dislocated his thumb early in the game. Reports are stating he will be out 2-4 weeks.
Following the loss to the Wizards, the Bulls lost their seventh game in January, falling to the 76ers 100-89 on Friday night. Though the injuries aren’t ideal, I believe that it could be key in understanding if Jim Boylen’s coaching abilities go beyond what he has shown. He has four players with injuries that will keep them out for an extended period of time. It’s time to see what Boylen can make of this group until after the All-Star break when we should see our starting cast back.
With the loss to two of the big men for the Bulls, it’s time to see how Boylen can use the rest of the team effectively to maximize the player’s abilities. This could be a key stretch in evaluating Boylen as a coach. The majority of fans and the media already believe we have seen the type of coach that Boylen can be and those arguments are fair. This roster is made up of young and hungry players who would be willing to step in and play in new roles to help this team win games. We saw a lot of Luke Kornet against the 76ers with Cristiano Felicio coming in at times. This was to be expected with Boylen as he has the next man up mentality and doesn’t tend to change his game plan much from the traditional style of coaching.
This team has All-Star talent in Zach LaVine, who accounted for 23 points against the 76ers, but they can’t rely on him to do everything during this period of injuries. It would be nice to see more of Lauri Markkanen out on the floor for longer stretches of time.
Against the 76ers, Lauri played less than 30 minutes, in a game where the Bulls lacked size across the board. With the injuries, Boylen went with a small ball combination of Markannen and Young out on the floor playing the 4 & 5. This was for a very brief period in the second quarter of the game. That type of lineup spread the floor, which took some of the pressure off of LaVine and matched up nicely against a 76ers team missing Joel Embiid. However, after a few minutes, Boylen went away from that lineup because it didn’t fit his traditional style of basketball.
At this point in the season, fans were hoping to see some cohesion between the starters and improvement in some of our young players but due to injuries and some questionable coaching decisions that aren’t the case.
With the season halfway complete and a tough stretch with injuries, this is Boylen’s time to make a case for his job. Make changes to the lineup to accommodate for injuries, try something new, and show the city and the fans that you actually care. We have a good core of young talent, so let’s see them play. In Boylen’s mind, this should be his last effort to try and keep his job, if he chooses to do nothing different then all Bulls fans along with myself will happily show him the door.
