Jimmy Butler poured in 31 points to help eliminate his former team 102-91 Friday night.
The Chicago Bulls’ season of mid came to its conclusion Friday night as they were eliminated in the Play-In tournament by Jimmy Butler & the Miami Heat 102-91. The 40-42 Bulls were trying to become the 1st 10-seed to make the playoffs by winning both games of the play-in tournament and for a minute it looked as though as the Bulls might pull it off. A Coby White 3-pointer gave the Bulls an 85-80 midway through the 4th quarter. Another 3-pointer by White after the Heat tied the score at 87 gave the Bulls a 3-point lead with over 3 minutes left. The Heat close the game out on a 15-2 run to make the playoffs as the #8 seed.
The Bulls’ play during the play-in tournament was a microcosm of how they played all season long. The Bulls trailed by as many as 18 points in their play-in game against Toronto due to another slow, lethargic start. It’s been a recipe Bulls fans have seen far too often this season. The Raptors though allowed the Bulls to get back in it as they missed 18 FTs during the game and played sloppily in the 4th quarter as the Bulls rallied for a 109-105 win. As well as the Bulls played down the stretch against the Raptors they played just as poorly down the stretch against the Heat on Friday. The Bulls took & made 17 fewer FTs, were minus-14 on the boards (including losing the offensive rebounding battle 10-5) and shot only 28% from the 3-pt line. The Bulls had trouble locating open 3-point shooters for MIA and Max Struss went off for 7 of 12 from 3 while scoring 31 points.
Despite the Bulls ranking in the top 5 in defensive net rating they also ranked 28th in offensive rebounds, last in 3PT FG attempted and made, 26th in Free Throw attempts, 24th in offensive net rating, 23rd in Assist percentage and 28th in offensive rebounding percentage. All of these deficiencies spelled for a team that was the very definition of mediocre.
So now that the season has come to an end – what’s next? Well let’s hear what Bulls VP of Operations Arturas Karnisovas and Head Coach Billy Donovan had to say in his end of season presser:
Arturas Karnsiovas & Billy Donovan address the media after the Bulls were eliminated.
There are a number of key things for the Bulls to do during this offseason. Here’s what they should be focusing on:
Arturas Karnisovas Must Have A Plan: AK went into the last offseason believing that continuity would be the key to the Bulls being in contention once again and that plan failed spectacularly. He didn’t address the Bulls lack of shooting heading into the 2022-23 season. He didn’t address the PG situation due to not precisely knowing Lonzo Ball’s status(Ball ended up missing the entire season) and he didn’t make any significant upgrades at the trade deadline. When asked about this season and the status of the team, Karnisovas offered up these thoughts:
“If you were going to have told me we’re going to be a top-five defensive team in the league prior to the season, I would think that we would struggle defensively instead of offensively. We struggled most of the year on offense, 24th offense in the league,” Karnišovas pointed out. “We were 16th (offense) post All-Star, but we were number one defensive post All-Star Weekend. And our record against good teams. That tells you that we’re better than our record. However, we are where we are. We are a 40-42 team. At the end of the day to be a .500 team is not good enough. I’m going to have to look at everything. But I would rather take this year’s than last year’s (team) where we were just beating up on bad teams. I think this year certain improvements were made and I’m happy to be competitive in every game.”
— Arturas Karnisovas via Sam Smith NBA.com
The Tough Pill To Swallow: Karnisovas has a tough pill to swallow but he needs to make a decision on this issue before he can move forward – DeMar DeRozan or Nikola Vucevic. Part of the offensive woes for this Bulls team dealt with the fact DeRozan & Vucevic shared the same space on offense. Vooch often found himself on the perimeter and at times the forgotten man as DeRozan & LaVine tried to do their thing. Vucevic aveaged 17.6ppg & 11.0rpg during the season but at points looked to be lost within the offense. DeRozan put up 24.5ppg, 5.1apg, 4.6rpg on 50% shooting this season. DeRozan made a living in the mid-range game but was not a volume 3-point shooter and is a ball dominant wing player. That style just doesn’t mesh that well with Vooch. DeRozan will be 33 heading into the 2023-24 season while Vucevic will be 34. DeRozan will be looking for an extension to the last year of his deal with the Bulls while Vooch heads into the offseason as an unrestricted free agent. The idea of keeping both players who occupy the same space and never really seemed to gel is an issue. The money it will take to keep both players would severely limit their options of upgrading their shooting. As tough as this sounds… the better option would be to keep Vucevic.
Lonzo Ball will more than likely miss the 2023-24 season with a 3rd knee surgery. Image courtesy of Chicago Sun-Times
The Point Guard Situation: Karnisovas made the mistake of not addressing the point guard situation last year as Lonzo Ball tried to rehab his knee. He would have two procedures done and could never get healthy enough to begin rehabbing the knee. Ball wound up getting a 3rd surgery in March and will more than likely miss most if not all of the 2023-24 season. Despite that, Arturas is still confident Lonzo will play in a Bulls uniform again:
“I have confidence that he’s going to come back,’’ Bulls executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas said. “In terms of a timeline, I don’t have that timeline right now… but we’re going to make adjustments and tweaks to the roster to address that.
— Arturas Karnisovas via Joe Cowley, Chicago Sun Times
The Bulls must make an upgrade at the point guard position this offseason. They need a point guard who can run the offense, take the pressure off of DeRozan who was the primary ballhandler(if he is still with the team) and get the scorers in the best position to get high quality looks.
GET SOME SHOOTERS: Too many times DeRozan and LaVine was forced to bail the Bulls out because there just weren’t enough options to spread the floor and get open shots. Case in point was Friday night as Billy Donovan went with a lineup of DeMar, Zach, Vooch, Caruso and Pat Bev. Caruso & Beverly aren’t good scorers so the defense basically dared them to shoot. Upgrading the Bulls’ bench with players who can shoot 3’s has to be a necessity. The Bulls cannot go into another season being the worst 3-point shooting team in the league when the average NBA team is putting up 34.2 three-pointers in a game.
There are plenty of decisions for the Bulls front office to make. This time around they won’t have the goodwill of the fans’ patience. They’re not going to be given the benefit of the doubt. This is going to be a make or break offseason for the Bulls’ brass.
