It's been an active summer for other NBA teams, with the Lakers getting Steve Nash, the Heat getting Ray Allen, Deron Williams staying with the Nets, and the Knicks getting Jason Kidd while probably keeping Linsanity. Not surprisingly, the Bulls have done little. I have a long held theory that when the White Sox are doing well, they get first dibs on the money and the Bulls' reservoir dries up. The Sox are doing well this year so no money for the Bulls unless they were miraculously on the verge of a championship.
With that in mind it is not surprising that the Bulls may well not resign Asik (the alternative is to over pay him), Brewer, Watson, Lucas, or Korver, and at the very least will certainly let some of those guys go. And our big addition this summer? The Bulls play the drum roll and present Kirk Hinrich! Hmm, that name does sound familiar. Oh yeah, that's the guy that the Bulls actually paid (in the form of both cash and a better draft pick) Washington to take off our hands the summer before last!
Well, you can't say the Bulls management isn't funny. And there sort of were reasons for what they did. In 2010 they were dumping salaries left and right with some insane hope of landing Lebron James. I thought at the time that it was stupid to toss Hinrich away on a chance worse than a lottery ticket, rather than keep him around to teach Rose some defense, and in retrospect it clearly was a bad move, but they were dreaming big then.
And now, well, if they aren't going to spend any money, they may as well pick up someone who wants to be here (Hinrich never sold his house from his first stint) plays defense and has a good attitude. I like Hinrich, even though I don't see him as a big upgrade from Watson. So, I guess I actually give the move a thumb's up, even though I can't resist chiding them for it.
Really, the Bulls are in a holding pattern now, waiting both to see if Rose will recover and for the Sox to be bad again. In their best case scenario, both of these take place next year. In the following year (or possibly the one after that) the Bulls amnesty the hopeless Carlos Boozer and bring over a ready-for-NBA Nikola Mirotic, who has been progressing nicely in Europe. And as long as I'm dreaming, we dump Deng before then and sign a tougher minded wing player coming into his prime and get a low post banger who will both score a little and play some defense without being insanely overpaid for just doing the former (like Mr. Boozer).
It's tough to have your hopes projected out a few years when this past season was setup for a championship. They did have the best record in the league despite having more than their share of injuries during the year. If Rose and Noah hadn't been injured in the playoffs I think the Bulls had the best chance to win it all, but it clearly wasn't to be. And the worst part about it is that we may not have hit bottom yet. Noah is out of the Olympics from that same injury so it is obviously far more serious than first thought. And more players never recover from Rose's injury than fully make it back. On the hopeful side he has youth and a good work ethic in his favor for recovery, but you can do everything right and win with the ACL. (Two days ago we were treated to video of Rose limping into a Hollywood nightclub, so we know he doesn't have his dance moves back yet.) However, no point in thinking about him never recovering and best to plan for a future with Rose again. The alternative will look amazingly like the Bulls team that made the lottery the year before Rose was drafted.
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