Is Tom Thibodeau to blame for the Chicago Bulls’ demise?
The Bulls have advanced to the postseason all five seasons that Tom Thibodeau has been the head coach. They have made it past the second round only once – his first year.
For the past five years, the Chicago Bulls have been stuck in the NBA’s upper middle class. In truth, this is not an undesirable place. The Bulls get the benefit of the doubt being honorable postseason losers, while they also stand out of the way of true success.
The blame for the Bulls’ inability to escape the East has been placed squarely on the shoulders of head coach Tom Thibodeau. As a result, he will likely part ways with Chicago (he also looks to be the leading candidate for the New Orleans Pelicans’ open coaching position). But is he truly at fault?
Is Tom Thibodeau to blame?
The common complaint levied against Thibodeau is that he overworks his players in the regular season. Tactically, when the goal is to win the game at hand, Thibodeau is one of the best in the NBA. His 255-139 regular season record proves as much. The Bulls have not finished lower than second in the Central Division every year that he’s has been the coach, and they have enjoyed home court advantage in the first round in every season save one (2012-13).
But strategically, when the goal is to place your team in the best position to win a championship in the long run, Thibodeau has failed.
Pau Gasol’s absence for a great deal of the Cleveland series illustrates that failure. Gasol had been playing 34 minutes per game at 34 years old, yet when the Bulls needed a rebounding presence and mid-range offense in the postseason, Gasol’s hamstring acted up.
Beyond Gasol, Jimmy Butler has played nearly 39 minutes per game in the past two seasons, and has missed large chunks of time each year.
Meanwhile, Joakim Noah has become a shell of his former self, shooting poorly and failing to get rebounds. This ineffectiveness is the result of his knee surgery which have made him less mobile and more timid.
Finally, there is Derrick Rose, whose history with knee injuries has been well-documented. In every season since 2010-11, Rose has missed time due to an injury. Including the playoffs, he has played in less than one third of the Bulls’ games (113 of 347) since the team lost to the Miami Heat in the 2011 Eastern Conference Finals.
The truth about Thibodeau is that he gives the Bulls a chance to compete in the playoffs every year. He has the highest floor of any coach in the NBA not named Popovich. His brand of defense-heavy lineups that eliminate corner threes and easy inside baskets will always produce more wins than losses, especially in the weaker Eastern Conference.
But at the same time, Thibodeau currently has a glass ceiling: a second or third round exit. The Bulls cannot win a series against a legitimate title contender with only defense. They needed floor spacing, healthy players and a go-to All-Star. Thibodeau’s coaching style was not conducive to that sort of combination. Keeping Tom Thibodeau meant staying in the playoffs. It also meant staying out of true championship contention.
Are the players to blame?
The appeal of the Bulls lies in their tenacity; never can a team chalk up an easy win against them. Opponents will be forced to grind through tough perimeter defense and scrappy play no matter how the Bulls are scoring that game. With Thibodeau they are tenacious almost to a fault, as it often leads to the injury situations that the Bulls have endured in the playoffs up to this point.
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Yet that trademark scrappiness was not on display for Game 6 against the Cavaliers. With its season on the line, the team was passive going through their offensive sets, and allowed Matthew-frickin-Dellavedova to take over the game. Even with the injury to Gasol, this was the healthiest Bulls team in the postseason since their 2011 playoff run. Beyond that, they were going up against a Cleveland team that was without Kevin Love for the series and J.R. Smith for the first two games – not to mention that Kyrie Irving was never at full health.
On top of that, add an uncharacteristically inefficient series out of LeBron James and the Bulls should have won this series in less than seven games. Instead, they lost in less than seven.
This team played without any spirit or confidence. Derrick Rose finally cut loose in the playoffs, and that meant play that was both electrifying and inefficient. Noah’s jump shot disappeared, meaning teams felt more confident clogging the lane when he operated away from the basket. The rest of the bench was lethargic in the series loss, and too often had lapses in control and efficiency.
Jimmy Butler is a wonderful player, but he is not the best player on a championship team. If Derrick Rose can become more efficient, then perhaps he is that player. But that refrain has been repeated too often for any sane fan of the Bulls to think that Rose will return to his original form.
Is the front office to blame?
As individual pieces, the Chicago Bulls sport one of the most talented and promising lineups in the NBA. When healthy and productive, the their main four of Rose, Butler, Gasol and Noah are all among the top 10 of starters at their position group. And their bench, with Aaron Brooks, Taj Gibson and Nikola Mirotic, to only name three, contains a deep cadre of players more than capable of having significant minutes.
However, as a unit the Bulls are a limited team. They are defense-heavy, without any sort of floor spacing or offensive rhythm. Their sets are simple and archaic, and they lack enough top end perimeter shooting (Okay, Tony Snell is a capable bench 3-and-D wing and Mike Dunleavy is a very strong shooter as a fifth man, but do either strike fear into the hearts of opposing defenses like the shooters of the major contenders?).
Meanwhile, their interior players are either aging or named Nikola Mirotic – meaning the former strength of interior defense is now a glaring weakness. Certainly they are not terrible, but the team’s limits make it incapable of beating the more complete squads in the NBA, even in the weak Eastern Conference.
General manager Gar Forman has shown an ability to identify talent (Butler, Mirotic and Gibson stand out as inspired acquisitions), but he hasn’t used that talent to build a well-rounded roster. He also has failed whenever he hoped to be aggressive in free agency – no splash signings of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade or Carmelo Anthony whenever they were shopping around. Snagging these players may seem unrealistic and perhaps even foolish, but with a more aggressive front office that wouldn’t have been out of the realm of possibility.
Perhaps the more troubling issue with the front office is its inability to function with the incumbent head coach. Thibodeau has been undermined multiple times, starting with the firing of his top assistant Ron Adams – a move that Forman failed to provide any sort of explanation for. There have also been concerns with the hiring of trainers to contradict Thibodeau’s lineups (although this claim is a bit suspect). Reports of a rift have trickled out of the Bulls’ front office, and it can be quickly gathered that these issues originate from management rather than coaching.
Forman also had problems with the Vinnie Del Negro regime. While it is not surprising that anyone would have a problem with Vinnie Del Negro as a coach, he has the opposite personality of the intense, blustery Thibodeau. Clearly it was not the same case of clashing dispositions, yet Forman also found a way to undermine him from within by way of calculated personnel choices.
Rather than being willing to reconcile those differences and create a team in a synthesized direction, Forman has cast his coaches as the enemy. One must wonder if the next Bulls coach will meet the same fate. Pair this with the inability to create a well-rounded lineup, and Chicago’s front office shoulders a great deal of the blame.
Is bad luck to blame?
LeBron James is decent at basketball. He is exceptionally decent when playing against the Chicago Bulls. James has played a part in eliminating the Bulls in three of Thibodeau’s five seasons (and four of the past six Bulls seasons). He has led the East’s champion in each of the past four seasons, and if his Cavs beat the Atlanta Hawks, it will make it a fifth consecutive year.
Without James’ presence in the East, particularly as the architect for the Miami Heat, the Bulls could have easily seen at least one Eastern Conference Championship.
No one has proven to be equipped to stop a LeBron-led team in the East since “The Decision,” though the team that appeared the closest was the Bulls with a fully healthy Rose in 2011. Rose’s injury in the 2012 playoffs could be classified as a freak accident, an impossible scenario to anticipate. His elongated recovery and diminishing returns since integrating himself into the lineup stunted the potential of this group and robbed the team of a chance to compete with the conference elite.
Luck definitely played a role in Chicago’s playoff futility, but alone it does not explain the past five seasons. It is becoming abundantly clear that the issues with the Bulls run deeper than coaching. If they let go of Thibodeau – an above-average coach – it’s likely that the successor will perform even worse. That’s a problem with the personnel.
AsThibodeau coaches right now, the Bulls never have a chance to win the Finals; however it is possible to win with him if he can become less stubborn. It is not possible to win with this limited group of players, even with the team at full health. The Bulls will need to rebuild the components of their team, and blowing up the roster may call for a change in coaching anyway.
Regardless, the Bulls as we know them will either change beyond recognition, or stay stuck in postseason mediocrity.