Should We Be Bullish on Ex-Bulls?

Not so long ago, sportswriters used the number of former Chicago Cubs on a major league baseball roster to determine that team's success in the post-season. The more exes there were, the greater the probability the team would fail.

With the NBA playoffs upon us, I'm wondering how that affects professional basketball teams with former members of the Chicago Bulls in their lockerooms.

It was a decade ago that the Bulls seemed on the verge of championship contention. Anchored by nascent superstar Derrick Rose, they possessed all the ingredients for a long run of success. But recurrent injuries to Rose's knees derailed what would have been a brilliant NBA career, and with it the aspirations of the entire roster.

Center Joakim Noah is retired, as are forwards Carlos Boozer and Luol Deng. But a smattering of the roster (including coach Tom Thibodeau) remains active. As do several other former Bulls.

So you have to wonder how the resurgent Atlanta Hawks (with Kris Dunn), Washington Wizards (with Robin Lopez and Daniel Gafford) and New York Knicks (with Rose, Taj Gibson and coach Thibodeau) will fare.

Ditto the Miami Heat, featuring built-in-Chicago superstar Jimmy Butler and fresh off an appearance in last year's NBA Finals. And we shouldn't forget the Milwaukee Bucks and Chicago refugee Bobby Portis.

So despite this season's startling success, does the fact the roster carries three ex-Bulls mean that Knicks' fans should be waving the white flag? Is their series with the Hawks (with only a lone Bull) a foregone conclusion?

And what of the Wizards? With zero ex-Bulls on the Philadelphia 76er roster, is their stirring late-season comeback and return to the post-season doomed to failure?

And how will things shake-out between Miami and Milwaukee? With a single ex-Bull populating each roster, do they negate each other, leaving their teams to fight it out on basis of merit?

With a fourth consecutive losing season, one over-before-it-began playoff appearance in their last six and a desultory rebuild mired in mud despite a new GM and a new coach, it's a bit disconcerting to see so many ex-Bulls thriving in new environments.

As fans do, I grew very attached to the teams coached by Thibodeau and Scott Skiles. Those rosters were gritty and talented. They played defense. Most importantly, they complemented each other.

It was tough to see them so rarely move beyond the first round.

I'm happy for Thibodeau's success, even if he's coaching my second least-favorite team in the NBA. The same goes for Rose, forced to consume a good deal of humble pie since the sparkling first act of his NBA career.

But I'm left wondering why the Bulls remain with an uneven, disjointed roster after so many other teams (Phoenix, Denver, Utah, Atlanta and those Knicks) have risen to contention in the same time frame.

If I even needed the impetus, I appreciate the Jordan-era dynasty anew.

My Chicago Bulls Christmas Wish

One of the things sport taught me is the meaning of words like ephemeral and ethereal. Life is fragile. And short. And that no matter how indomitable something may appear, it is often little more than smoke curling through air. It takes only a faint breeze to disturb and redirect its trajectory.

In the spring of 2011, the Chicago Bulls were a young team on the rise. They had lucked into that elusive thing called chemistry, with talented, heady players who bought into a charismatic coach’s vision of how the game should be played. All of this was cemented by the skills of a nascent superstar named Derrick Rose.

Yes, the view from northeast Illinois was mighty sweet. The Miami Heat might be the team of today, but it was very hard to believe the Bulls weren’t the team of tomorrow. Yet two and-a-half years later, the team of tomorrow looks like the woulda shoulda coulda team of yesterday.

Derrick Rose’s future as an NBA point guard is very much in doubt after successive anterior cruciate ligament and meniscus injuries. It’s hard to look at him and not see Anfernee Hardaway or Grant Hill.

Small forward Luol Deng has already expressed his intent to explore free agency, following public questioning of his toughness and commitment. Power forward Carlos Boozer, signed to an enormous contract following the Bulls failed attempts to land either LeBron James or Dwyane Wade in the summer of 2010, will likely remain, but is untradeable and on the downside of a productive career.

Gritty point guard Kirk Hinrich is feeling the effects of multiple seasons spent sacrificing his body in the name of defense, leaving center Joakim Noah and reserve forward Taj Gibson as the Bulls’ sole long-term assets.

The window of opportunity that magically opens for certain combinations of players and coaches has silently and immutably closed. Run ragged by an unceasing succession of injuries, the formerly resilient Bulls are now exhausted and overwhelmed. It is a good thing it’s Christmas.

My Christmas wish for the Bulls begins with David Robinson’s foot.

You see, David Robinson was an elite professional basketball player. He was fast, strong and agile. He was a seven-foot center who could move with the speed and quickness of a much smaller man. He single-handedly turned the San Antonio Spurs into contenders, and quickly became one of the NBA’s most dominant players.

His greatest weakness was that he possessed the physiology of a human being.

On December 23rd, 1996, while playing in just his sixth game after recovering from an off-season back injury, Robinson suffered a broken foot. This not only ended his season, but effectively ended the Spurs’ as well. Without their stellar center and small forward Sean Elliot, they nose-dived to an NBA-worst 20 and 62 record.

But with Robinson’s injury and the Spurs’ dismal 1996/97 season came a blessing: the number-one pick in the 1997 NBA draft. And with it, the Spurs chose Tim Duncan, beginning a run of sixteen straight winning seasons which includes four NBA championships.

So as this scarred and ravaged edition of the Chicago Bulls picks its way through the schedule, the prospect of a high draft pick in next year’s draft might be the silver lining in what has become a very dark cloud. I’m not advocating tanking here; just holding out a carrot amid the wreckage of what was once a contender.

Merry Christmas.