Billy D Struggling Early in Chicago

There are 30 teams in the NBA. Half of them get a playoff chance to win the championship. So only the bottom half of the league has no chance to make the playoffs. This is his fourth year at Chicago. He will fail to make the playoffs 3 of those 4 years including the last two (this season included).

In the other 6 years he's coached as a pro (5 with OKC), he made it to the conference finals once (with a team that was already a playoff team), and got eliminated in the first round 5 times.

Nothing in the above even remotely suggests that he is NBA coaching material. It is time for him to seriously re-evaluate his career alternatives. He is LOST in the league and it is obvious.

 

Could you please advise as to his NBA coaching deficiencies? I have watched his teams play from time to time, and I cannot identify his weaknesses as a coach. It just seems to me that he has never had the right blend of players.

 

IMO, there are several flavors of teams that make up the NBA. At the bottom is a team filled with middling players and a coach who doesn't get the NBA. The next up is a team with middling players but the coach is capable. But since you win in the NBA with players (no one-loss-and-go-home scenario), you can play well enough to stay out of the lottery. Next level, you have good players and coach, just not THAT many quality players. And you go to the playoffs and leave in the first or second round. That to me is where Billy resides.

After that, you have a superstar player to go with a lot of really good players and obviously a quality coach. Unless you are the Bucs or the Clippers, you don't win it all. And it takes one H__L of a superstar and support. The last line is 2-3 superstars who know how to win in crunch time (Westbrook is NOT one of those) and a supporting cast that is close. This is what wins just about every time. And the reason to me is because of all the games you need to win AND because the refs, um, "conveniently" find "creative" ways to keep the games in line to go the entire number (usually 7). I find the NBA to be just this side of corrupt. Amazing athleticism? absolutely. Just that no "team" gets to win it all. It takes..."selection".

 

The record speaks for itself. The Bulls have not been the same with the absence of Ball, but with a core of Lavine, DeRozan, and Vucevic, this teamnshouod be winning more than it is losing.

We all know that that is not the case.

 

The team doesn’t move the ball on offense. They get practically no assists. They play lousy defense. Vukevic is an average center who plays lousy defense. Blame Donovan for these shortcomings if you choose to, but the real problem is the roster.