Game 38: Bulls @ Cavs 1/15/2024

[ijspeelman]

[jbk1234]

Yeah, this would've been a good game to insert CPJ when Mitchell rested.

[ijspeelman]

Yeah, this would've been a good game to insert CPJ when Mitchell rested.

Probably, but a win is a win. JB probs wanted to play a shortened line-up since we had so much rest, but idk

I think his selection of CPJ into our line-up has been a little too conservative, but I am glad he hasn't let him completely loose

[JonFromVA]

Yeah, this would've been a good game to insert CPJ when Mitchell rested.

Probably, but a win is a win. JB probs wanted to play a shortened line-up since we had so much rest, but idk

I think his selection of CPJ into our line-up has been a little too conservative, but I am glad he hasn't let him completely loose

We blew the lead, not sure what our coach needs to see to want to shore up the second unit besides sending Mitchell in.

[jbk1234]

Yeah, this would've been a good game to insert CPJ when Mitchell rested.

Probably, but a win is a win. JB probs wanted to play a shortened line-up since we had so much rest, but idk

I think his selection of CPJ into our line-up has been a little too conservative, but I am glad he hasn't let him completely loose

We blew the lead, not sure what our coach needs to see to want to shore up the second unit besides sending Mitchell in.

Yeah, it's fine when guys are hitting their threes, but when you hit that cold streak, you need a creator other than LeVert on the floor. If we were auditioning LeVert as a first option for the benefit of other teams, I'm afraid I have bad news.

[JonFromVA]

Probably, but a win is a win. JB probs wanted to play a shortened line-up since we had so much rest, but idk

I think his selection of CPJ into our line-up has been a little too conservative, but I am glad he hasn't let him completely loose

We blew the lead, not sure what our coach needs to see to want to shore up the second unit besides sending Mitchell in.

Yeah, it's fine when guys are hitting their threes, but when you hit that cold streak, you need a creator other than LeVert on the floor. If we were auditioning LeVert as a first option for the benefit of other teams, I'm afraid I have bad news.

As we've been discussing for years, it's not hard to slow down a single creator and Caris is decent but a pretty predictable one. We have guys now who can take and make tough 3's but of course those shots are going to be fickle.

Of course we can't just play 6 guys, so, someone would have to come out to add CPJ. If it's Caris, then the core problem remains. The Bulls could have put Caruso on CPJ and he might struggle. I wouldn't mind seeing what happened given how often CPJ has surpassed expectations, but keeping Caris out there is reasonable.

We could go with a small lineup by pulling TT which would cause some major problems with Drummond on the floor, but Niang would have either pulled him out of the paint or his looks from 3pt would have been a lot more wide open. That would be interesting.

The answer is probably Strus who wasn't shooting well and is apparently playing with an injury. He normally can play the role of secondary ball handler to some extent, but who knows how much his knee was bothering him.

Of course I wouldn't mind seeing Emoni get a shot to just come in and catch fire, but we know that's the furthest thing from JBB's mind.

[jbk1234]

We blew the lead, not sure what our coach needs to see to want to shore up the second unit besides sending Mitchell in.

Yeah, it's fine when guys are hitting their threes, but when you hit that cold streak, you need a creator other than LeVert on the floor. If we were auditioning LeVert as a first option for the benefit of other teams, I'm afraid I have bad news.

As we've been discussing for years, it's not hard to slow down a single creator and Caris is decent but a pretty predictable one. We have guys now who can take and make tough 3's but of course those shots are going to be fickle.

Of course we can't just play 6 guys, so, someone would have to come out to add CPJ. If it's Caris, then the core problem remains. The Bulls could have put Caruso on CPJ and he might struggle. I wouldn't mind seeing what happened given how often CPJ has surpassed expectations, but keeping Caris out there is reasonable.

We could go with a small lineup by pulling TT which would cause some major problems with Drummond on the floor, but Niang would have either pulled him out of the paint or his looks from 3pt would have been a lot more wide open. That would be interesting.

The answer is probably Strus who wasn't shooting well and is apparently playing with an injury. He normally can play the role of secondary ball handler to some extent, but who knows how much his knee was bothering him.

Of course I wouldn't mind seeing Emoni get a shot to just come in and catch fire, but we know that's the furthest thing from JBB's mind.

It seems clear to me that LeVert's highest and best use is as a secondary, or even tertiary creator. This is especially the cae now that he's actually developed some catch and shoot ability from 3. If they're attempting to audition him, that's what they should be showing.

I do worry about running Strus into the ground, but our game plan with Garland out seems to be play defense, shoot 3s, and let Mitchell get us over the finish line. Hence, Merrill seeing major minutes. So, in your scenario, I suspect it might be Okoro's minutes getting cut after inserting CPJ. I suspect they may be auditioning him as well.

Of course, it may be JBB defaulting to why would I change anything if we're winning. It's hard to know without being part of the internal deliberations.

[JujitsuFlip]

Yeah, it's fine when guys are hitting their threes, but when you hit that cold streak, you need a creator other than LeVert on the floor. If we were auditioning LeVert as a first option for the benefit of other teams, I'm afraid I have bad news.

As we've been discussing for years, it's not hard to slow down a single creator and Caris is decent but a pretty predictable one. We have guys now who can take and make tough 3's but of course those shots are going to be fickle.

Of course we can't just play 6 guys, so, someone would have to come out to add CPJ. If it's Caris, then the core problem remains. The Bulls could have put Caruso on CPJ and he might struggle. I wouldn't mind seeing what happened given how often CPJ has surpassed expectations, but keeping Caris out there is reasonable.

We could go with a small lineup by pulling TT which would cause some major problems with Drummond on the floor, but Niang would have either pulled him out of the paint or his looks from 3pt would have been a lot more wide open. That would be interesting.

The answer is probably Strus who wasn't shooting well and is apparently playing with an injury. He normally can play the role of secondary ball handler to some extent, but who knows how much his knee was bothering him.

Of course I wouldn't mind seeing Emoni get a shot to just come in and catch fire, but we know that's the furthest thing from JBB's mind.

It seems clear to me that LeVert's highest and best use is as a secondary, or even tertiary creator. This is especially the cae now that he's actually developed some catch and shoot ability from 3. If they're attempting to audition him, that's what they should be showing.

I do worry about running Strus into the ground, but our game plan with Garland out seems to be play defense, shoot 3s, and let Mitchell get us over the finish line. Hence, Merrill seeing major minutes. So, in your scenario, I suspect it might be Okoro's minutes getting cut after inserting CPJ. I suspect they may be auditioning him as well.

Of course, it may be JBB defaulting to why would I change anything if we're winning. It's hard to know without being part of the internal deliberations.

I'd say any other team could assume Okoro, Wade, and LeVert are being show cased.

[JonFromVA]

Yeah, it's fine when guys are hitting their threes, but when you hit that cold streak, you need a creator other than LeVert on the floor. If we were auditioning LeVert as a first option for the benefit of other teams, I'm afraid I have bad news.

As we've been discussing for years, it's not hard to slow down a single creator and Caris is decent but a pretty predictable one. We have guys now who can take and make tough 3's but of course those shots are going to be fickle.

Of course we can't just play 6 guys, so, someone would have to come out to add CPJ. If it's Caris, then the core problem remains. The Bulls could have put Caruso on CPJ and he might struggle. I wouldn't mind seeing what happened given how often CPJ has surpassed expectations, but keeping Caris out there is reasonable.

We could go with a small lineup by pulling TT which would cause some major problems with Drummond on the floor, but Niang would have either pulled him out of the paint or his looks from 3pt would have been a lot more wide open. That would be interesting.

The answer is probably Strus who wasn't shooting well and is apparently playing with an injury. He normally can play the role of secondary ball handler to some extent, but who knows how much his knee was bothering him.

Of course I wouldn't mind seeing Emoni get a shot to just come in and catch fire, but we know that's the furthest thing from JBB's mind.

It seems clear to me that LeVert's highest and best use is as a secondary, or even tertiary creator. This is especially the cae now that he's actually developed some catch and shoot ability from 3. If they're attempting to audition him, that's what they should be showing.

I do worry about running Strus into the ground, but our game plan with Garland out seems to be play defense, shoot 3s, and let Mitchell get us over the finish line. Hence, Merrill seeing major minutes. So, in your scenario, I suspect it might be Okoro's minutes getting cut after inserting CPJ. I suspect they may be auditioning him as well.

Of course, it may be JBB defaulting to why would I change anything if we're winning. It's hard to know without being part of the internal deliberations.

I was specifically talking about the 25-3 run the Bulls went on in the second half where obviously we struggled to score. A good chunk of that Isaac was off the floor and I was focusing on the TT-Niang-Strus-LeVert-Merrill lineup. Plenty of shooting in that lineup, but they obviously struggled to create against the Bulls

Playing 4 shooters at the same time is a nice improvement from JBB, but geez, he needs to be able to make adjustments to what he sees the other team doing to his guys before it turns in to a 25-3 run.

[jbk1234]

As we've been discussing for years, it's not hard to slow down a single creator and Caris is decent but a pretty predictable one. We have guys now who can take and make tough 3's but of course those shots are going to be fickle.

Of course we can't just play 6 guys, so, someone would have to come out to add CPJ. If it's Caris, then the core problem remains. The Bulls could have put Caruso on CPJ and he might struggle. I wouldn't mind seeing what happened given how often CPJ has surpassed expectations, but keeping Caris out there is reasonable.

We could go with a small lineup by pulling TT which would cause some major problems with Drummond on the floor, but Niang would have either pulled him out of the paint or his looks from 3pt would have been a lot more wide open. That would be interesting.

The answer is probably Strus who wasn't shooting well and is apparently playing with an injury. He normally can play the role of secondary ball handler to some extent, but who knows how much his knee was bothering him.

Of course I wouldn't mind seeing Emoni get a shot to just come in and catch fire, but we know that's the furthest thing from JBB's mind.

It seems clear to me that LeVert's highest and best use is as a secondary, or even tertiary creator. This is especially the cae now that he's actually developed some catch and shoot ability from 3. If they're attempting to audition him, that's what they should be showing.

I do worry about running Strus into the ground, but our game plan with Garland out seems to be play defense, shoot 3s, and let Mitchell get us over the finish line. Hence, Merrill seeing major minutes. So, in your scenario, I suspect it might be Okoro's minutes getting cut after inserting CPJ. I suspect they may be auditioning him as well.

Of course, it may be JBB defaulting to why would I change anything if we're winning. It's hard to know without being part of the internal deliberations.

I was specifically talking about the 25-3 run the Bulls went on in the second half where obviously we struggled to score. A good chunk of that Isaac was off the floor and I was focusing on the TT-Niang-Strus-LeVert-Merrill lineup. Plenty of shooting in that lineup, but they obviously struggled to create against the Bulls

Playing 4 shooters at the same time is a nice improvement from JBB, but geez, he needs to be able to make adjustments to what he sees the other team doing to his guys before it turns in to a 25-3 run.

I'm inclined to agree with you. They needed another creator on the floor during that stretch. The guys they had in couldn't hit the side of a barn and it seemed like a good time to insert CPJ. You don't want to be a knee-jerk reactionary as a coach, but that 25-3 run didn't happen in a couple minutes. We have a the benefit of hindsight, but it even seemed obvious in real time. I was just offering a non-coaching explanation as to why that might have happened.

[JujitsuFlip]

Also, the other layer of that is if Jb isn't gonna play CPJ then don't even dress the guy, he has a finite amount of eligibility left on his 2way. So unless the Cavs think he will sign to a standard NBA deal for dirt cheap, might wanna be wise with the games he dresses for.

[JonFromVA]

It seems clear to me that LeVert's highest and best use is as a secondary, or even tertiary creator. This is especially the cae now that he's actually developed some catch and shoot ability from 3. If they're attempting to audition him, that's what they should be showing.

I do worry about running Strus into the ground, but our game plan with Garland out seems to be play defense, shoot 3s, and let Mitchell get us over the finish line. Hence, Merrill seeing major minutes. So, in your scenario, I suspect it might be Okoro's minutes getting cut after inserting CPJ. I suspect they may be auditioning him as well.

Of course, it may be JBB defaulting to why would I change anything if we're winning. It's hard to know without being part of the internal deliberations.

I was specifically talking about the 25-3 run the Bulls went on in the second half where obviously we struggled to score. A good chunk of that Isaac was off the floor and I was focusing on the TT-Niang-Strus-LeVert-Merrill lineup. Plenty of shooting in that lineup, but they obviously struggled to create against the Bulls

Playing 4 shooters at the same time is a nice improvement from JBB, but geez, he needs to be able to make adjustments to what he sees the other team doing to his guys before it turns in to a 25-3 run.

I'm inclined to agree with you. They needed another creator on the floor during that stretch. The guys they had in couldn't hit the side of a barn and it seemed like a good time to insert CPJ. You don't want to be a knee-jerk reactionary as a coach, but that 25-3 run didn't happen in a couple minutes. We have a the benefit of hindsight, but it even seemed obvious in real time. I was just offering a non-coaching explanation as to why that might have happened.

Yep, that one sure seemed obvious in real time, but hey maybe CPJ is too rusty and doesn't help because you know JBB can't be bothered to find our backup PG minutes even when we're down 3 PG's.

[JonFromVA]

Also, the other layer of that is if Jb isn't gonna play CPJ then don't even dress the guy, he has a finite amount of eligibility left on his 2way. So unless the Cavs think he will sign to a standard NBA deal for dirt cheap, might wanna be wise with the games he dresses for.

Well, JBB might play him ... if there's garbage minutes, an injury, foul trouble, or perhaps a minor miracle?