WHERE'S THE BEEF?
-VS-
Game Time Start: 8:00 PM EST
Where: United Center, Chicago, IL
Officials: B. Salvatore, T. Brown, M. Lindsay
Media Notes: Indiana Notes, Chicago Notes
Television: FOX Sports Indiana / WGN
Radio: WFNI 1070 AM / WMVP 1000 AM, WRTO 1200 AM
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PACERS Danny Granger - left knee tendinosis (out) BULLS Richard Hamilton - torn plantar fascia in left foot (day-to-day) Derrick Rose - left knee (out) |
Ricky O'Donnell: Kirk Hinrich - One of the worst players in the NBA The Chicago Bulls' problems are bigger than Kirk Hinrich, but no one player personifies them more succinctly. SB Nation Chicago's Ricky O'Donnell looks at what went wrong for the Bulls' prized free agent signing. How's this for a kick in the stomach: when Gar Forman and John Paxson decided to make signing Kirk Hinrich the Chicago Bulls' top offseason priority this summer, they were thinking about you. I swear it's true. The decision to bring back Hinrich was, in the most mangled sense of the term, good publicity for a franchise in desperate need of some. In the warped minds of the people who call the shots for Chicago's pro basketball team, signing Hinrich amounted to throwing the fans a bone. I know. There's no denying the fact that Hinrich is the type of player fans like, and the Bulls have great fans. The Bulls have sold out nearly every home game for over two decades, and the people who buy those seats are the type of customers who can appreciate the less tangible aspects of Hinrich's game: grit, toughness, ability to persevere through obvious physical shortcomings. All of those things sell to the public. In this sense, signing Hinrich was almost a slam dunk. He was familiar, likable and safe. He would work hard, stay out of trouble off the court and toe the company line through and through. Did you hear he kept a house in area the last two years while battling injuries and fumbling his way \through underwhelming campaigns in Washington and Atlanta? It's true! There's a lot to like about Kirk Hinrich, I suppose, save for his ability to play basketball. Kirk Hinrich is terrible at playing basketball. There's a reason Forman and Paxson have their job, and they've largely done well in turning the Bulls into something of an agile beast the last two seasons. Give them credit for choosing Derrick Rose over Michael Beasley, give them credit for hiring Tom Thibodeau, give them credit for drafting Taj Gibson and Joakim Noah. But when it comes to roster construction and team makeup, the decision makers are supposed to be smarter than the people who buy the tickets. There was almost no analytical way to argue procuring Hinrich to a two-year, $8 million contract, and saddling the team with a hard cap for the rest of the season, was a smart move. Through 14 games this season, Hinrich has already proven that without a doubt. You could see the headline coming from the moment Hinrich's signing was announced. I laughed audibly the first time I read it: Kirk Hinrich evaluated by more than numbers Well, that's good. Because Hinrich's numbers are atrocious. Hinrich has an offensive rating this season of 92. For players that have started at least 12 games this season, only four players are worse. You don't even need to dabble in advanced metrics to tell Hinrich doesn't have it anymore, the numbers on the back of a basketball card do the job fine enough. Take a look at those numbers: Points per game: 6.2 Field goal percentage: 32% Free throw percentage: 62% Three point percentage: 29% Kirk Hinrich's PER this season is 9.03. Here's how that stacks up on John Hollinger's scale, via Wikipedia: just above "Definitely renting" (9.0), with "Next Stop: D-League" (5.0) as the lowest hurdle to clear. Hinrich isn't going to the D-League, you can bet on that. He'll be bricking jumpers with the Bulls all season long. This isn't hate-fueled, as I'm sure Hinrich is a nice enough guy. It's just: what does he do well on a basketball court...CONTINUE READING AT SB NATION CHICAGO |
Kelly Dwyer: Derrick Rose, according to one source, could be a few weeks away from practicing. This might not be great news for Bulls fans You can see this grain of salt from miles away. From wherever you pick up the Damen bus, number 50, in order to shuffle your way to the United Center. Some lone "NBA source" — a single person — is speculating that some members of the Chicago Bulls think star guard Derrick Rose "could" be a few weeks away from practicing. Which would then push Rose's return to live action closer to late-December, ticking closer to the "eight" in the "eight to 12 months" diagnosis he was given after tearing his left ACL in a playoff game on A. Someone's playing doctor, and the Chicago Sun-Times' Joe Cowley is reporting it. And because we've just as much insight as we guess from afar — like the source, like Cowley, like the players who might be watching Derrick cut and spin in individual drills every day but have no idea as to Rose's eventual return — we're going to play doctor as well. And point out that the sooner the Chicago Bulls push Derrick Rose into the lineup, the more worried you should be. Because the team doesn't have the greatest history of acting like the grown-ups in this situation. First, Cowley's report, which starts with the discussion that Derrick "could be just weeks away from practicing" with the team: ''That's the belief that a couple of [the Bulls'] players are under,'' the source said. Rose has been expected to be able to play in games by February, but that has been inferred more than actually stated. Even if the Bulls receive the ultimate Christmas present of getting him back on the practice court just before Dec. 25, it doesn't mean he's necessarily ahead of that February schedule — or behind it. Asked Monday if there was a specific timetable for Rose to start practicing, general manager Gar Forman answered in a text message: ''We're still taking the process step by step, and a date hasn't been set.'' If that sounds tactful, coming from Chicago's GM, it's because he is on point with his on record patience. And while it's a jerk move for us to expect Forman and his franchise to do the inappropriate thing and let Rose play as soon as Derrick feels as if he's ready, it's worth pointing out that Chicago's history with these sorts of things isn't as tactful as Forman's comments appear above. No NBA team comes close to working its players through injury or fatigue like these Bulls. Former center Omer Asik limped around the court in a playoff series against Miami in 2011 with what wasn't initially diagnosed as a fractured fibula — the same malady that could keep Steve Nash off the court until January — but was later revealed to be a FRIGGING FRACTURED LEG-BONE once Chicago's season ended. Luol Deng was fielded in much the same way a few years back, as the Bulls hemmed and hawed over his willingness to play through injury during the 2009-10 season. Deng, it turns out...CONTINUE READING AT BALL DON'T LIE |
Mark Deeks: Nazr Mohammed and Trade Kickers Even though he signed a one year minimum salary contract using the Minimum Salary Exception, Nazr Mohammed has a 15% trade kicker in his current contract. Trade kickers in contracts are somewhat rare. They are particularly rare in small contracts, as becomes obvious upon a study of the current trade kickers in the league today: Ray Allen - 15% - $3,090,000 Andrea Bargnani - 5% - $10,000,000 Nic Batum - 15% - $10,825,000 Chris Bosh - 15% - $17,545,000 Jose Calderon - 10% - $10,561,982 Vince Carter - 10% - $3,090,000 Tyson Chandler - lesser of 8% or $500,000 Pau Gasol - 15% - $19,000,000 Manu Ginobili - 5% - $14,107,492 Eric Gordon - 15% - $13,668,750 Blake Griffin - 15% - trade kicker in extension, begins next year Udonis Haslem - 15% - $4,060,000 Roy Hibbert - 15% - $13,668,750 LeBron James - 15% - $17,545,000 Amir Johnson - 5% - $6,000,000 DeAndre Jordan - 15% - $10,532,977 Brook Lopez - 15% - $13,668,750 Robin Lopez - 15% - $4,899,293 Shawn Marion - 15% - $8,646,364 O.J. Mayo - 15% - $4,020,000 Mike Miller - 15% - $5,800,000 Nazr Mohammed - 15% - $1,352,181 (cap number of $854,389) Steve Nash - 15% - $8,900,000 Derrick Rose - 15% - $16,402,500 Josh Smith - 15% - $13,200,000 Jason Terry - 7.5% - $5,000,000 Jason Thompson - 5% - $5,250,000 Anderson Varejao - 5% - $8,368,182 Dwyane Wade - 15% - $17,182,000 Deron Williams - 15% - $17,177,795 Metta World Peace - 15% - $7,258,960 Furthermore, many of those trade kickers are in contracts that are already paying the maximum salary to the relevant player. As kickers cannot be used to increase a salary to an amount greater than the max, those kickers are thus pretty much redundant. [As for why anyone puts them in, then - well, why not? What if the max gets bigger? Unlikely, but plausible.] Very few trade kickers actually matter, then. Indeed, of all the contracts in the league today, only three contain already-enacted trade kickers. Of those three, one was partially waived in order to facilitate the trade (Hedo Turkoglu), and one was redundant for the aforementioned maximum contract reasons (Chris Paul). That leaves Luke Walton as the one example of a current contract that was increased by a trade kicker. In a bloviated way, the point is hereby made - trade kickers aren't very common. When they are given out, they are done so as leverage. If a team and a player cannot meet in the middle on contract negotiations, the inclusion of a trade bonus serves to bridge the gap; an increase in salary upon being traded gives greater incentive to accept perceived home town discounts. In Nazr's case, negotiations probably can't have gone on for too long, as there was surely no dispute as to the fact that he was a minimum salary contract calibre player. What Nazr's trade kicker...CONTINUE READING AT SHAMSPORTS |
Pacers Mike Wells @MikeWellsNBA Jared Wade @8pts9secs Tim Donahue @TimDonahue8p9s Tom Lewis @indycornrows |
Bulls K.C. Johnson @KCJHoop BullsBlogger @BullsBlogger Kelly Dwyer @KDonhoops Mark Deeks @MarkDeeksNBA |
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