2011-2012 Finish: not very good (13-53)

Season Highlight
Hmmmmmm. This is a tough one. In a season which was all about 3 things: 1) trading for 1st round picks, 2) securing a good 1st round pick of your own, 3) trading for first round picks - given none of 1, 2 or 3 really panned out quite as hoped, it's pretty damn hard to find a highlight in 2011/12 for the Bulls. Give me a few minutes and I'll get back to you É


Season Lowlight
There were probably 2 main lows for the Bulls. Firstly, "Does anyone want Elton Brand?", apparently not. The Bulls traded the not so talented, but at least young n cheap Robin Lopez for Elton Brand before the season kicked off. At the time probably a fairly decent trade - Lopez isn't anything spectacular and Brand, whilst no spring chicken, is still capable of good numbers. The unfortunate thing is that as the Bulls season quickly turned towards securing a good lottery pick, Brand had no purpose and his fairly large salary (at the time) wasn't very appealing or hittable for any team that could have found a use for him. The Bulls wanted a first rounder for him, and he could have been worth a late first, but no matter how many times he was offered there just wasn't a taker. In hindsight keeping Lopez might have been a better option. The second lowlight came on draft lottery day. Not only did the Bulls get pipped for the worst record (by the downward spreaking Warriors), they then missed a top 3 pick in the lottery, and ended up with 4th pick. Damn! A shocking season, and only 4th pick to show for it!


Best Trade
Not a season full of trades for Chicago, so this one will go down as the best - a 3 teamer with the Nets and Warriors. Bulls traded Antawn Jamison and his large contract for Okur, Childress, Jimmy Butler and 10 GM points. Since the Bulls were looking to rebuild, taking the non-contributing Okur and his expiring contract was good. Childress maybe wasn't such a good guy to take on with 6.5m and 3 years to run, but he has now been amnestied and will be a far better contract. Jimmy Butler was a very nice pickup - he is young and will likely get some good NBA minutes. So this turned into a good re-building deal for the Bulls.


Worst Trade
They only made one other trade - and I'll deem it worth of being bad. The previously mentioned deal sending Robin Lopez for Elton Brand. This didn't really make sense for a rebuilding team. Jamison was moved out of town - no place for his potential to help win games. So why take on Brand? It's turned out the NBA Brand has been amnestied and fortunately his salary is only 2.1m, which is a great outcome. But at the time it was a bit of a head scratcher.


Other Notable Trades
It was a pretty quiet year for the Bulls - there weren't any other trades.


Best FA Signing
It wasn't a big year for FA signings either. It's a tough call between Earl Clark and Patty Mills. Yep, not much went down. Patty Mills is panning out to be solid depth at PG, but he will unlikely be anything more than that.


Worst FA Signing
There isn't a lot of difference between the worst and best - Harangody, Summers, Hughes, Stevenson. Not much doing there.


Star
Roy Hibbert - C - Hibbert is the building block for the Bulls. He's a young up and coming big man. There are still plenty of questions about whether he will eventually turn into a star player, but he's the best the Bulls have. He contributed well offensively, leading the team with 15 ppg at 60% (yeah I know, when 15 ppg is your best scorer hen things are tough). But he wasn't anywhere near as strong on the glass as you would expect - just 5.5 rpg. But he's a big body who will block shots and be a presence and that isn't easy to come by, so he is someone you can build around.


Surprise
Patty Mills - G - I'm not sure if he was acquired because of the aussie factor, but he was given plenty of minutes on this Bulls team and he made a strong contribution. Yeah he wasn't amazing - it's hard to pick a surprise on a team that only wins 13 games. Mills ended the season 3rd in PPG for the bulls. He started 25 of the 29 games he played. His shooting percentages weren't good (few guard's are in this league at present), but he made his mark when he got the chance.


Goat
Josh Childress - G/F - Childress hasn't been the same since his stint overseas. The Bulls picked him up in the dumping of Jamison trade. His 6m salary isn't massive, but you still expect some reasonable productivity from him. But it would appear there is a God that looks after the Bulls, cos NBA Josh got cut and his salary is now a fraction of what it was - at least his output will match his $s now.


Draft Report Card
The Bulls were hoping for a poor season resulting in a great draft pick. Unfortunately it didn't. They finished with the 2nd worst record and were right in the lottery hoping for a top pick, maybe even #1 if the balls fell just right. Well they didn't - the Bulls balls went MIA and they ended up with the 4th pick. Still a solid pick, but hey. But in some ways maybe this year is the right time to slip from 2 to 4 in the lottery, cause the talent pool is a bit of a lottery itself. With their 4th pick they decided to go with 6-8 SF Harrison Barnes. Barnes is a scorer - he has good range and he knows how to get the ball in the hole. The Bulls certainly could do with a goto scorer. But does he have the skill to be the main man for a team? They passed on Kidd-Gilchrist - also a SF but more a hard working all-rounder slasher than a shooter. Kidd-Gilchrist is possibly a better option to help build a team, but he needs others around him to turn a team into a winner. So perhaps Barnes was the best pick for the Bulls. If he turns into a bigtime scorer then we'll all be congratulating the Bulls on their foresight.


Looking to the Future
The Bulls are certainly rebuilding. They have some strong players to build with in Hibbert and Barnes. Kemba Walker is a young talent and the Bulls will be hoping he can progress more than he did in his rookie season. Alec Burks and Jimmy Butler are also young guys that the Bulls will be hoping to see good things from this season. Butler should see more NBA time which helps, but he plays the same position as Barnes - still depth is always handy. Poor Darrel Arthur has apparently been hit with the injury stick again. Having missed last season with a busted knee, he has now gone down with a fractured leg - while not sevre, you have to wonder what black cat crossed his path and whether he will get over the injuries that seem to be plaguing him.

What the Bulls lack is a really strong guard to control the play. They tried both Walker and Burks (along with Mills) but neither are strong controllers of the game. Whether Walker can step up and become that is questionable. They will obviously want to stay young, so it's unlikely they could acquire a strong young PG. If they wanted to they may be able to entice an old over to help the kids. Thats a choice they will have to make. And yeah, that season highlight, I'm still thinking.


Upcoming Free Agents
Roy Hibbert is a RFA, and he will certainly return no questions asked. Darrel Arthur and Patty Mills are RFAs too. Arthur should return if the Bulls want to persist. Mills is uncertain. Kirk Hinrich, who was just as untradable as Brand will likely be gone for no return, but no one will lose sleep over that. Stevenson needs to be signed-and-traded, might be hard to get any quality for him though. And Okur, who cares really. All in all, the Bulls will get to keep who they want and cut some baggage they have been trying to part with.