Just What Happened to the Chicago Bulls?

A little over a year ago, the Chicago Bulls seemed to be a team on the rise and figured to be a contender in the soft Eastern Conference.

Today, they couldn’t be further away from that goal.

Ever since the man called Michael left (and even a bit before), the Chicago Bulls front office has been subject to mockery and loathing. In my mind at least, there is nothing worse than when a team is ruined by guys in suits. Perhaps the 90’s Bulls had their run either way, and perhaps it was time to let someone else win a ring, but the way that team was unceremoniously torn apart is still a great tragedy in NBA history.

Since then, it’s only gotten worse. They had Elton Brand. They had Ron Artest. They had Tyson Chandler. They failed to capitalize on any of them, and it was mainly because of issues with management. Let’s not be overly short-sighted: they weren’t brilliant on the court, and were even worse on the bench. But still, I maintain that management is mainly responsible for this.

Flashback to Opening Night of the 2006/07 season.

Chicago vs. Miami on Ring Night.

Chicago dismantled the Heat on the first night of the new season, proving to be the first of a long line of kicks between the legs for Heat as they fell from greatness. During Miami’s title run, the Heat beat the Bulls 4-2 in the first round. Chicago avenged this in the '07 playoffs by sweeping Miami and officially telling the world that they were a force to be reckoned with. Britain’s own Luol Deng emerged as the team’s leader and perhaps the franchise player. Ben Gordon was a deathly scoring threat, and even Ben Wallace (yeah, remember him?) seemed to jump for rebounds and put in effort to win basketball games, as he had been the off-season’s biggest signing the previous summer.

That was the last success the Bulls had. After this, Detroit once again made them look like a team that did not belong in the playoffs.

What is annoying is that things could be different. Although they wouldn’t have made much of a difference in the 2007 season, Chicago made several key mistakes that most likely sealed their fate during the 2006 off-season.

They drafted Lamarcus Aldridge, then traded him away for Tyrus Thomas. They also managed to land Rodney Carney and traded him away for Thabo Sefolosha. Plus, they paid probably about twice the amount that Ben Wallace was worth. To be fair, Big Ben did appear to be one of the best when with Detroit, but still, that was a lot of money to invest in an aging and under-sized big man with little to no offensive skills, especially when you are in dire need of a franchise player. (This being before Deng emerged to be one of the premier talents in the league).

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