# It's official: Noc is back, afternoon press conference



## Swan (Jun 27, 2005)

According to the Trib:


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## TomBoerwinkle#1 (Jul 31, 2002)

As "Sailor" says in "Wild at Heart:"

*Rockin' good news!*


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## BG7 (Jun 25, 2003)

Take that Kobe Bryant.

Nocioni > Kobe

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## yodurk (Sep 4, 2002)

Awesome!

Very happy he'll be back (at least until December, ), and I think that's a fair deal for both sides.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

I'm glad Paxson has no problem quickly locking up backup small forwards to rich, multi year deals.

Now lets try and replace the gaping hole in the paint, unless we're going for "win later."

I'm glad Noc is back. Better than losing him for nothing. I'm concerned about his health / athleticism long term though. He sucked *** when he was gimpy.


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## TomBoerwinkle#1 (Jul 31, 2002)

Mebarak said:


> Take that Kobe Bryant.
> 
> Nocioni > Kobe



Ahhhh...not so much. Glad to have Noc back --really glad -- but I don't see any 80 point games from him any time soon.


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## Snake (Jun 10, 2007)

Welcome back Noc. :cheers:


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## truebluefan (May 27, 2002)

He is posturing to win now. Nocioni gives us plenty of depth at pf and sf spots. 

He knows the system already.


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## yodurk (Sep 4, 2002)

kukoc4ever said:


> I'm glad Paxson has no problem quickly locking up backup small forwards to rich, multi year deals.


Now why couldn't you just say, "I'm glad Paxson has no problem locking up tough, rugged, always-play-balls-out, get under the opponents skin, versatile with 3-pt range, and always productive (when healthy) small forwards to moderate, market-worthy contracts"?? :thinking2: 

His contract is smaller than Crawford's, which many described as fair value (uh-oh, did I say a bad word?). :uhoh:


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## TripleDouble (Jul 26, 2002)

Good move. He's going to anchor the second unit and bring that energy every night. 

It will be fun to see him, Noah and Thomas get after people. They'll probably piss a lot of people off.


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## BULLHITTER (Dec 6, 2005)

> I'm glad Paxson has no problem quickly locking up backup small forwards to rich, multi year deals.


well i for one am glad paxson gives pause to locking up limited, questionably motivated, one-dimensional force-fed bigs who aren't instrumental to winning, let alone being one of the higher paid players on the roster.


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## Nocioni's Mom (Jul 6, 2007)

kukoc4ever said:


> I'm glad Paxson has no problem quickly locking up backup small forwards to rich, multi year deals.
> 
> Now lets try and replace the gaping hole in the paint, unless we're going for "win later."
> 
> I'm glad Noc is back. Better than losing him for nothing. I'm concerned about his health / athleticism long term though. He sucked *** when he was gimpy.


No cookie for you.


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

Terrific news.:clap2:


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

kukoc4ever said:


> I'm glad Paxson has no problem quickly locking up backup small forwards to rich, multi year deals.
> 
> Now lets try and replace the gaping hole in the paint, unless we're going for "win later."
> 
> I'm glad Noc is back. Better than losing him for nothing. I'm concerned about his health / athleticism long term though. He sucked *** when he was gimpy.


It's great to see you so wholeheartedly join in the celebration.:biggrin:


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## Nocioni's Mom (Jul 6, 2007)

transplant said:


> It's great to see you so wholeheartedly join in the celebration.:biggrin:


You want cookie? You have cookie, Mr. Nice Man.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

Its nice that we signed Nocioni. I like the guy as much as all of you do. He’s gritty, gutty, a gamer, a warrior, etc.

I don't think we're in any better shape to win the NBA title next season at this point. We'll go as far as Tyrus' progresses on the development curve, if Wallace stays healthy.

Dear God, let's hope these nagging injuries don't persist.


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## popeye12 (Nov 11, 2002)

Great news!!! We now have depth to help any kind of injuries that may happen to this squad. Also, Nocioni is a key part of this team, he can start or come off the bench and be productive! I dont understand why people would be against this - paxson has been honest and true to his points about keeping the core together and doing what it takes to sign them. I do not see how this signing will effect Deng or Gordon. Go Bulls, nice job Pax!


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## theanimal23 (Mar 2, 2005)

Will it be online? I just got home and saw this thread.


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## BG7 (Jun 25, 2003)

All I have to do is remember how back two years ago, Nocioni was our 2nd best player behind Gordon. Him, Gordon, and Hinrich carried us to the playoffs, and then Nocioni was the best player once we got there. He's definitely not chump change that could have easily been given to Memphis, and its good that Paxson knows this.

I want Nocioni or Tyrus to be the starting powerforward, but if Joe Smith does, I won't be entirely upset.

Chris Duhon-Thabo Sefolosha-Andres Nocioni-Tyrus Thomas-Joakim Noah will be an absolutely siKKK second unit, and throughout the regular season, Skiles uses an all bench lineup for extended stretches (8 minutes or so). 

Hopefully the depth cracks down to something like:

Kirk Hinrich =36 minutes
Ben Gordon= 36 minutes
Chris Duhon = 6 minutes (does not play in 2nd half)
Thabo Sefolosha = 18 minutes (does not play from 8 minutes on unless foul trouble)
Luol Deng = 36 minutes
Ben Wallace = 28 minutes (does not play in end stretches)
Joe Smith= 18 minutes 
Andres Nocioni = 26 minutes
Tyrus Thomas = 20 minutes
Joakim Noah = 16 minutes

Something in that realm.


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## theanimal23 (Mar 2, 2005)

I agree Sloth, that will be a nasty 2nd unit, especially defensively. Offensively, it won't be pretty. 

We got Noce at a great rate too.


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## T.Shock (Feb 11, 2003)

theanimal23 said:


> I agree Sloth, that will be a nasty 2nd unit, especially defensively. Offensively, it won't be pretty.
> 
> We got Noce at a great rate too.


Disagree. If Joe Smith ends up starting at PF for whatever reason the Bulls have Duhon, Nocioni, and Tyrus offensively off the bench, all three of which are capable of putting up 20 in a game. Defensively, you have Thabo for bigger guards and Noah for post defense and the ever-elusive height.


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

:yay: :clap: :cheers:


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## theanimal23 (Mar 2, 2005)

T.Shock said:


> Disagree. If Joe Smith ends up starting at PF for whatever reason the Bulls have Duhon, Nocioni, and Tyrus offensively off the bench, all three of which are capable of putting up 20 in a game. Defensively, you have Thabo for bigger guards and Noah for post defense and the ever-elusive height.


If Tyrus and Thabo have improved their games this offseason, you are correct -- Our bench will be solid offensively and the potential to be damn good defensively. I'm just holding my breath until we see some progress in Summer League from the kids and hope it continues into the season.


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## Snake (Jun 10, 2007)

I think Noc will be our main offensive 6th man/bench player. I'd rather have one of Smith/Mihm/Moore or TT or Noah start so they can get some rebounds and score closer to the basket. Noc can energize the offense when the second unit comes in. The top 3 teams in the league all had good 6th men for this role(Barbosa, Ginobilli, Stackhouse).


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

Very good stuff. Pax should now try hard to get Gordon and Deng on the dotted line.


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## BG7 (Jun 25, 2003)

Nocioni = 6th man of the year????


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## TomBoerwinkle#1 (Jul 31, 2002)

Mebarak said:


> Nocioni = 6th man of the year????


Not beyond the realm of possibility.


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## Bulls42 (Jul 22, 2002)

Good signing but even though he is one of my favorites, would still include him in a trade for Gasol.


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

kukoc4ever said:


> Its nice that we signed Nocioni. *I like the guy as much as all of you do. He’s gritty, gutty, a gamer, a warrior, etc.*
> 
> I don't think we're in any better shape to win the NBA title next season at this point. We'll go as far as Tyrus' progresses on the development curve, if Wallace stays healthy.
> 
> Dear God, let's hope these nagging injuries don't persist.


Nocioni's Mom, please take note of the bolded part above. C'mon, give him a cookie...from him this is high praise.

K4E, The Bulls kept a nice piece. As you know, several teams with whom we're competing have added pieces...but also lost some. The Bulls have added some and Nocioni was the most significant piece we could lose. This is a good day for our favorite team.

Nocioni doesn't have "nagging injuries." He has one. As for the plantar fasciitis, it's the same thing Gasol had and many of us lust after Gasol, our lust not being dampened a bit by his prior affliction. It's treatable with a very high % of success. To be fair, it's much more reasonable to assume that Nocioni will respond positively to treatment than to dump in the celebratory pool, unless, of course, there's a negative agenda that must be faithfully followed.

If you're happy Paxson signed Nocioni, then BE HAPPY. If you think Paxson shouldn't have made this move, perhaps because it prevents him from making the kind of move(s) he should make, please SAY SO. Honestly, you insult my intelligence by applauding with one hand.


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## Nocioni's Mom (Jul 6, 2007)

Oh...poop.

K4E, if you want cookie, have cookie. Milk to dunk in even, please.

Only because Mr. Nice Man say so.


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

Nocioni's Mom said:


> Oh...poop.
> 
> K4E, if you want cookie, have cookie. Milk to dunk in even, please.
> 
> Only because Mr. Nice Man say so.


You really must be a mom...so understanding. Many thanks.


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## superdave (Jul 16, 2002)

I love this signing. 

Only slightly more than what Eddie Robinson got. Have you seen that kid? He can jump out of the gym. He'll be a great fit alongside Jalen Rose.


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## yodurk (Sep 4, 2002)

Nocioni's Mom said:


> Oh...poop.
> 
> K4E, if you want cookie, have cookie. Milk to dunk in even, please.
> 
> Only because Mr. Nice Man say so.


Uh...er...welcome to the boards!


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## Marcus13 (Jul 17, 2002)

Thats too bad. Oh well


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## Showtyme (Jun 24, 2002)

Nocioni is a great re-signing, and at a good deal. I think he will recover this season and be able to give us 2005-06 playoff level of play, and we'll need it.

And because of this, I think we should ditch Joe Smith and focus more on Moore or Mihm. Mihm's a bit of a stiff, but he's taken big steps of improvement in the league and makes a very decent backup big. He's tall. Moore, similarly, will bring consistent effort night in and night out, has some offensive ability, and is also tall. He is the consummate NBA backup center.

We do need a backup center, IMO, much more than we need a veteran starting PF. I mentioned this in the other thread, but assuming Noah and Gray get their minutes whenever:

Deng/Noch
Noch/Tyrus
Wallace/Mihm

is much better than

Deng/Noch
Smith/Tyrus
Wallace/rookie (Noah or Gray)


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## WestHighHawk (Jun 28, 2003)

:clap: :clap: :clap:


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> I don't think we're in any better shape to win the NBA title next season at this point.


I disagree. 
Positives from last year to this year:
1) Extra year of experience and playoff experience for Deng, Hinrich, Gordon, Duhon, Tyrus, and Thabo most of whom could improve considerably individually still and the others will still probably improve their playoff performances with more exposure to the playoff format, environment, and pressure.

2) Possibility for better health at playoff time instead of having Nocioni gimpy.

3) Addition of Noah, Gray, and Curry which adds a lot of height, and some bulk in gray, and having an offensive chucker like Curry could at least fulfill our lack of a Janerro Pargo desperation scorer from last year. Granted, Gray and Curry will likely have little impact, but they actually do both bring something that we were missing from last year potentially.

4) Adaptation of Ben Wallace to our schemes and buying into our system. He played better as the year went on, and had he not gone through a rough patch early the team would have been the 2 seed for sure and possibly the 1 seed.

Negatives:
1) Loss of PJ, Sweets, Allen - Well none of these guys seem to have been that good. PJ had one good half in the playoffs combined, and the other 2 were basically non factors.

2) Ben Wallace being a year older/slower - This is a legitimate concern as he clearly had to go partial speed during the regular season, so he does need to watch his minutes and does seem to have problems contributing on a consistent basis. Clearly this could completely offset positive point #4, but I tend to think the two will likely cancel each other out somewhat.

Does Nocioni himself give us a better chance than last year by staying? Well, possibly, because if he's just healthy in the playoffs he could be a good playoff performer. Overall though, I think it's more that losing him would have hurt us quite a bit potentially (though it's possible Tyrus/Noah could have picked up the slack).


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## Sith (Oct 20, 2003)

one of the key reasons i think why paxson gave him 7-8mil a year is because now we have the salary to match up for trades. I still think a consildation trade is going to happen sooner or later. perhaps gordon+noc and maybe noah for a good scoring big man.


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## Nocioni's Mom (Jul 6, 2007)

yodurk said:


> Uh...er...welcome to the boards!


Thabo Mom y Thabo Dad post here last year. Tell me good place.

Many people like cookie.


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

I'm quite pleased.



kukoc4ever said:


> I'm glad Paxson has no problem quickly locking up backup small forwards to rich, multi year deals.
> 
> Now lets try and replace the gaping hole in the paint, unless we're going for "win later."


If we had the Bird rights to any high quality post scorers, it would be this easy. Also, we have a pretty solid front court rotation these days so I think you need to at least modify it to "gaping back to the basket scoring hole in the paint" or something to that effect. Wait, how is this thread about a back to the basket scorer again?



Mebarak said:


> Hopefully the depth cracks down to something like:
> 
> Kirk Hinrich =36 minutes
> Ben Gordon= 36 minutes
> ...


This is probably getting off topic a bit but I really don't think Joe Smith is anywhere near good enough to warrant playing him 18 minutes per game at the expense of Noc, Tyrus, and Noah. I sure hope that doesn't happen...

Edit: I'm reconsidering the above statement. 18 MPG might be reasonable.


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## ballafromthenorth (May 27, 2003)

Sweet! Glad Nocioni is staying. I hope he comes back and plays as effective as he did before injuries.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> If we had the Bird rights to any high quality post scorers, it would be this easy. Also, we have a pretty solid front court rotation these days so I think you need to at least modify it to "gaping back to the basket scoring hole in the paint" or something to that effect. Wait, how is this thread about a back to the basket scorer again?


If I learned one thing on this board last off-season is that "redundancy" (chandler / wallace) is bad, that's why it was a good idea to dump Chandler.

Somehow Wallace / Noah is good. Go figure. Tyrus brings mainly rebounding and blocking as well. We have a "redundant" frontcourt, according to many.

Everyone knows the team needs some post scoring. Still not addressed. Still holding the team back. 

Once again, I'm very glad Nocioni is back on the team. I just hope that he's able to bring it next year. I saw the same injury plague my namesake for many a season.


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## thebizkit69u (Feb 12, 2003)

Good to see that Average players in the NBA can sign 30+million dollar contracts.


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## nanokooshball (Jan 22, 2005)

thebizkit69u said:


> Good to see that Average players in the NBA can sign 30+million dollar contracts.


Nocioni is NOT the average player. He's a guy that will average a 15 and 6 off the bench without complaints. Puts his heart out there no matter what. Embodies the team spirit. A cog that helped us out of the dark ages. Yes, 30 mil may be expensive for a bench player, but he's our 6th man and is not getting paid the $ barbosa and stack are getting.


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## chifaninca (May 28, 2002)

I'm glad he's back. He's got real value and will earn his paycheck till he gets traded in a consolidation package..........thoughI'd be more than happy to see him end his career here to.


Paxson kept another "piece" of the puzzle and you have to like that.

I agree that we need to see Paxson get something moving with Gordon and Deng.....

I would be happy with any additional guy from (Mihm, Smith, Moore and Darko)


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## thebizkit69u (Feb 12, 2003)

nanokooshball said:


> Nocioni is NOT the average player. He's a guy that will average a 15 and 6 off the bench without complaints. Puts his heart out there no matter what. Embodies the team spirit. A cog that helped us out of the dark ages. Yes, 30 mil may be expensive for a bench player, but he's our 6th man and is not getting paid the $ barbosa and stack are getting.


I dont look at Nocioni and say well there is a player thats better then most. Hes a nice player but when you talk about everything else hes just another guy. Hes not a special athlete, he doesnt score at will and he doest do one thing great. In a year where you draft 2 bigs and are interested in signing a few more bigs you kinda wonder where your going to play Nocioni and if 30+ million is what a 20 mpg player make. 

Luol Deng will need all the minutes you can give him at SF,Tyrus Thomas will need more minutes, Noah isnt going to sit on the bench all season and your not going to sign Chris Mihm or Joe Smith to play 15 minutes.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> and your not going to sign Chris Mihm or Joe Smith to play 15 minutes.


We shouldn't sign either of them if that's not the case.


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## TomBoerwinkle#1 (Jul 31, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> We shouldn't sign either of them if that's not the case.


As I and others have pointed out elsewhere, Noah is at best slotted for 15 minutes, and probably more likely 12 minutes per game as a rookie on a second round playoff team.

If that is true, the Vet FA center we sign is looking at more like 20, not 15-6 minutes per game.


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## thebizkit69u (Feb 12, 2003)

TomBoerwinkle#1 said:


> As I and others have pointed out elsewhere, Noah is at best slotted for 15 minutes, and probably more likely 12 minutes per game as a rookie on a second round playoff team.
> 
> If that is true, the Vet FA center we sign is looking at more like 20, not 15-6 minutes per game.


C-Wallace- 33 minutes, Mihm 10, Joe Smith 5? 
PF- Tyrus Thomas 20, Noah 12, Nocioni 16
SF- Deng 38, Noc 10 

How is Mihm going to get 20 minutes if Wallace is playing 30+
You HAVE to give Tyrus more minutes at PF and you HAVE to play Noah.
There is no point in signing Nocioni to 30+ million if we arent going to give him close to 30 minutes per.


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## SausageKingofChicago (Feb 14, 2005)

This is great news 

This guy is the Bulls heart 

You don't rip the heart of your team


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## thebizkit69u (Feb 12, 2003)

SausageKingofChicago said:


> This is great news
> 
> This guy is the Bulls heart
> 
> You don't rip the heart of your team


God you sound like a Sox fan. "THE FIRE AND THE PASSION IS ALL WE NEED." 

Andres NociRowand.


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## T.Shock (Feb 11, 2003)

thebizkit69u said:


> C-Wallace- 33 minutes, Mihm 10, Joe Smith 5?
> PF- Tyrus Thomas 20, Noah 12, Nocioni 16
> SF- Deng 38, Noc 10
> 
> ...


I'd say it'd break down like this...

SF-Deng(35 min)/Nocioni(13 min)
PF-Tyrus(20 min)/Nocioni(16 min)/Smith(12 min)
C-Wallace(30 min)/Noah(12 min)/Smith(6 min)

That leaves Deng-35, Nocioni-29, Wallace-20, Tyrus-20, Smith-18, Noah-12 with Gray as a garbage time player.


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## Electric Slim (Jul 31, 2002)

thebizkit69u said:


> C-Wallace- 33 minutes, Mihm 10, Joe Smith 5?
> PF- Tyrus Thomas 20, Noah 12, Nocioni 16
> SF- Deng 38, Noc 10
> 
> ...


I think it's either Mihm or Smith, not both.

B. Wall can swing to PF with Mihm in the game depending on matchups, and Noah would be splitting his minutes equally at PF and C. I honestly wouldn't expect much from Noah for a couple years though anyways.

I'm more on the Mihm bandwagon, especially since we're keeping Nocioni. The only thing that worries me about Mihm are injuries.


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## SausageKingofChicago (Feb 14, 2005)

thebizkit69u said:


> God you sound like a Sox fan. "THE FIRE AND THE PASSION IS ALL WE NEED."
> 
> Andres NociRowand.


Cubs actually


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## thebizkit69u (Feb 12, 2003)

SausageKingofChicago said:


> Cubs actually


No Cubs fans talk about the Future and value players who hit home runs and strikeout pitchers. 

The whole fire and passion garbage comes from Sox fans who miss Aaron Rowand and apparently now Bulls fans who are hoping that Freakishness and Passion are turned into an official NBA Stat.


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## thebizkit69u (Feb 12, 2003)

T.Shock said:


> I'd say it'd break down like this...
> 
> SF-Deng(35 min)/Nocioni(13 min)
> PF-Tyrus(20 min)/Nocioni(16 min)/Smith(12 min)
> ...


I'm not cool with Deng averaging 3 less minutes per game, I'm actually expecting Deng to hit the 40 mark next season. If Deng is going to be our superstar then he needs to play superstar minutes.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

SausageKingofChicago said:


> This is great news
> 
> This guy is the Bulls heart
> 
> You don't rip the heart of your team


Dunno if you get the show "Who wants to be a millionaire?" but the other day one of the questions was "who is abe frohman?"


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## mizenkay (Dec 29, 2003)

i'm thrilled we didn't lose him.

he is the embodiment of *blood on the horns*.

i think he's worth his contract.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

Good for Noc. As a fan of him, I feel good. As a fan of the Bulls, I have quite a bit more mixed feelings. I wrote this the other day



> There's a lot of sentimentality going on here, but the reality is we're about to pay $7M/yr to a guy who's destined to be a 20mpg player for us and who's coming off a major injury.
> 
> I don't want to lose the guy, but we need to be objective about things too.
> How did we play in the latter part of the year without Noc? Not bad.
> ...


That's not to say I don't like Noc. I love the guy. With the right teammates, he's worth every bit of that salary. On the Bulls though, he projects to having a smaller and smaller role while having a bigger and bigger salary, which is a poor combination.


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## Rhyder (Jul 15, 2002)

MikeDC said:


> There's a lot of sentimentality going on here, but the reality is we're about to pay $7M/yr to a guy who's destined to be a 20mpg player for us and who's coming off a major injury.
> 
> I don't want to lose the guy, but we need to be objective about things too.
> 
> ...


I was meaning to respond to this and never got back to it the other day. Chandler would have been paid ~$11.5 million per season of his remaining contract primarily to be a backup to Wallace. For all those that complain we were playing 4v5 on offense with Big Ben, we would have been playing 3v5 on offense with Big Ben and Chandler on the floor together.

Much of the same reasoning you are using with your concerns paying Nocioni this amount can be the same as said for Chandler:
* How did we play last year without Chandler? Not bad.
* How well would Chandler mesh with Wallace on the court? Probably not well unless we need one key defensive stop
* How tradable would Chandler have been on his deal? Very iffy if he played anything like he did his last season for the Bulls. He'd certainly be overpaid.
* Can we see Chandler's role on the team getting bigger or smaller? Only smaller unless he develops some semblance of an offensive game.

Besides the obvious monetary difference (Nocioni being paid about $4 million less per year on average than Chandler), Nocioni has a skill very important to this team, his shooting. Outside of Kirk and Gordon, Nocioni has been the only other player on our team that can stretch defenses with his perimeter shooting. Deng has this to a certain extent, but that extra 4 feet of range means that much more ground to cover with defensive rotations. Our offense outside of the pick and roll relies on taking advantage on slow defensive rotations at some point during the shot clock. Noc's shooting provides that ever important extra spacing.

If Chandler weren't more or less a black hole on offense or at least provide some stellar man defense at the C position, I think we would have been a lot more likely to keep him. Instead we upgraded to Wallace, which I like as long as we are using that money to re-sign the rest of the core. Chandler was the most expendable out of the core with the addition of Big Ben, and being the highest paid player on the team outside of Wallace made him even more expendable.


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## theanimal23 (Mar 2, 2005)

Pax at it again - Genius.

http://chicagosports.chicagotribune...sbits,1,7760009.story?coll=cs-bulls-headlines


> Sources familiar with the negotiation said general manager John Paxson *front-loaded *Andres Nocioni's five-year contract. This move was done in the hope extensions can be reached with Gordon and Deng, both of whom should command big money.


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## SALO (Jun 6, 2002)

MikeDC said:


> Good for Noc. As a fan of him, I feel good. As a fan of the Bulls, I have quite a bit more mixed feelings. I wrote this the other day
> 
> 
> That's not to say I don't like Noc. I love the guy. With the right teammates, he's worth every bit of that salary. On the Bulls though, he projects to having a smaller and smaller role while having a bigger and bigger salary, which is a poor combination.


Yup.


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## Cyanobacteria (Jun 25, 2002)

theanimal23 said:


> Pax at it again - Genius.
> 
> http://chicagosports.chicagotribune...sbits,1,7760009.story?coll=cs-bulls-headlines


I absolutely love this trend, I think the Bulls are way ahead of the game doing this (does anybody know if other teams are doing it?).

What's not to like as a player? You get your biggest pay-year up front so that your money is earning interest 4 years earlier and you can pretend you did it all for the benefit of your team (even if you're lying) and teammates (freeing up cap space in the future for their deals).

The team uses present cap space to reward their players and builds cap space in the future. The Bulls open a gap since the cap keeps going higher and some of their salaries keep getting smaller. Can we officially call this "cap gap" to differentiate it from regular cap space?

Way to go Pax! 

I love wrapping up Noc, getting it done early, and getting it done on terms that benefit the team's future instead of matching someone else's deal.

Go Chapu! Go Bulls!


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

Rhyder said:


> I was meaning to respond to this and never got back to it the other day. Chandler would have been paid ~$11.5 million per season of his remaining contract primarily to be a backup to Wallace. For all those that complain we were playing 4v5 on offense with Big Ben, we would have been playing 3v5 on offense with Big Ben and Chandler on the floor together.


You mean like we did with Ben and Tyrus for significant stretches? 

I answer these questions pretty differently:



> Much of the same reasoning you are using with your concerns paying Nocioni this amount can be the same as said for Chandler:
> * How did we play last year without Chandler? Not bad.


Not bad, but we were continually hurting for athletic length. Which is what Chandler brought.
We didn't seem to hurt for what Noc brought too much when he went down.

So yeah, we were "pretty good", but it's two different things. We were pretty good but missed what Chandler brought. We were pretty good while not missing what Noc brought.



> * How well would Chandler mesh with Wallace on the court? Probably not well unless we need one key defensive stop


Disagree. First, Wallace and the team would have benefitted from playing him less, something we couldn't really afford to do. Second, defensively they pair up just fine. We were hurting all year for a guy who could defend 5s, and Chandler had been doing that fine for two years. Offensively, yeah, they'd suck, but again, no worse than Tyrus who ended up playing plenty of minutes next to Ben.



> * How tradable would Chandler have been on his deal? Very iffy if he played anything like he did his last season for the Bulls. He'd certainly be overpaid.


And not iffy at all if he played anything like he did last season for the Hornets.



> * Can we see Chandler's role on the team getting bigger or smaller? Only smaller unless he develops some semblance of an offensive game.


I don't see this. Wallace looked slow, unable to jump, and often disinterested. Unless he discovers the fountain of youth, Chandler would, at the very minimum, project to take over his role.

Which is the really obvious point. Sure, you look at the life of Chandler's deal, and bringing in Wallace makes it inefficient at the start. But Wallace is old and Chandler projected to play a bigger role over time.

With Noc, you've got just the opposite. His role already seemed somewhat superceded (by Ty and Thabo, and perhaps now by an MLE signing and Noah) and will definitely decline.

So I'm not really conceding those points, but if you look at them like you're looking at them, I don't really see how the shooting difference is enough...



> Besides the obvious monetary difference (Nocioni being paid about $4 million less per year on average than Chandler), Nocioni has a skill very important to this team, his shooting. Outside of Kirk and Gordon, Nocioni has been the only other player on our team that can stretch defenses with his perimeter shooting. Deng has this to a certain extent, but that extra 4 feet of range means that much more ground to cover with defensive rotations. Our offense outside of the pick and roll relies on taking advantage on slow defensive rotations at some point during the shot clock. Noc's shooting provides that ever important extra spacing.


... when you can't shoot while you're sitting on the bench.



> If Chandler weren't more or less a black hole on offense or at least provide some stellar man defense at the C position, I think we would have been a lot more likely to keep him. Instead we upgraded to Wallace, which I like as long as we are using that money to re-sign the rest of the core. Chandler was the most expendable out of the core with the addition of Big Ben, and being the highest paid player on the team outside of Wallace made him even more expendable.


Me no buy. On net, Chandler would have worked out much better than commonly thought next to/in addition to Wallace. I said that above, so I won't just restate it. I think there are quite a few cases last year his presence would have deservingly put Wallace on the bench. Truth is, Wallace spent a fair amount of time there anyway, and when he did, we were throwing Allen there. 

To make the case simply, the difference between Chandler and Allen is bigger than the difference between Noc and Tyrus and Thabo at the end of the year (and certainly in the future).

But yeah... I don't really see the need to run down Chandler. I was for keeping Chandler and as I wrote to Vintage in the other thread, I'm for keeping Noc in the absence of a better deal. It's just that 1) I don't think we exhaustively tried to find a better deal and 2) the fact I'm for it doesn't mean I feel 100% good about it. In light of the way the Bulls typically approach things (financially), it's a risk.

Beyond that, it just seems like the team keeps getting a weirder and weirder assortment of players. Problems or not, it's a simple thing to look at Ben Wallace and Tyson Chandler and say "Young guy will replace the old guy". Sure, you waste money in the short run, but in the long-run it's a good investment because you don't grow quality seven footers on trees. When I look at the situation with Noc, it's the same thing except he's the guy who gets replaced in the longer term.


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## Rhyder (Jul 15, 2002)

MikeDC said:


> You mean like we did with Ben and Tyrus for significant stretches?
> 
> I answer these questions pretty differently:
> 
> ...


It's obvious that I think more highly of Ben Wallace than do you and less of Tyson Chandler than do you.

That said, I thought the trade of Chandler for PJ Brown was premature as do most posters on this board outside of maybe bullybullz. He was last on my list of core players, and if Paxson felt that he had to get rid of a core player due to JR's monetary limits, Chandler would have been my choice to ship. However, I thought a deal like Chandler for PJ could have been worked out by the trade deadline, even if Chandler didn't play all too well. I'm guessing Paxson was trying to be as risk averse as possible when it came to Chandler after the Ben Wallace signing. Can't say I disagree 100%.

I was a big fan of Curry, which I think often gets mistaken as I usually defend most of Paxson's moves. Heart issues aside, I would have gladly kept Curry and shipped Chandler. I never thought they meshed well together and remember wishing I had someone like Ben Wallace to complement Curry.


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## J-City (Feb 20, 2003)

Great sign, great value!

Top twenty (if not ten) defender in the league, perennial 6th man candidate!

Gets under the opponents skin like no other.

Who says you can't win a championship with pure defense? In the NFL it's a luxury?

Copernicus once declared the Earth revolves around the Sun.

Word.


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## darlets (Jul 31, 2002)

yippie.

I think some of the previously time break downs are just fine, with only one of mihm or smith.

I think Smith is the more likely of the two.

It's a long season and you need depth in the front court.

We now have
Wallace
TT
Noah
Noc
to get time at the 4 and 5 position
A vet big would do us the world of good.

You need to make the young guys earn there minutes and having a vet on the team does that. Also it covers for injuries.

Gray's nice insurance and could be handy here and there, but we need another vet that can play.

Wallace 33, Smith 15
TT 22, Noah 14 Noc 12
Deng 36, Noc 12
or there abouts.


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## TomBoerwinkle#1 (Jul 31, 2002)

thebizkit69u said:


> God you sound like a Sox fan. "THE FIRE AND THE PASSION IS ALL WE NEED."
> 
> Andres NociRowand.


Its not all we need.

But if fire and passion were not a part of the equation, the Knicks very well might be trying for a threepeat in the upcoming season.


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

MikeDC said:


> That's not to say I don't like Noc. I love the guy. With the right teammates, he's worth every bit of that salary. On the Bulls though, he projects to having a smaller and smaller role while having a bigger and bigger salary, which is a poor combination.


The issue of whether Nocioni is a good fit with the Bulls depends on their style of play and the style of play of their opponents.

It appears to me that many teams in the NBA, including the Bulls, are slowly moving toward "small-ball" lineups that feature speed, passing, up-tempo tactics, and the occasional zone over slow, grind-it-out positional basketball that features post-up plays and individual match-ups.

Nocioni is a perfect 6th man on an up=tempo team that features Deng, Thomas and Noah or Wallace (for short stretches). In an up-tempo game Nocioni runs the floor much better than say, for example, Gasol, has better quickness on defense, more range on offense, and still has the strength to get a reasonable share of rebounds. 

In set-piece battles against dinosaurs it might be advantageous to replace Nocioni with a Mihm or Gray or pine forlornly for Eddie Curry or Paul Gasol. But the Phoenix and Golden State have proven that you don't necessarily need to ride the back of a dinosaur to win in the NBA.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> I look at all that, and I don't see the logic. Especially when we're saying it makes sense to dump young big guys because we've got old big guys, and we're doing that so we can keep around a guy who projects as our 6th or 7th man? It's inconsistent to say the least.


Nocioni didn't play as badly as Chandler and is being given a deal that averages 4 million per year less.

I mean I can see the parallels you are drawing, but the fact that Chandler was getting paid star money, was coming off a year with a worse performance, became redundant, and didn't get along with the coach seem like they'd be pretty big factors in the decision.

In comparison, Nocioni is getting paid just 1 million over the average salary, had a solid year, and fits in well with the team mentality.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Top twenty (if not ten) defender in the league, perennial 6th man candidate!


Nocioni is not a to defender (or particularly close to it) in the league. He gets abused at PF, and he's only decent as a SF defender because he's not as quick as many. He over commits on team defense a lot which often causes huge problems for the rest of the team. He's great at taking charges, but he's probably a below average team defender, and only an average or slightly above average man defender at SF while definitely below average at PF.


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

dougthonus said:


> Nocioni is not a to defender (or particularly close to it) in the league. He gets abused at PF, and he's only decent as a SF defender because he's not as quick as many. He over commits on team defense a lot which often causes huge problems for the rest of the team. He's great at taking charges, but he's probably a below average team defender, and only an average or slightly above average man defender at SF while definitely below average at PF.


I wonder how much you opinion is shaped by Nocioni's performance last year, when he appeared to be significantly slowed by his foot injury. They say defense is played with your feet, and Nocioni's feet were definitely not up to par last year.

My memories of the 2005-6 season are dimming, but my impression that year was that Nocioni was an excellent defender whose mediocre offense was tolerated because of his ability to disrupt other teams on the defensive end. In fact, one of the things I think I remember is how fast he was with his feet on defense.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

I'm with Doug. I think Noch's defense has always been overrated on this board. Beyond eyeballing it, consider how Noch's +/- has always been worse than Deng's. Like Walton says, don't confuse activity with accomplishment.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

johnston797 said:


> I'm with Doug. I think Noch's defense has always been overrated on this board. Beyond eyeballing it, consider how Noch's +/- has always been worse than Deng's. Like Walton says, don't confuse activity with accomplishment.


What made Nocioni's defense seem good is all the charging fouls he drew.


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## Fizer Fanatic (Jun 20, 2002)

I'm glad that we have Chapu back to be a key piece for us at the 3/4. He knows the system, has great chemistry w/ teammates, his energy makes those around him better and his shooting ability both off the bench and at the 4 is much needed on this team. All of those people wanting a trade for a marquee player need to consider that we need more depth and salaries before some trades would be possible. I like yet another front loaded contract given that we still have plenty of guys on rookie deals. I'm hoping for Darko now, but would also be happy w/ a healthy Mihm. Smith could also be good, Moore would definitely better than nothing.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

> In comparison, Nocioni is getting paid just 1 million over the average salary, had a solid year, and fits in well with the team mentality.


I'm not gonna continue the Chandler debate too much except to say I don't think he was redundant given that we still had an obvious need for length, so much that we played a guy who was just as poor a shooter, but shorter on offense. Obviously Chandler isn't an ideal _fit_, but he wasn't _redundant _in the sense that he addressed what was a continuing need.

That's not just a play on words. It's a subtle difference perhaps, but Nocioni is the exact opposite. He's a good _fit_ in the senses you and McBulls mention, but he's _redundant _in the sense that there are several other Bulls that seem likely to go on the court before him. To draw an analogy, Mike Sweetney wass a great fit (low post scorer), but was totally redundant (lots of guys we'd play before even considering him). 

And yet, how does he fit in? Well... McBulls has some answers...



> It appears to me that many teams in the NBA, including the Bulls, are slowly moving toward "small-ball" lineups that feature speed, passing, up-tempo tactics, and the occasional zone over slow, grind-it-out positional basketball that features post-up plays and individual match-ups.


Is that equally true in the playoffs? I agree in general, but I think the distinction is a bit different. I don't think grind-it-out ball is going away at all. It's just a different style. Take out the post up plays and insert more team-based half-court offenses that expose defensive soft spots and you've got teams like the Spurs, Pistons, Mavs and Cavs.

Those teams don't fly up and down the court and play small ball. They're the better teams in the league and they're better because they're long and can play half-court ball.

And those are fairly poor matchups for Noc, at least playing next to smaller guys like Wallace or Thomas. 

Ironically, I think he'd be a heck of a player on the Spurs, because they've got the length and skills at other positions to cover for him. Put him next to Manu, Oberto/Elson and Duncan and you're in great shape. Or at the 4 with Duncan at the five. Or Gooden, Z and big wings like Lebron. Or Gasol Gay and Miller. That's a better set of guys to pair him with.



> *Nocioni is a perfect 6th man on an up=tempo team that features Deng, Thomas and Noah or Wallace (for short stretches).* In an up-tempo game Nocioni runs the floor much better than say, for example, Gasol, has better quickness on defense, more range on offense, and still has the strength to get a reasonable share of rebounds.


Here's the rub... I don't agree with this. If you've got Deng, Thomas and Wallace, starting, is Noc your 6th man?

Once he gets settled (which I think happens within his first season), Noah seems the more obvious replacement for Thomas or Wallace because you want a long and quick guy next to them. If we bring in Smith or Moore, the same will be true of them. Even Mihm isn't a hulking tree stump who can't get down the floor.

And at the 3 spot, you're only taking Deng off the court for 10 minutes a night probably, and you've got Thabo who looks a lot more like a 3 than anything else.

I think to improve Noc's value to the Bulls, you really a guy who's both long and skilled. Noah is the only guy sort of like that, and I don't think he's going to evolve into a Duncan or even Gasol type guy. He's more like a Gooden or Varejao type guy.

Wallace (now) and Ty (over time), I just don't see them as ever being very good mates with Noc. I think Noc is pretty much as poor a fit next to them as Chandler, just for entirely different reasons.


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## Bulls42 (Jul 22, 2002)

Actually, drawing timely, momentum-shifting charges is good defense, and no-one on this team is as good at it as Noce. Noce is a small forward, so when he happens to be matched up against back to the basket PF's he does struggle, but not bc he is a bad defender, but bc he is being asked to play out of position. 
Noce has always been a clutch offensive player, except for in the playoffs last year when clearly hurt. However, I can't see how people can't look back to the previous year when Noce single-handedly carried the team throughout the Heat series. 
The guy always seems to deliver on both ends whenever needed.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

DaBullz said:


> What made Nocioni's defense seem good is all the charging fouls he drew.


Drawing charges is a legitimate defensive skill, just like getting steals, which is something that often gets talked down as a "glory stat" that gets defensive recognition for players who don't play good positional or team defense.

Well, maybe, but there's a lot of value in guys who force turnovers. Positional defense isn't the paragon of everything. It's not like even the best man defenders consistently lock down the best scorers. But the best turnover creaters (and Noc is one of them) consistently give their teams an edge in turnovers and possessions, which is probably a better proposition.

In short, I'd give up some positional defense for a guy who creates turnovers.


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## theanimal23 (Mar 2, 2005)

If Noce can become 100% Healthy again, I look for him to be the guy in the 05-06 season and the guy who always shows up when you need him (Heat Series).

I don't know how people can complain about this deal. Its barely above the MLE, and there are far far worse deals given out for players who are one-dimensional or who are not as good. See Jared Jeffries, Kyle Korver, Jerome James, Antoine Walker, Jason Williams, Austin Croshere, Larry Hughes, blah blah blah

It's a descending deal, so we'll be paying him good money for him in his prime but when his play falls, his contract will be easy to ship off and can be used for filler in a trade -- something we currently have difficulties doing.


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## bullybullz (Jan 28, 2007)

Rhyder said:


> It's obvious that I think more highly of Ben Wallace than do you and less of Tyson Chandler than do you.
> 
> That said, I thought the trade of Chandler for PJ Brown was premature as do most posters on this board outside of maybe bullybullz. He was last on my list of core players, and if Paxson felt that he had to get rid of a core player due to JR's monetary limits, Chandler would have been my choice to ship. However, I thought a deal like Chandler for PJ could have been worked out by the trade deadline, even if Chandler didn't play all too well. I'm guessing Paxson was trying to be as risk averse as possible when it came to Chandler after the Ben Wallace signing. Can't say I disagree 100%.
> 
> I was a big fan of Curry, which I think often gets mistaken as I usually defend most of Paxson's moves. Heart issues aside, I would have gladly kept Curry and shipped Chandler. I never thought they meshed well together and remember wishing I had someone like Ben Wallace to complement Curry.


Don't mention my name without my written consent!! And also don't use me as a example when I'm not even in the discussion!!:azdaja: :azdaja: :azdaja: :azdaja: :azdaja: 






:joke:

Oh yeah, great signing by John Paxson!!


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## BG7 (Jun 25, 2003)

Cyanobacteria said:


> I absolutely love this trend, I think the Bulls are way ahead of the game doing this (does anybody know if other teams are doing it?).
> 
> What's not to like as a player? You get your biggest pay-year up front so that your money is earning interest 4 years earlier and you can pretend you did it all for the benefit of your team (even if you're lying) and teammates (freeing up cap space in the future for their deals).
> 
> ...


I disagree, HORRIBLE trend.

If Hinrich/Wallace were both having contracts with raises.

We would have 13.3 million in capspace

Give Nocioni a contract starting at 6, Darko at 7.3

Nocioni = 45 million over 6 years 
Darko = 42 million over 5 years.

Worked out terribly imho.


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## Aesop (Jun 1, 2003)

If Deng develops a low-post game as he gets older and stronger, he could become more of a 4 than a 3. In a few years, we may see Nocioni getting most of the SF minutes.


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

kukoc4ever said:


> *If I learned one thing on this board last off-season is that "redundancy" (chandler / wallace) is bad, that's why it was a good idea to dump Chandler.
> 
> Somehow Wallace / Noah is good. Go figure. Tyrus brings mainly rebounding and blocking as well. We have a "redundant" frontcourt, according to many.
> *
> ...


If anyone ever calls you stupid on this board, they'll have to fight me first. You've proven to be a very bright guy. You clearly understand
why a $9MM/year veteran back-up who expects to start can be considered redundancy and a 1.8MM/year rookie can be considered a reasonably priced sub. This is why I find the above post curious.


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## BG7 (Jun 25, 2003)

Also...if we didn't frontload those contracts, and somehow managed to unload Duhon/Khryapa using future picks to Charlotte (or Atlanta). We'd have 16.5 in capspace. Imagine giving a big contract to Chauncey Billups?

Starting at 10.5 (5 years, 61 million) along with Nocioni starting at 6 (45 million over 6 years).

PG-Chauncey Billups/Kirk Hinrich
SG-Ben Gordon/Thabo Sefolosha
SF-Luol Deng/Andres Nocioni
PF-Tyrus Thomas/Joakim Noah
C- Ben Wallace/Aaron Gray/Martynas Andrisukscuivsa

Now we have the best backcourt in the league. It would probably have to break down to Gordon, Hinrich, and Billups, with no Thabo...but we would have great assets for a consolidation trade.

We could do as the basis of a package Kirk Hinrich + Andres Nocioni + Joakim Noah for Pau Gasol.

That'd leave us with:

PG-Chauncey Billups/JamesOn Curry
SG-Ben Gordon/Thabo Sefolosha
SF-Luol Deng/Thabo Sefolosha
PF-Pau Gasol/Tyrus Thomas
C- Ben Wallace/Aaron Gray/Martynasua jatjalkdghjahg

Just pointing out the type of moves we could have made without frontloading the contracts.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> I wonder how much you opinion is shaped by Nocioni's performance last year, when he appeared to be significantly slowed by his foot injury. They say defense is played with your feet, and Nocioni's feet were definitely not up to par last year.
> 
> My memories of the 2005-6 season are dimming, but my impression that year was that Nocioni was an excellent defender whose mediocre offense was tolerated because of his ability to disrupt other teams on the defensive end. In fact, one of the things I think I remember is how fast he was with his feet on defense.


Nocioni's defense has never been that good. He gets a reputation as a defender because he draws charges. He's one of the best in the league at drawing charges. However, he is undisciplined and has never stayed in the Bulls scheme. His injury made this problem 5x worse as he seemed to guess and take chances to try and compensate for his injury, but even at his peak he's probably the least disciplined Bulls defender.

As a PF, he gets abused as other PFs can shoot over him or overpower him. He doesn't block shorts, generate steals, or really cause turnovers other than with charges. He's effective at times because he can be bothersome, physical, and gets under people's skin. However, fundamentally he's not that good of a defender.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> I'm not gonna continue the Chandler debate too much except to say I don't think he was redundant given that we still had an obvious need for length, so much that we played a guy who was just as poor a shooter, but shorter on offense. Obviously Chandler isn't an ideal fit, but he wasn't redundant in the sense that he addressed what was a continuing need.
> 
> That's not just a play on words. It's a subtle difference perhaps, but Nocioni is the exact opposite. He's a good fit in the senses you and McBulls mention, but he's redundant in the sense that there are several other Bulls that seem likely to go on the court before him. To draw an analogy, Mike Sweetney wass a great fit (low post scorer), but was totally redundant (lots of guys we'd play before even considering him).


You seem to have missed my point.

1) His skills are redundant because we felt in the short term Ben Wallace could do everything Chanlder would and better (which I believe was mostly accurate. I think Chandler may have rebounded the ball better, but he would have lost at pretty much everything else). In the long term, we felt (and probably still do) that Tyrus Thomas could do everything Chandler did and more (which I also feel is still accurate).

2) He was a poor fit with the team mentality because he was lazy. He even admitted he was lazy. He didn't get along with the coach, he didn't work with the team in the off season, he didn't put the work in on his own either. That's why he didn't fit in with the team. I'm not saying he didn't fit as in he didn't have a role on the floor (though with Tyrus and Wallace, you could argue that he wouldn't fit long term there either).

3) His contract was giving him the benefit of the doubt that he would continue to improve. He got an all-star level contract. However, not only did he not improve, but he got considerably worse. At this point, he was one bad season away from being untradeable if he did not bust out of his slump the following year then he likely would have been untradeable. 

Compare that to Nocioni:
1) Nocioni does bring something we don't have on the team in any other player currently which is offense and shooting from the PF position. The Bulls only have 4 legitimate offensive options on the team, and Nocioni is one of them, so his skills are are at a high level of need. 

2) Nocioni fits in with the team mentality in that he's a hard worker, gets along well with his teammates and coach, and will always put in the effort. 

3) We won't know if Nocioni will decline next year, but he's only getting paid as if he's a somewhat above average player which seems like a fair amount to me. He's on a deal that does not require him to improve to be worth his money, but only to maintain a level of performance which he has already achieved. The declining nature of his contract along with likely increases in the salary cap as time goes on means that as time goes on his deal will likely not look less attractive in 2 years unless his game goes into the tank or he is hampered with injuries.

So while I agree to an extent, about your point that there are similarities to Chandler in the off season we traded him, and Nocioni in the season we extended him, there are great differences too.


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Nocioni's defense has never been that good. He gets a reputation as a defender because he draws charges. He's one of the best in the league at drawing charges. However, he is undisciplined and has never stayed in the Bulls scheme. His injury made this problem 5x worse as he seemed to guess and take chances to try and compensate for his injury, but even at his peak he's probably the least disciplined Bulls defender.
> 
> As a PF, he gets abused as other PFs can shoot over him or overpower him. He doesn't block shorts, generate steals, or really cause turnovers other than with charges. He's effective at times because he can be bothersome, physical, and gets under people's skin. However, fundamentally he's not that good of a defender.


Are the Bulls unaware of these deficiencies? How could that be? Are they stupid?

OK, you're entitled to your opinion. We all have them. Yours is worth as much as mine or anyone else's. I think Nocioni's an excellent defender, and it's not just about taking charges. He's a very good help defender (if he wasn't, the Bulls wouldn't want him). The Bulls are all about defense and the idea that any of us has a better feel for this than they do is, well, uh, hard for me to swallow.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

transplant said:


> You clearly understand
> why a $9MM/year veteran back-up who expects to start can be considered redundancy and a 1.8MM/year rookie can be considered a reasonably priced sub. This is why I find the above post curious.


Chandler expected to start? That's news to me. He didn’t’ mind coming off the bench while on his rookie deal. He got the minutes. Everyone knows that’s what is important, unless people are fishing for excuses to justify a disgusting, franchise harming salary dump.

Nocioni just signed a large money deal. Yes, less than Chandler. I wonder if Nocioni will expect to start as well. Funny how people assumed Chandler would not accept anything less than starting but Nocioni would be fine w/ it, when both players accepted their heavy minutes bench roles in the past. I'd rather have above averge players for depth at center than at tweener sf. Perhaps thats just me.

Redundant skills. That was the argument. Why keep Chandler. We have Wallace. 

I also love reading the few posters that like the Nocioni trade b/c it gives Paxson contract ammo to make a big deal. Like Chandler would not have given Paxson more of that. And Chandler is a more valuable NBA player.


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## BG7 (Jun 25, 2003)

I think what Paxson has quitely done was create the frontcourt that will give the Spurs the most problems come finals time.

San Antonio is a very, very unathletic frontcourt. Tyrus Thomas and Joakim Noah should give them problem in the finals, as Tyrus gave them immense problems in the regular season last year. San Antonio plays two seven footers. Nocioni will be able to stretch out one of those 7 footers to the tree point line...otherwise just square up and take and make threes himself.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I think Chandler may have rebounded the ball better, but he would have lost at pretty much everything else).


No "may" about it. Chandler rebounded the ball better. Noone in the NBA rebounded the ball better.

Chandler also had a much higher TS% than Wallace.





> He even admitted he was lazy.


How does a lazy person lead the league in rebound rate? 




> (though with Tyrus and Wallace, you could argue that he wouldn't fit long term there either).


I really liked your post about how Noah was the right pick for the bulls at #9. I assume you don't think he's a bad fit, right? Please explain.




> At this point, he was one bad season away from being untradeable if he did not bust out of his slump the following year then he likely would have been untradeable.


There was uncertainty. Paxson made the wrong call.






> 1) Nocioni does bring something we don't have on the team in any other player currently which is offense and shooting from the PF position.


But, given the clear need is post scoring, playing Nocioni at the 4 means we're back to small ball with nothing inside.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Are the Bulls unaware of these deficiencies? How could that be? Are they stupid?


I'm sure the Bulls are quite aware of his deficiencies. Why do you think they wouldn't be? It's not like I said he is without strength. He spreads the floor on offense, and he can get under people's skin on defense. He provides toughness, effort, hustle, and can be an emotional game changer.


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

kukoc4ever said:


> Chandler expected to start? That's news to me. He didn’t’ mind coming off the bench while on his rookie deal. He got the minutes. Everyone knows that’s what is important, unless people are fishing for excuses to justify a disgusting, franchise harming salary dump.
> 
> Nocioni just signed a large money deal. Yes, less than Chandler. I wonder if Nocioni will expect to start as well. Funny how people assumed Chandler would not accept anything less than starting but Nocioni would be fine w/ it, when both players accepted their heavy minutes bench roles in the past. I'd rather have above averge players for depth at center than at tweener sf. Perhaps thats just me.
> 
> ...


Your original statement was related to the Noah-Wallace redundancy. Again, given what the Bulls are paying Noah, the redundancy issue is moot...cheap redundancy=back-up. C'mon, you understand this, don't you. Or do you?

Forget it. I quit. You win.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

transplant said:


> ...cheap redundancy=back-up


Is Nocioni cheap?


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> No "may" about it. Chandler rebounded the ball better. Noone in the NBA rebounded the ball better.
> 
> Chandler also had a much higher TS% than Wallace.


I agree that he rebounded better. 

Do you want to bring Chandler's offense into this equation as a strength? His scoring percentage was up because New Orleans didn't use him on offense other than an opportunity basket scorer. His FGA rate was the 2nd lowest in his career (only to 05/06).



> How does a lazy person lead the league in rebound rate?


1) Chandler came out and said he did nothing during the off season to improve his game and went on to absolutely suck on the court. Don't blame me for calling him lazy. Blame Chandler for being lazy then coming out and telling everyone how lazy he was.

2) His per minute rates for blocks, steals, and assists were at career lows. His scoring rate was the second lowest of his career. We've agreed he's a good rebounder, now what else does he do?



> I really liked your post about how Noah was the right pick for the bulls at #9. I assume you don't think he's a bad fit, right? Please explain.


Unlike Chandler, Noah can do the following things:
1) Set up in the post and make good passes. You can run an offense through him in the post not as a scorer, but as a distributor much like we do with Ben Wallace, except that Noah is a better passer than Ben.

2) Noah can catch the ball, go up, and finish even with other players in the area.

3) Noah can put the ball on the floor and go around a slower player.

It's much teh same reason that Tyrus is better on offense. He can go to the basket and catch the ball and finish. Chandler could not. If Chandler could actually catch the ball while moving and finish afterwards he wouldn't have been the big man equivalent to Chris Duhon in his ability to draw double teams on other players.



> There was uncertainty. Paxson made the wrong call.


I don't know, I still wouldn't want Chandler on an 11 million dollar per year deal this year, and you assume that he would have come back motivated in Chicago, gotten playing time over Ben Wallace, and still improved with a coach he hated. I can't say I agree with these assumptions.



> But, given the clear need is post scoring, playing Nocioni at the 4 mean we're back to small ball with nothing inside.


1) Which post scorer did we pass up for Nocioni?

2) He'll play some at the 3 just because Deng isn't going to play 48 minutes a night, and even if he plays at the 4 for 2/3rds of the time then it still gives us a scoring option there which we wouldn't have otherwise.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

transplant said:


> Your original statement was related to the Noah-Wallace redundancy. Again, given what the Bulls are paying Noah, the redundancy issue is moot...


No its not. We're trying to win basketball games. When all-NBA post scorers are being traded for "redundant" to Wallace raw, wait 3 years to develop players, it turns into a weird cluster ****. Wallace is declining. Tyrus is raw as hell. Who knows about Noah. We locked up a backup SF/PF for 5 years for significant money. And this group is going to "win now?" 

Nocioni will likely play the 4, unless Tyrus makes major strides, b/c, if healthy, he's the best player. Problem is, small ball and grittiness isn't going to get the job done.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> His FGA rate was the 2nd lowest in his career (only to 05/06).


His ts% was #6 in the NBA.





> 2) His per minute rates for blocks, steals, and assists were at career lows. His scoring rate was the second lowest of his career. We've agreed he's a good rebounder, now what else does he do?


Blocks shots, makes a shot when he attempts one or gets to the line. There are several other PF/Cs in the league with worse assists ratios. Alters shots in the line. Ya know, the big man stuff.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> His ts% was #6 in the NBA.


A huge percentage of his baskets were open opportunity looks. You can't use him on offense in any situation other than garbage points, so who cares. 



> Blocks shots, makes a shot when he attempts one or gets to the line. There are several other PF/Cs in the league with worse assists ratios. Alters shots in the line. Ya know, the big man stuff.


There were only 45 big men who blocked more shots per minute. I'm also glad to hear that he wasn't the worst in the league in assist ratios among big men. 

It's not that Tyson was awful, but he's still not worth 11 million a year, even after his rebound season.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Wallace is declining. Tyrus is raw as hell. Who knows about Noah. We locked up a backup SF/PF for 5 years for significant money. And this group is going to "win now?"


If you mean the title, I agree we won't win now. 

Tell me, which move could we have made that would have allowed us to win now? I don't believe there is any way that this could have happened. Only one of 30 teams wins each year. For some reason, people seem to think that it'd be easy to win the whole thing.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Unlike Chandler, Noah can do the following things:
> 1) Set up in the post and make good passes. You can run an offense through him in the post not as a scorer, but as a distributor much like we do with Ben Wallace, except that Noah is a better passer than Ben.
> 
> 2) Noah can catch the ball, go up, and finish even with other players in the area.
> ...


OK - At the same age as Noah will be, Chandler played 27 mins a game with a PER of 16.4 on our team that won 47 games.

So what's your prediction for Noah for minutes and PER this year? And next?


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> OK - At the same age as Noah will be, Chandler played 27 mins a game with a PER of 16.4 on our team that won 47 games.
> 
> So what's your prediction for Noah for minutes and PER this year? And next?


I would make the following points which are directly related to what I perceive as your point:

First to answer your questions, I haven't spent a lot of time looking at PERs of rookies to feel that I could make a great guess, but since you asked: This year, probably about PER of 15 and minutes between 15-20. Next year, PER of 16 and minutes around 25.

Second, in the year we traded Chandler (when he was a year older than Noah) he had a PER of 12.2 on a team that won 41 games. I'm willing to bet Joakim as a rookie will put up a better PER, and that the Bulls will win more games (though I don't expect the 2 to be linked since I think the Bulls will top the 47 wins we got with Chandler whether Joakim is on the team or not). 

Third, my point is not that Chandler sucks. He's a great rebounder, an average shot blocker, and can get some efficient garbage points. That's who he is. My point is paying 11 million a year for that is too much. I wouldn't pay Joakim Noah 55 million for the next 5 years based on what I think he'll be able to do either. 

If we had kept Chandler under contract and not used any of our cap space to bring in Ben Wallace (or anyone else) then I think the Bulls would be in good shape. However, fans would have absolutely revolted if the Bulls didn't use that cap space, so they played some sleight of hand sending off Chandler, replacing him with Wallace adn ending up basically cap neutral while filling up all our cap space and saving money to pay Deng and Gordon (hopefully).


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> This year, probably about PER of 15 and minutes between 15-20. Next year, PER of 16 and minutes around 25.


We will be great if he is able to play at that level. I'm not optimistic.



dougthonus said:


> Second, in the year we traded Chandler (when he was a year older than Noah) he had a PER of 12.2 on a team that won 41 games.


Yep, one bad year. Great bounce back last year. 17 PER. Looks like his performance next year will go a long way to proving his value. I expect another step forward.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> You seem to have missed my point.


Not at all, I just don't agree with it. But again, the whole business of Chandler seems to be the focus (especially if the argument reduces to Chandler = lazy bum and Noc = definition of hustle, which seems flawed but dubious even if flawed), when I spent a whole lot of time talking about Noc.



> Compare that to Nocioni:
> 1) Nocioni does bring something we don't have on the team in any other player currently which is offense and shooting from the PF position. The Bulls only have 4 legitimate offensive options on the team, and Nocioni is one of them, so his skills are are at a high level of need.


Again... Sweetney was a legitimate offensive option. But he didn't see the court for other reasons.

Noc is a better offensive player than Noah, Thabo or Tyrus, but they are going to seriously squeeze him for minutes. Which gets back to the point. He might "fit a need", but the question is how much he sees the court. And he'll see the court less and less unless Ty or Noah are big time busts or Wallace gets seriously hurt. If he does see time, it will be because something went majorly wrong.



> 2) Nocioni fits in with the team mentality in that he's a hard worker, gets along well with his teammates and coach, and will always put in the effort.


Brian Cardinal always does a hell of a job cheering on the sidelines.



> 3) We won't know if Nocioni will decline next year, but he's only getting paid as if he's a somewhat above average player which seems like a fair amount to me. He's on a deal that does not require him to improve to be worth his money, but only to maintain a level of performance which he has already achieved. The declining nature of his contract along with likely increases in the salary cap as time goes on means that as time goes on his deal will likely not look less attractive in 2 years unless his game goes into the tank or he is hampered with injuries.


How does he maintain the same level of performance while playing fewer and fewer minutes?

The argument about frontloading it making it more attractive doesn't make sense to me. He'll be significantly overpaid at the beginning (when we're likely to try and trade him) and because of BYC issues it will be harder to trade him as a frontloaded contract than a backloaded contract. So that's not good. Over time, the cap goes up and his contract goes down, but his role is virtually certain to decline as well, and he'll be on the wrong side of 30, so I don't know that it starts to look better. I think that part's a push.

I also don't know about front-loading his deal WRT the luxury tax. I hope the Bulls have some idea of how much the cap is going to increase, because if it doesn't go up by a lot, 
1) frontloading Noc +
2) Signing an MLE level player (as Pax has said he's in a position to do) +
3) Market value extensions for Deng and Gordon
= Luxury Tax

Again, that's ok with me if the Bulls are prepared to accept that, but it's pretty unclear they really will.



> So while I agree to an extent, about your point that there are similarities to Chandler in the off season we traded him, and Nocioni in the season we extended him, there are great differences too.


Regardless of Chandler, it seems to me we're paying a lot of money for a guy because he's a sentimental favorite at best. From a basketball perspective, he'll likely play less and less, and that's not considering the fact he's coming off a serious injury.


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## MikeDC (Jul 16, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> If you mean the title, I agree we won't win now.
> 
> Tell me, which move could we have made that would have allowed us to win now? I don't believe there is any way that this could have happened. Only one of 30 teams wins each year. For some reason, people seem to think that it'd be easy to win the whole thing.


If they can't win now, the idea ought to be to maximize the chance of winning later.

I also think there's a range to how aggressive GMs seem to be about trying to make things happen. Call it a matter of emphasis. Was the emphasis for Pax signing up Noc or working the phones hard and looking for a deal? Thee's a big difference between looking for deals and being willing to listen to deals, and everything I've seen about the Bulls is that they seem to fall more in the latter category.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> A huge percentage of his baskets were open opportunity looks.


Same with Wallace (or it should be, he's best suited for this), expect Chandler is better.

Much better.

Chandler is #6 in ts%. Wallace was 190 out of 194. That's real bad.






> There were only 45 big men who blocked more shots per minute. I'm also glad to hear that he wasn't the worst in the league in assist ratios among big men.


Block and alter shots. An athletic 7 footer like Chandler bouncing around in the lane changes things, even without the giant block totals.

One of the "big men" Chandler had a better assist ratio than was Nocioni, BTW. 




> It's not that Tyson was awful, but he's still not worth 11 million a year, even after his rebound season.


Well, yah, it would be silly to say Tyson was awful. Only a fool would say that. Say what you want about Team USA... but they don't go after AWFUL players. I'm going out on a limb and saying that they go after very good players.

Was Ben Wallace worth 16 million last year? Who do you think will be more productive out of the two (PER) the next 3 seasons?


And no, offense isn't a strength of Chandler. Same with Wallace and likely Noah. And Chandler isn't the brutal player on O that many make him out to be. His assist ratio is better than guys like Yao Ming, Joe Smith, Josh Howard, Andres Nocioni. He's around the same level assist ratio wise as Nick Collinson and Antwan Jamison.

His ts% is #6 in the NBA. 

These are all good things for one of the best defensive 7 footers in the game.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Tell me, which move could we have made that would have allowed us to win now?


I think a core 5 of Hinrich/Gordon/Deng/Chandler/Curry would have a better chance of winning now and winning later then this strange assembly.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Yep, one bad year. Great bounce back last year. 17 PER. Looks like his performance next year will go a long way to proving his value. I expect another step forward.


Even if Chandler has the same PER again, I wouldn't put him back on the team based on the other players we have and the financial trouble it would likely cause. His PER is high because he's a great rebounder and no longer is involved in the offense except on gimmie plays. Instead of trying to allow him to expand his offense (as the Bulls did for most of his time here), the Hornets have accepted him for what he is and let him focus soley on his strengths.


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## rwj333 (Aug 10, 2002)

Chandler was to a large degree redundant because we had an older player at the same position who was significantly better, Wallace, and a younger player who projected to be much better, Thomas. Chandler was signed to a potentially cap-killing contract and had an awful season prior to be being traded. 

Nocioni is to a large degree redundant because we have younger players at the same position who project to be or are better in Deng, Thomas, and possibly Thabo. Nocioni just signed a large contract that overpays him. 

They seem like very similar situations to me. Chandler's skills are more rare, but his contract and play were far worse, compared to Nocioni. In both cases there was an overpaid player who played a role where the Bulls had comparable, better options. Yet people (including me) seem to strongly support keeping one and somewhat dislike keeping the other.


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## superdave (Jul 16, 2002)

This is one of the finer threads on BB.net in a while (kudos to K4E, Doug, MikeDC, etc.)

To address the idea of Noch being redundant with current/future minutes at the forward position, I think this is exactly Pax's point in re-signing Noch on the quick. Why? 1) Noch is perfectly fine with taking secondary minutes off the bench 2) Pax still might be angling for a Gasol/Kobe in principle for Deng type of deal. 3) Still think that with the front loaded deal this is a solid value/contract for a Noch type of player

As it stands the Bulls roster has some ridiculous depth so minutes will be a bit of a crunch next season. There are basically 9 players that should/would/could receive 20+ minutes on an average NBA team: Kirk, Ben, Du, Thabo, Deng, Noch, TT, Wallace, Noah. How these minutes will be doled out (especially if we sign a big for the MLE and/or some scenario like JamesOn being a better version of Pargo) I have no idea, but as a fan of the Bulls this seems to be a good problem to have.

Things are looking up IMO.


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## SausageKingofChicago (Feb 14, 2005)

1. Curry Gate had a big part to pay in Chandler's contract 

2. Tyson was in a contract reneg and didn't work out and had all the respitary problems 

3. He played a lot smaller than his size and his contract 

4. Pax traded him, ostensibly, so he could sign a multi DPOY and gain an expiring contract that wasn't parlayed into a trade for Pau Gasol

5. We won 49 games and were 1 to 2 games of competing for an Eastern Conference Championship 

6. Would we have got further with Chandler from the view that was formed of him from Management by the end of the 2005/2006 season - IE what was known at the time. Probably not. In retrospect ? Probably not

7. Tyson has been born again as a Hornet. Good for him and good for the Hornets

8. Should Pax have changed the philosophy and structure of this team to accommodate Tyson such that there was a tailor made platform here just for him to be the Tyson he could be ? Absolutely not

9. Was Pax right to stay his course in building this team not only with his personnel choices _but perhaps of equal importance with the ethos of what this team is about and the image it projects ?_ and conversely was Pax right to trade away the Tyson that was for the same reasons ?

10. Was the signing of Ben Wallace , considered to be an ugly contract for a declining one dimensional bum , by the naysayers consistent with the right player choice in the context of the ethos that is at the crux of Pax's building plans? Yes.

11. Are the decisions to re-up Kirk Hinrich and Andres Nocioni similarly rooted ?

If these questions can be answered with honesty and objectiveness without the player love and hate on an individual per player basis I put it to you all that you see Pax's vision and the frame of his plan pared down to its bare bones

Player fits the system and what that system demands

The system doesn't alter to fit the player 

And he's not afraid ( and therefore neither is the Chairman ) to pay and get the players they want -arguably over market by some people's assessment 

Pure and simple


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

kukoc4ever said:


> If I learned one thing on this board last off-season is that "redundancy" (chandler / wallace) is bad, that's why it was a good idea to dump Chandler.
> 
> Somehow Wallace / Noah is good. Go figure. Tyrus brings mainly rebounding and blocking as well. We have a "redundant" frontcourt, according to many.
> 
> Everyone knows the team needs some post scoring. Still not addressed. Still holding the team back.


Well, personally I've always argued against that to some extent. You'd rather have players that complement each other but I don't think it's the worst thing in the world to have multiple fantastic defenders in your front court.

Noah doesn't bring us offense but neither do Malik, Sweetney, or P.J. really and he's a better player so I don't see how his addition can't improve the team in at least some small way.

I'm probably becoming a broken record at this point but Tyrus scored at rather solid clip as a 20 year old rookie last season (over 15 points per 40 minutes). He provides more offense than people give him credit for. I certainly wouldn't lump him in with Wallace (a dismal 7.3 points per 40 minutes) or Noah who I'm completely convinced will ever average double figures.


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## Fizer Fanatic (Jun 20, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> I'm probably becoming a broken record at this point but Tyrus scored at rather solid clip as a 20 year old rookie last season (over 15 points per 40 minutes). He provides more offense than people give him credit for. I certainly wouldn't lump him in with Wallace (a dismal 7.3 points per 40 minutes) or Noah who I'm completely convinced will ever average double figures.


With Noah, I'm assuming you meant to say never instead of ever. When I look at the numbers (see http://gatorzone.com/basketball/men/stats.php#TEAM.IND), it seems that Horford and Noah were very similar in terms of both production and efficiency in college. And this while I understand Noah was playing with a shoulder injury. Yet the consensus perception (from actually watching the games) is that Horford will translate much better to the NBA offensively. I don't completely buy that consensus. While I still look for Horford to be the better pro offensively, I'm looking for a pleasant surprise from Noah offensively. After all he did shoot over 60% and average double digits on a very talented Florida team with an injured shoulder. I'm hoping the coaching staff can help improve his jumper. Irregardless, I believe he'll be a bit more productive than Ben Wallace or Tyson Chandler offensively.


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## Cyanobacteria (Jun 25, 2002)

Mebarak said:


> Also...if we didn't frontload those contracts, and somehow managed to unload Duhon/Khryapa using future picks to Charlotte (or Atlanta). We'd have 16.5 in capspace. Imagine giving a big contract to Chauncey Billups?
> 
> Starting at 10.5 (5 years, 61 million) along with Nocioni starting at 6 (45 million over 6 years).
> 
> ...


Is Reinsdorf shelling out about 80 mil plus luxury tax in a season or 2? This is all meaningless abstraction (with several unlikely assumptions piled on top) to me unless you put a monetary context to it. What are Ben and Lu resigning for if the contracts are not front-loaded? if Wallace/Gasol/Billups are combining for 45 mil a year?


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

thebizkit69u said:


> I dont look at Nocioni and say well there is a player thats better then most. Hes a nice player but when you talk about everything else hes just another guy. Hes not a special athlete, he doesnt score at will and he doest do one thing great. In a year where you draft 2 bigs and are interested in signing a few more bigs you kinda wonder where your going to play Nocioni and if 30+ million is what a 20 mpg player make.
> 
> Luol Deng will need all the minutes you can give him at SF,Tyrus Thomas will need more minutes, Noah isnt going to sit on the bench all season and your not going to sign Chris Mihm or Joe Smith to play 15 minutes.


There just really aren't that many players who can average 15 PPG in the NBA and Lu and Tyrus aren't going to be playing 48 MPG anytime soon.



thebizkit69u said:


> I'm not cool with Deng averaging 3 less minutes per game, I'm actually expecting Deng to hit the 40 mark next season. If Deng is going to be our superstar then he needs to play superstar minutes.


I'm close to as big a Lu Deng fan as you'll find but I like the idea of him playing 35 MPG. He'll play better if he's well rested and it may lead to him having a longer career. Only six guys in the league played 40 or more MPG last season.



MikeDC said:


> There's a lot of sentimentality going on here, but the reality is we're about to pay $7M/yr to a guy who's destined to be a 20mpg player for us and who's coming off a major injury.
> 
> I don't want to lose the guy, but we need to be objective about things too.
> 
> ...


Other than the insinuation that his injury is something to be concerned about, I don't really disagree with any of that. It's just that I don't really see the downside. I don't think Pax would've made the offer if it might jeopardize willingness to resign Lu and BG down the line. I don't think we'll be able to sign better players with the MLE down the line. The alternatives to me are losing a player who will be better than at least some of the players who take his minutes or getting 30 cents on the dollar in a sign and trade. So, since I see plenty to lose by parting with him and very little to lose by keeping him, I have pretty much no concerns about this deal. 



MikeDC said:


> So yeah, we were "pretty good", but it's two different things. We were pretty good but missed what Chandler brought. We were pretty good while not missing what Noc brought.


I think you need to be pretty careful with this sort of logic. It's basically the logic behind plus/minus stats which I don't particularly like. There are so many different things going on in a basketball game so correlation often does not equal causation.

One reason that I think we played better without Noc is that Tyrus saw more minutes and we didn't need to cut down or eliminate Noc's minutes in order for that to happen.



MikeDC said:


> Once he gets settled (which I think happens within his first season), Noah seems the more obvious replacement for Thomas or Wallace because you want a long and quick guy next to them.
> 
> And at the 3 spot, you're only taking Deng off the court for 10 minutes a night probably, and you've got Thabo who looks a lot more like a 3 than anything else.


We can debate whether it's the wisest substitution pattern for this team or not but Skiles likes to have a scorer as his sixth man and Noc fits that reputation much more than Noah.

I like Thabo at the 2 and even at the 1 better than I like him at the three. The reason we drafted him was supposedly to get size in the backcourt. He's not a good shooter but I don't think that means he's not well suited to play guard.





Mebarak said:


> I disagree, HORRIBLE trend.
> 
> If Hinrich/Wallace were both having contracts with raises.
> 
> ...


It's smart considering our limitations. We couldn't sign both those deals anyways because of luxury tax concerns. 



dougthonus said:


> 1) His skills are redundant because we felt in the short term Ben Wallace could do everything Chanlder would and better (which I believe was mostly accurate. I think Chandler may have rebounded the ball better, but he would have lost at pretty much everything else). In the long term, we felt (and probably still do) that Tyrus Thomas could do everything Chandler did and more (which I also feel is still accurate).


FWIW, Chandler also scores better than Wallace, and by a decent margin.



dougthonus said:


> Do you want to bring Chandler's offense into this equation as a strength? His scoring percentage was up because New Orleans didn't use him on offense other than an opportunity basket scorer. His FGA rate was the 2nd lowest in his career (only to 05/06).


Strength is probably putting it to strongly, but he's competent while Wallace is awful. Even though he doesn't attempt a lot of shots, that type of efficiency is still valuable. There are plenty of garbage men types in the NBA (Wallace being one example) who miss plenty of shots.



MikeDC said:


> I also don't know about front-loading his deal WRT the luxury tax. I hope the Bulls have some idea of how much the cap is going to increase, because if it doesn't go up by a lot,
> 1) frontloading Noc +
> 2) Signing an MLE level player (as Pax has said he's in a position to do) +
> 3) Market value extensions for Deng and Gordon
> = Luxury Tax


I think the luxury tax is the reason it's frontloaded: put as much of the money as possible in the first year of the deal while Lu and BG's extensions still haven't kicked in. 



Fizer Fanatic said:


> With Noah, I'm assuming you meant to say never instead of ever. When I look at the numbers (see http://gatorzone.com/basketball/men/stats.php#TEAM.IND), it seems that Horford and Noah were very similar in terms of both production and efficiency in college. And this while I understand Noah was playing with a shoulder injury. Yet the consensus perception (from actually watching the games) is that Horford will translate much better to the NBA offensively. I don't completely buy that consensus. While I still look for Horford to be the better pro offensively, I'm looking for a pleasant surprise from Noah offensively. After all he did shoot over 60% and average double digits on a very talented Florida team with an injured shoulder. I'm hoping the coaching staff can help improve his jumper. Irregardless, I believe he'll be a bit more productive than Ben Wallace or Tyson Chandler offensively.


I actually meant ever. I think he probably will be able to but it's not a lock in my mind. The college numbers aren't bad and he has athleticism so he could surprise, like you said it's just an issue of whether the offense will translate to the NBA.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Again... Sweetney was a legitimate offensive option. But he didn't see the court for other reasons.


If Sweetney could have stayed in shape he could have been a legitimate offensive option, but as it was, he didn't and wasn't. Sweetney was such a huge disappointment for me, because I had pretty high expectations. However, Nocioni is a 4th offensive option who actually can stay on the court and isn't subjected to a bench role for 'other reasons'.



> Noc is a better offensive player than Noah, Thabo or Tyrus, but they are going to seriously squeeze him for minutes. Which gets back to the point. He might "fit a need", but the question is how much he sees the court. And he'll see the court less and less unless Ty or Noah are big time busts or Wallace gets seriously hurt. If he does see time, it will be because something went majorly wrong.


I don't know. Tyrus and Noah still need to develop. We don't know how good they will be (though I am hopeful). Wallace will start to decline. It seems like there will be minutes for Noc as Tyrus + Noah develop and then minutes again as Wallace fades away. I do agree that we have a minutes crunch though, and that I wouldn't have been upset to let Nocioni go because I think we'd be fine without him. I'm not saying that Nocioni was a guy we just couldn't lose or anything like that. We'd have been fine letting him go, but we got him on a reasonable deal. I'm not going to complain about it. He'll definitely help us more in the short term than not having him.



> Brian Cardinal always does a hell of a job cheering on the sidelines.


Do you think Nocioni is worse than Cardinal? 

Do you not think that having a culture of laziness didn't hurt this franchise in the not too distant past?



> How does he maintain the same level of performance while playing fewer and fewer minutes?


His level of achievable performance seems unlikely to decline. Whether he plays fewer minutes will be left for us to wait and see.



> The argument about frontloading it making it more attractive doesn't make sense to me. He'll be significantly overpaid at the beginning (when we're likely to try and trade him) and because of BYC issues it will be harder to trade him as a frontloaded contract than a backloaded contract. So that's not good. Over time, the cap goes up and his contract goes down, but his role is virtually certain to decline as well, and he'll be on the wrong side of 30, so I don't know that it starts to look better. I think that part's a push.


I don't think we'll try to trade him immediately myself. The front loading of the contract will make sure that he will keep his contract more movable down the road. His contract runs to when he is 32. At the point he has 3 years left and the deal is basically 20 million for 3 years and he'll be 30, 31, and 32 during those years, I think it will still be very movable. I think the Bulls would keep him at least that long.



> I also don't know about front-loading his deal WRT the luxury tax. I hope the Bulls have some idea of how much the cap is going to increase, because if it doesn't go up by a lot,
> 1) frontloading Noc +
> 2) Signing an MLE level player (as Pax has said he's in a position to do) +
> 3) Market value extensions for Deng and Gordon
> = Luxury Tax


I have a salary chart assuming increasing contracts for Gordon and Deng at 55 million each. We'll be at 61 million this year without using the MLE, so an MLE deal would push us very close to the tax. Personally, I can't imagine why we'd want to use the MLE considering the current roster. I felt it would have made sense if we let Nocioni go.



> Regardless of Chandler, it seems to me we're paying a lot of money for a guy because he's a sentimental favorite at best. From a basketball perspective, he'll likely play less and less, and that's not considering the fact he's coming off a serious injury.


What are your thoughts on letting him go and using the MLE on Joe Smith, Mikki Moore, or Chris Mihm? I'm feeling pretty good about Nocioni for 7.5 a year compared to these guys at 6.5 a year myself. I would see the signing of Nocioni as a reason not to use the MLE. However, we'll have to wait and see if Paxson feels the same way. I think the roster is way too jammed to add an MLE player onto it now even with just a 1 or 2 year deal.


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

dougthonus said:


> I have a salary chart assuming increasing contracts for Gordon and Deng at 55 million each. We'll be at 61 million this year without using the MLE, so an MLE deal would push us very close to the tax. Personally, I can't imagine why we'd want to use the MLE considering the current roster. I felt it would have made sense if we let Nocioni go.


Does the chart have the extensions factored into this coming season? Because they wouldn't kick in until the season after that, no? If not, I'm trying to figure out how it's that much money since Noc, Kirk, and Wallace are the only three players with big contracts.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> I think a core 5 of Hinrich/Gordon/Deng/Chandler/Curry would have a better chance of winning now and winning later then this strange assembly.


I'm iffy about it. 

However, Curry's heart condition to me makes the question irrelevant anyway. I'm sure you don't want to argue that one, because while I may have not been in those arguments here I was in them on realgm quite in depth. To sum it up, my personal opinion is that it made sense to trade him. When a leading cardiologist in the world says "I won't clear you without this test" then I error on the side of caution if I'm the financial decision maker of a half billion dollar business or I'm cautious if it was me, my child, or anyone else important to me. To me it was the smart business decision not to take the chance just because the downside if he has an issue is just so huge. Regardless of Paxson's decision on that, it's debatable whether Reinsdorf would have allowed him the leeway to take on an uninsured contract under the circumstances anyway.

Besides which, I have to say, I think I like this groups chances more anyway. Curry is so bad defensively that it's mind boggling. I think people dramatically over rate his improvement. He scores 3 points more per game last year, but his defense, which was never special, has gone to an absolutely abysmally bad level.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

I've seen or read nothing that says Skiles likes his 6th man to be an offensive player. What I've seen him quoted as saying is that (at the time Gordon became a starter) he likes to have at least one guy on the bench who can score, period. That starting Gordon, Hinrich, Nocioni, and Deng would leave nobody on the bench who could come in and provide a lift.

The discussion has included Chandler. Well, he was 6th man on the 47 win team.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Does the chart have the extensions factored into this coming season? Because they wouldn't kick in until the season after that, no? If not, I'm trying to figure out how it's that much money since Noc, Kirk, and Wallace are the only three players with big contracts.


I accidentally had Sweetney's QO on there, so I was off by 3.8 million. I now have it as 57.5 million for this year.


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## The Krakken (Jul 17, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Personally, I can't imagine why we'd want to use the MLE considering the current roster. I felt it would have made sense if we let Nocioni go.
> 
> 
> 
> What are your thoughts on letting him go and using the MLE on Joe Smith, Mikki Moore, or Chris Mihm? I'm feeling pretty good about Nocioni for 7.5 a year compared to these guys at 6.5 a year myself. I would see the signing of Nocioni as a reason not to use the MLE. However, we'll have to wait and see if Paxson feels the same way. I think the roster is way too jammed to add an MLE player onto it now even with just a 1 or 2 year deal.


Nocioni doesn't address a hole. We still have a big hole. One that will keep us from sniffing a title. What player have we acquired that solves our easy offense (post offense if you will) problem? Not Noc.


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## ace20004u (Jun 19, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I'm iffy about it.
> 
> However, Curry's heart condition to me makes the question irrelevant anyway. I'm sure you don't want to argue that one, because while I may have not been in those arguments here I was in them on realgm quite in depth. To sum it up, my personal opinion is that it made sense to trade him. When a leading cardiologist in the world says "I won't clear you without this test" then I error on the side of caution if I'm the financial decision maker of a half billion dollar business or I'm cautious if it was me, my child, or anyone else important to me. To me it was the smart business decision not to take the chance just because the downside if he has an issue is just so huge. Regardless of Paxson's decision on that, it's debatable whether Reinsdorf would have allowed him the leeway to take on an uninsured contract under the circumstances anyway.
> 
> Besides which, I have to say, I think I like this groups chances more anyway. Curry is so bad defensively that it's mind boggling. I think people dramatically over rate his improvement. He scores 3 points more per game last year, but his defense, which was never special, has gone to an absolutely abysmally bad level.



That sort of ignores the fact that there were several leading cardiologists that were willing to clear him without a DNA test.

He seems to be fine playing in NY...

ACE


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Even if Chandler has the same PER again, I wouldn't put him back on the team based on the other players we have and the financial trouble it would likely cause. His PER is high because he's a great rebounder and no longer is involved in the offense except on gimmie plays. *Instead of trying to allow him to expand his offense (as the Bulls did for most of his time here), the Hornets have accepted him for what he is and let him focus soley on his strengths.*


Actually, Bryon Scott and Paul had to insist that Chandler play on Offense this year. There are tons of quotes about how this had to be forced as he wouldn't look at the basket at the start of the year. Chandler did go from 8 ppg per40 in his last year with the Bulls to 11 ppg per40 last year. In fact, if you look at the splits, Chandler was supplying much better O at the end of the year. After he starting looking for his shot again.

EDIT: His is a link to some past quotes: http://www.basketballforum.com/4477081-post63.html

EDIT 2: http://www.nba.com/hornets/news/review_23apr2007.html


> As a result of Chandler’s lack of aggressiveness, Scott began fining the 235-pounder small amounts of cash whenever the player grabbed a rebound but immediately passed the ball back out to the perimeter. *Scott’s coaxing, along with a gradual but noticeable increase in Chandler’s confidence*, resulted in an eye-opening second half to the season. The Dominguez (Calif.) High product peaked in February, grabbing an incredible 16.1 rebounds per game, along with 13.2 points, both season-highs for a month by Chandler.


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

DaBullz said:


> I've seen or read nothing that says Skiles likes his 6th man to be an offensive player. What I've seen him quoted as saying is that (at the time Gordon became a starter) he likes to have at least one guy on the bench who can score, period. That starting Gordon, Hinrich, Nocioni, and Deng would leave nobody on the bench who could come in and provide a lift.


Yeah, I suppose it doesn't necessarily follow that the scorer has to be the sixth man. But since I've never heard Skiles describe any other type of player he finds it important to have on the bench, I think it's a reasonable assumption. 



dougthonus said:


> I accidentally had Sweetney's QO on there, so I was off by 3.8 million. I now have it as 57.5 million for this year.


Hmm. Yeah, I looked at Mike's payroll protection thread and I guess the small just contracts add up more than I realize. Looking at some of these numbers make me think it will be quite difficult for us to avoid the luxury tax in the coming seasons. The $8 to $10 million dollars we've been talking about for Gordon's and Deng's extensions don't seem that realistic all of a sudden and they'll be followed by Tyrus and Noah (though getting Wallace's contract off the books obviously helps).



The Krakken said:


> Nocioni doesn't address a hole. We still have a big hole. One that will keep us from sniffing a title. What player have we acquired that solves our easy offense (post offense if you will) problem? Not Noc.


I mean he addresses a hole the same sense that Noah addresses a hole: he adds depth and prevents us from possibly giving his minutes to less productive players. Our need is a back to the basket scorer and Moore and Smith certainly don't fit into that category.


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## rwj333 (Aug 10, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> I'm close to as big a Lu Deng fan as you'll find but I like the idea of him playing 35 MPG. He'll play better if he's well rested and it may lead to him having a longer career. Only six guys in the league played 40 or more MPG last season.


Lu is our best player and also only 22. It's hard to see Skiles cutting back on his minutes. We're not like San Antonio, who are confident that they are a championship squad, can limit the minutes of Duncan, Parker, and Ginobli, and can afford to lose a few during the regular season that they could win if they went all out. 



DaBullz said:


> I've seen or read nothing that says Skiles likes his 6th man to be an offensive player. What I've seen him quoted as saying is that (at the time Gordon became a starter) he likes to have at least one guy on the bench who can score, period. That starting Gordon, Hinrich, Nocioni, and Deng would leave nobody on the bench who could come in and provide a lift.


I've pretty frequently read quotes from Skiles where he said he liked having at least one offensive player off the bench. I'm too lazy to search for it. But that was his reasoning for benching Nocioni/starting Gordon in the middle of the season.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

rwj333 said:


> I've pretty frequently read quotes from Skiles where he said he liked having at least one offensive player off the bench. I'm too lazy to search for it. But that was his reasoning for benching Nocioni/starting Gordon in the middle of the season.


That's what I said


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## rwj333 (Aug 10, 2002)

DaBullz said:


> That's what I said


ack! reading comp


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> That sort of ignores the fact that there were several leading cardiologists that were willing to clear him without a DNA test.
> 
> He seems to be fine playing in NY...


If you had a heart condition, and the leading cardiologist in the world said you needed to take a test to make sure you are okay, would you take it even if another cardiologist said "nah don't worry about it". It's a test. It's not like it was open heart surgery. They had to draw blood. If it was anyone you cared about would you advise them to take the test? If it was someone you were going to pay 60 million dollars would you make them take the test?

Even Paxson said on the day he traded him (paraphrased) "He's probably fine, but we can't take the chance". That's what I have always thought and still agree with. He was probably fine, but you couldn't take the chance. Especially when you offered the 60/20 deal (60 million if he passes and 20 if he fails) I can't understand how you could have approached him more fairly than that. It didn't work out. I have no qualms with what Eddy did in getting traded to NY for a huge guaranteed deal without the risk of taking a test which might end his career. That's his choice. I also think the Bulls did the right thing in not allowing any chance for him to die on their hands after he was diagnosed with a heart condition.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Actually, Bryon Scott and Paul had to insist that Chandler play on Offense this year. There are tons of quotes about how this had to be forced as he wouldn't look at the basket at the start of the year. Chandler did go from 8 ppg per40 in his last year with the Bulls to 11 ppg per40 last year. In fact, if you look at the splits, Chandler was supplying much better O at the end of the year. After he starting looking for his shot again.


Chandler's FGA per 40 over his career:
8.8, 10.6, 8.1, 7.7, 5.3, 7.4

He had more looks every year of his career per minute except 05/06. So the coaches can say whatever rhetoric they want about getting him more looks, but it's not true. The Hornets have a better PG at breaking teams down and generating quality looks giving Chandler probably 1-2 additional easy opportunity baskets a game which has raised his efficiency. However, that's all he's got still opportunity baskets.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

As a side note, I do agree that Chandler could have developed better if he had a different coach. Skiles does not seem to deal well with people who can't deal with the whip. Chandler seems to be one of those such players which is no knock on him, people just deal with different personalities in different ways. Personally, I'm with Chandler. I used to have a tennis coach who went to the whip instead of the sugar cubes constantly and I completely regressed under him big time and ended up quitting the team my senior year because I got sick of dealing with him.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Chandler's FGA per 40 over his career:
> 8.8, 10.6, 8.1, 7.7, 5.3, 7.4
> 
> He had more looks every year of his career per minute except 05/06. So the coaches can say whatever rhetoric they want about getting him more looks, but it's not true. The Hornets have a better PG at breaking teams down and generating quality looks giving Chandler probably 1-2 additional easy opportunity baskets a game which has raised his efficiency. However, that's all he's got still opportunity baskets.


But Chandler was better than 9.0 after the All-Star break. Per the quote, Bryon Scott talked about how it was a process. And Chandler started breaking out when Paul was hurt.

Chandler went from 10.6 with Cartwright and then decreased for 3 straight years with Skiles. Nice work, Skiles.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Chandler went from 10.6 with Cartwright and then decreased for 3 straight years with Skiles. Nice work, Skiles.


I don't know how much I blame Skiles (but clearly it's at least some and probably quite a bit, so don't get me wrong):
year 1 with Skiles, Chandler was injured and never seemed to gain confidence.
Year 2 with Skiles is still Chandler's best year as a PRO IMO. He was a bigger difference maker that year than in New Orleans this past year defensively. 
Year 3 with Skiles he admitted to slacking all off season and seemed to have trouble adjusting to playing center all the time instead of getting minutes at PF.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I don't know how much I blame Skiles (but clearly it's at least some and probably quite a bit, so don't get me wrong):
> year 1 with Skiles, Chandler was injured and never seemed to gain confidence.
> Year 2 with Skiles is still Chandler's best year as a PRO IMO. He was a bigger difference maker that year than in New Orleans this past year defensively.
> Year 3 with Skiles he admitted to slacking all off season and seemed to have trouble adjusting to playing center all the time instead of getting minutes at PF.


Look, you can make all the excuses you want. But Chandler clearly never looked for his shot in his last year with the Bulls. He never got a look in the post. Last year, Chandler made tremendous strides if you look at the splits. Chandler's coach has clearly explained his approach to help making that happen. (Note: that one article wasn't the most detailed one.)

p.s. Clearly, last year was Chandler's best. Best PER. Starters minutes for the first time. Best showing in All-Defense Team and All-NBA voting.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Look, you can make all the excuses you want. But Chandler clearly never looked for his shot in his last year with the Bulls. He never got a look in the post. Chandler made tremendous strides if you look at the splits. Chandler's coach clearly explains his approach to help making that happen.
> 
> p.s. Clearly, last year was Chandler's best. Best PER. Starters minutes. Best showing in All-Defense Team and All-NBA voting.


I didn't make excuses. I specifically said that Skiles shared at least some portion of the blame and possibly quite a bit of it. It sounds like I was agreeing with you, so unless you think that Chandler is exempt from all blame when he admitted he didn't work out at all during the summer and came in out of shape then we are probably largely on the same page.

He may have been better on 06/07 than 04/05, but I think it's debatable. He played much less aggressively defensively which allowed him to stay on the floor more, but made him less impactful as a defender. I don't think his personal offense improved in any significant way, but the quality of looks he got improved via having a better PG. I could be wrong though, I watched probably 80 games in 04/05 of Chandler and probably only about 20 of 06/07. It's possible I'm just romanticizing the 04/05 season in my mind though. I think that was Curry's best year as a pro as well.


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> No its not. We're trying to win basketball games. When all-NBA post scorers are being traded for "redundant" to Wallace raw, wait 3 years to develop players, it turns into a weird cluster ****. Wallace is declining. Tyrus is raw as hell. Who knows about Noah. We locked up a backup SF/PF for 5 years for significant money. And this group is going to "win now?"
> 
> Nocioni will likely play the 4, unless Tyrus makes major strides, b/c, if healthy, he's the best player. Problem is, small ball and grittiness isn't going to get the job done.


If Nocioni had been healthy, the Bulls might well have made it to the finals, at least they would have had a better chance of beating Detroit in the semifinals. That goes double for next year. Last year they proved they could play with any team in the NBA, including San Antonio. This year, barring multiple injuries, they will be better. 

The team as presently constituted is young, but deep and strong at every position. Every position is manned by a player who has experience winning at the highest level and who have not experienced a losing season in years. They're probably going to add a power forward or center free agent who can score inside, but I don't think they need a post-up player to win it all. Small-ball, combined with league-leading defense is enough, although I bet the team will have plenty of inside scoring next year as well.

The Bulls are ready to win now. The only things that can stop them are injuries and stupid trades for aging superstars.


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

rwj333 said:


> Lu is our best player and also only 22. It's hard to see Skiles cutting back on his minutes. We're not like San Antonio, who are confident that they are a championship squad, can limit the minutes of Duncan, Parker, and Ginobli, and can afford to lose a few during the regular season that they could win if they went all out.


I don't know. Whether his minutes are increasing or decreasing seems irrelevant to me. If he'd played 44 minutes per game last season, presumably we could all agree that cutting back his minutes would be the smart thing to do. If we were cutting his minutes down to 32 MPG or so I'd agree that it probably hurts our ability to win games and is a luxury we may not have. 35 MPG are still starter's minutes though and I think that by keeping Lu fresh, it might even increase our ability to win games. I guess that personally, I just see 35 minutes as pretty much ideal and playing someone more requires a bit of desperation that I don't think we should have with a starting caliber player as the backup.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

McBulls said:


> If Nocioni had been healthy, the Bulls might well have made it to the finals,


Well, anything "may" have happened. Do you think that if Nocioni was there it would have happened? I like Nocioni b/c he's decent and plays with da fire and da passion, but I don't think he's the difference between the Bulls getting to the finals and them not getting to the finals.




> The team as presently constituted is young, but deep and strong at every position.


At the 4 and 5, its either too young or on the decline. At the 1,2,3 we're more like what you describe. Hinrich/Gordon/Deng/Curry/Chandler would have been exactly what you describe.





> Small-ball, combined with league-leading defense is enough, although I bet the team will have plenty of inside scoring next year as well.


I disagree. Where is the inside scoring coming from again? THe MLE? Whose minutes (Nocioni, Tyrus, Noah, Wallace) will this inside force be stealing from? Joe Smith is not good. Mihm is average at best. Guys like this don't make much difference at all.



> injuries and stupid trades for aging superstars.


Do you think Wallace was a good signing?


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## lgtwins (May 18, 2004)

K4E, what should we (I mean, Paxon) do? Do you have answer? 

Not what Paxon should have done. Cause that is moot point at this point. 

What should Paxon do from this point on?


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> What should Paxon do from this point on?


It's hard for anyone to give a real answer to this. For the most part, we don't know what our options are. Maybe we could get KG or Kobe right now if we paid enough, but we don't know what it would cost or if it's possible. We don't know how much we'd have to spend on the various FAs out there either. 

Personally right now, I would go into the season as is without spending my MLE this year. I'd want to put my young players in position to get as many minutes as possible. I would only make a trade if something fell into my laugh and I was clearly getting the best end of the deal. I would consider Ben Wallace highly tradeable for assets that would help the Bulls in a couple of years even if it meant a short term decline. However, I don't think that's likely to be possible.


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## Hustle (Dec 17, 2003)

dougthonus said:


> It's hard for anyone to give a real answer to this. For the most part, we don't know what our options are. Maybe we could get KG or Kobe right now if we paid enough, but we don't know what it would cost or if it's possible. We don't know how much we'd have to spend on the various FAs out there either.
> 
> Personally right now, I would go into the season as is without spending my MLE this year. I'd want to put my young players in position to get as many minutes as possible. I would only make a trade if something fell into my laugh and I was clearly getting the best end of the deal. I would consider Ben Wallace highly tradeable for assets that would help the Bulls in a couple of years even if it meant a short term decline. However, I don't think that's likely to be possible.


:clap2: 

Except for the MLE part, Joe Smith please.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

Its hard to say what Paxson should do until the opportunities present themselves.

The Gasol trade opp last season was a perfect opportunity to make up for Paxson botching the blessing of the twin towers inheritance. After that, the Bulls had problems at the 4 and 5, which necessitated blowing 60 mil over 4 years on a declining Ben Wallace and burning 2 lotto picks on 4s and 5s and burning years to develop them, and throwing off the shared time window of the roster. 

So, when a deal like Gasol comes up, Paxson should be aggressively pursuing a player like that. I'm not convinced he was. I think he basically dusty phoned it. Anything other than a trade heavily lopsided for the Bulls would "disrupt the core 4." How a backup SF is part of a core 4 is beyond me. Going forward the key is to snag a superstar or to develop one internally, if we have one, which I’m not sure about at all. Easier said than done, but if acquisition from outside is required, I doubt that the ultra-conservative method is going to get the job done. Good but not great. The Mark Price Cavs to some other teams MJ.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> The Gasol trade opp last season was a perfect opportunity to make up for Paxson botching the blessing of the twin towers inheritance. After that, the Bulls had problems at the 4 and 5, which necessitated blowing 60 mil over 4 years on a declining Ben Wallace and burning 2 lotto picks on 4s and 5s and burning years to develop them, and throwing off the shared time window of the roster.


Would you have traded Deng + Gordon for Gasol or Deng + Tyrus + Noah for Gasol? Those are the two deals that I have heard that Memphis would have accepted. I think the Bulls would be in far worse position for doing either of them.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I didn't make excuses. I specifically said that Skiles shared at least some portion of the blame and possibly quite a bit of it. It sounds like I was agreeing with you, so unless you think that Chandler is exempt from all blame when he admitted he didn't work out at all during the summer and came in out of shape then we are probably largely on the same page.


Chandler is definitely in part to blame for his poor year. Skiles and Pax are responsible for losing a valuable asset.

I don't know if we are on the same page or not. Earlier in the thread you indicated, _
*"Instead of trying to allow [Chandler] to expand his offense (as the Bulls did for most of his time here), the Hornets have accepted him for what he is and let him focus soley on his strengths"*_ 

It seems pretty clear to me that Skiles influence caused Chandler to reduce his attempts on the offense end and Byron Scott is in the middle of the process to expand it. 

That would appear to be a fairly large difference in opinion.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

In the end, one has to come to a conclusion about a Hinrich/Gordon/Deng/Nocioni/Wallace core for next season with a bench of youngsters, Duhon, cheap vets and a Joe Smith level MLE.

I don't think that's good enough to win the NBA Title or even make the NBA Finals out of a weak East, unless we see some strong, strong growth from Tyrus. Same plan as last year, except Wallace will likely be worse this year than last, making up weaker at the 5.

If you come to the conclusion I have and want to win now, you need to deal for a stud player, IMO. A tweak won’t do it. This is going to require trading assets. More than one of them, and likely at least one that’s going to be very painful to give up. But, what is the alterative? 

And, if we’re talking about getting a Gasol level player, I think we’re getting the best player in the deal at a position where we have a desperate need for and is difficult to fill. Now that Noah was drafted its going to be tougher to fill the 3 spot if Deng is dealt.

You either have to aggressively pursue an in his prime, top 15 in NBA production type player, or you develop the young players and go for win later. How the Ben Wallace signing helps w/ the latter I don’t see, other than a very, very expensive mentor.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Would you have traded Deng + Gordon for Gasol or Deng + Tyrus + Noah for Gasol? Those are the two deals that I have heard that Memphis would have accepted. I think the Bulls would be in far worse position for doing either of them.


I've read reports from all over the map as to what was on the table and what was not. These two are two of the most expensive options I heard.

If your deals, what else was coming back from Memphis?


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> I've read reports from all over the map as to what was on the table and what was not. These two are two of the most expensive options I heard.
> 
> If your deals, what else was coming back from Memphis?


It was widely reported originally that Jerry West wanted Deng and Gordon. There was another report later that they would settle for Deng + Tyrus + the pick.

I have not heard any other report of what Memphis would have accepted. Paxson said in his interview that Memphis wanted Deng included with significant other assets, but didn't specify, one of the Chicago beat writers said the other assets were Tyrus + the pick this year. I'm not clear as to what would have come back with Gasol in teh deal, but I would have to assume nothing else significant.


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## Electric Slim (Jul 31, 2002)

kukoc4ever said:


> Do you think Wallace was a good signing?


Were you on the Wilcox or Nene bandwagon?


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> I don't know if we are on the same page or not. Earlier in the thread you indicated,
> "Instead of trying to allow [Chandler] to expand his offense (as the Bulls did for most of his time here), the Hornets have accepted him for what he is and let him focus soley on his strengths"
> 
> It seems pretty clear to me that Skiles influence caused Chandler to reduce his attempts on the offense end and Byron Scott is in the middle of the process to expand it.


My replies after which on the subject were:


> As a side note, I do agree that Chandler could have developed better if he had a different coach. Skiles does not seem to deal well with people who can't deal with the whip. Chandler seems to be one of those such players which is no knock on him, people just deal with different personalities in different ways. Personally, I'm with Chandler. I used to have a tennis coach who went to the whip instead of the sugar cubes constantly and I completely regressed under him big time and ended up quitting the team my senior year because I got sick of dealing with him.





> I don't know how much I blame Skiles (but clearly it's at least some and *probably quite a bit*, so don't get me wrong):


I was finding common ground, and pointing out that I do agree with several of your points. To which you told me not to make up excuses.

I don't agree with you entirely, in that I still think Chandler's increased efficiency is due to having a better point guard and not that he's now becoming an offensive player around the basket. This is based on the games I've watched him play which was largely at the end of the season when I was seeing if the Knicks would finish above or behind New Orleans. 

However, I do think Skiles deserves a good portion of the blame for Chandler not performing better. I am not upset about the Chandler trade seeing as that I wouldn't add him back onto the Bulls knowing the financial restraints they work under on his current deal even if we removed no one else.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I have not heard any other report of what Memphis would have accepted.



There is a difference between wanted and would have accepted.

I’m not digging through all of the old posts. I remember a radio interview w/ KC Johnson on the score that indicated that Paxson was not willing to give up much for Gasol. Its that attitude that I find most troubling. Search through the post archives to read what was said.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> There is a difference between wanted and would have accepted.
> 
> I’m not digging through all of the old posts. I remember a radio interview w/ KC Johnson on the score that indicated that Paxson was not willing to give up much for Gasol. Its that attitude that I find most troubling. Search through the post archives to read what was said.


To summarize your position then:
1) You won't do either deal that Memphis would have taken.
2) You have no evidence that they would have taken a different deal, but just feel that Paxson didn't try hard enough to find one?

I mean it's possible that he didn't push them hard enough, or it's possible that the discussions were brief, because Jerry West wasn't going to give up Pau for less than a king's ransom. If the first case is true and we could have gotten Pau for Tyrus, PJ and 2007 #1, then I'd have been disappointed. I don't believe it's true though.


----------



## bbertha37 (Jul 21, 2004)

Electric Slim said:


> Were you on the Wilcox or Nene bandwagon?


I think you mean Knee Knee.


----------



## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Would you have traded Deng + Gordon for Gasol or Deng + Tyrus + Noah for Gasol? Those are the two deals that I have heard that Memphis would have accepted. I think the Bulls would be in far worse position for doing either of them.


I know this isn't addressed to me, but since I was VERY hot for Gasol (still am), I'll answer.

I wouldn't do either of those trades.

At last year's trading deadline, I would have done Deng (or Gordon) + Tyrus (or the Knicks pick) + filler for Gasol. Now, I'd have to take Tyrus off the table unless he replaced Deng/Gordon as the centerpiece (Tyrus + Noce + filler). Probably the best I could do would be Deng + Noah + filler.

Gasol's a very good player, but no superstar. There need to be limits.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> To summarize your position then:
> 1) You won't do either deal that Memphis would have taken.
> 2) You have no evidence that they would have taken a different deal, but just feel that Paxson didn't try hard enough to find one?


Hey, thanks for the free position summarization. I disagree with it. 

I don't know what Memphis would have taken. You just told me what West wanted. Usually there is some kind of meeting in the middle.

I have an OK idea about what Paxson was willing to give up though, which isn't enough to land a Gasol.

http://www.basketballforum.com/chicago-bulls/342246-what-paxson-willing-give-up-pau-gasol.html



> a trade of Nocioni, the Knicks pick and two exp deals would not be palatable from Paxson's end.


I remember this one to be particularly jaw dropping.



> I mean it's possible that he didn't push them hard enough


Its probable, IMO, given that Paxson didn't want to give up much.



> or it's possible that the discussions were brief, because Jerry West wasn't going to give up Pau for less than a king's ransom.


Or b/c Paxson wasn't willing to give up much of anything, which I heard from Schuster and Johnson.


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## Electric Slim (Jul 31, 2002)

kukoc4ever said:


> I don't know what Memphis would have taken. You just told me what West initially wanted. Usually there is some kind of meeting in the middle.
> 
> I have an OK idea about what Paxson was willing to give up though, which isn't enough to land a Gasol.
> 
> ...


All I heard was that West was asking for Deng and "significantly more" for Gasol.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

Electric Slim said:


> All I heard was that West was asking for Deng and "significantly more" for Gasol.


And that Paxson wasn't willing to part with Deng for Gasol (KC article) or any member of the core 4 for Gasol (Schuster, KC on the Score)

That mindset isn't going to land a Gasol or any other top tier NBA player.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> I have an OK idea about what Paxson was willing to give up though, which isn't enough to land a Gasol.
> 
> http://www.basketballforum.com/chicago-bulls/342246-what-paxson-willing-give-up-pau-gasol.html



i dunno. we dont know what the deals were for Gasol, so blaming Pax for not making one is reaching. it's just blaming Pax for the sake of blaming him.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> And that Paxson wasn't willing to part with Deng for Gasol (KC article) or any member of the core 4 for Gasol (Schuster, KC on the Score)
> 
> That mindset isn't going to land a Gasol or any other top tier NBA player.



with regards to the Schuster and KC on 670 point, there were also reports that we went back to West at the deadline offering Gordon et al. Gordon is one of the core. 

We dont know what to believe. with McGraw this week, we've seen how unreliable these beat guys can be. they are trying to sell papers. so they have no problem saying: "a deal can be done by the end of the week!"

technically that is always true.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> i dunno. we dont know what the deals were for Gasol, so blaming Pax for not making one is reaching. it's just blaming Pax for the sake of blaming him.


No its not.

Its clear based on that radio interview, if Schuster and KC Johnson are to be trusted, that Paxson was not willing to give up Hinrich, Gordon, Nocioni or Deng for Gasol.

Its also clear from Johnson's article that Paxson was not willing to give up Deng for Gasol.

Good luck landing a top tier guy w/ that mindset.

Paxson is content to "play these," IMO, unless a team is willing to part with an in-his-prime top tier NBA player for well below market value. Only if he passes the jib restriction and can also get along with Skiles of course.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> No its not.
> 
> Its clear based on that radio interview, if Schuster and KC Johnson are to be trusted, that Paxson was not willing to give up Hinrich, Gordon, Nocioni or Deng for Gasol.
> 
> ...


KC doesnt know Pax's mindset. we dont know Pax's mindset. All you're citing is what KC thinks Pax's mindset is. Again, we heard reports that Gordon was talked about. 

You also have to consider Noc's foot problems were going to leave us without a SF if Deng was traded.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> We dont know what to believe.


One can always play the "attack the source" card with any one of these reports.

I tend to trust what I hear from KC Johnson. Perhaps that trust is misplaced. I don't think it is.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> KC doesnt know Pax's mindset. we dont know Pax's mindset. All you're citing is what KC thinks Pax's mindset is. Again, we heard reports that Gordon was talked about.



Could also be an off-the-record quote from Paxson, an off-the-record quote from someone in the org, or some other source.

KC is far more connected than most everyone on this board, that's for sure. I'll go with his opinion.

Plenty of guys could have been talked about. But, when the rubber meets the road if Paxson does not want to part with the precious "core," then a trade isn't going to happen.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> Paxson is content to "play these," IMO, unless a team is willing to part with an in-his-prime top tier NBA player for well below market value. Only if he passes the jib restriction and can also get along with Skiles of course.



My guess is closer to this: Pax wants to keep his core, which has played together for several years now, and land a big piece with a combination of Noah, Tyrus, Noc-down-the-road, future picks.

You can fault this, but when you see how NY got Randolph, how Denver got Iverson..... you have to admit that there are creative ways of doing trades, if you wait things out. we didnt have a Francis-esque contract to dump (and yes you can argue holding onto Tyson wouldve helped in this regard).... but we still may be able to do something during next season even.


lets put it this way: if Pax lands Gasol for Tyrus, Noah and some other team's excess in a 3-way, your approach will seem suicidal.


Pax can ALWAYS trade Deng later. he is exploring everything else he can now. wasnt that your prescription for not dealing Tyson so soon? so he's learning from you now, dont fault him for that.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> You can fault this, but when you see how NY got Randolph, how Denver got Iverson..... you have to admit that there are creative ways of doing trades, if you wait things out.


Randolph was in play. Why were we not in on it?


Unless Paxson is agressivly persuing these deals and willing to part with the core to get some deals done, its not going to happen.



> (and yes you can argue holding onto Tyson wouldve helped in this regard)


Of course it would have. Oh yah, we'd also have the 24 year odl, 7 foot tall, best rebounder in the NBA on the roster as well. Team USA.




> lets put it this way: if Pax lands Gasol for Tyrus, Noah and some other team's excess in a 3-way, your approach will seem suicidal.


That's not going to happen.





> he is exploring everything else he can now.


It does not matter what he explores, if he's not willing to pull the trigger.


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## rwj333 (Aug 10, 2002)

Why would Paxson let it be known, through the press, that he would readily trade one of his players? A specific, good player?

"Luol, we would give you up for Gasol in a second. But Memphis wanted Thabo, too, and that's too much, so I guess we're stuck with you for right now." 

You don't let that kind of news leak out if you want to keep the player, if you don't want to insult him and risk having hard feelings develop. 

I could easily see Paxson lying about this sort of thing to make Deng feel wanted. The bottom line is nobody knows.


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## BULLHITTER (Dec 6, 2005)

> The Gasol trade opp last season was a perfect opportunity to make up for Paxson botching the blessing of the twin towers inheritance.



6 years and 2 invisible playoff appearances by the skinny dude, "team usa" candidate, leading rebounder in the nba , 0 playoff appearances by the chubby "2nd leading scoring center in the nba (maybe he'll "lead" them out of the lottery this year?)...... :lol: 

the funniest crap i've read in days.........oh, and btw this was a thread about nocioni's return to the bulls, now it's curry and chandler part IIXV and there's still room for debate.....where's the "beating the dead horse" emoticon when you need it?:boohoo:


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## Electric Slim (Jul 31, 2002)

BULLHITTER said:


> 6 years and 2 invisible playoff appearances by the skinny dude, "team usa" candidate, leading rebounder in the nba , 0 playoff appearances by the chubby "2nd leading scoring center in the nba (maybe he'll "lead" them out of the lottery this year?)...... :lol:
> 
> the funniest crap i've read in days.........oh, and btw this was a thread about nocioni's return to the bulls, now it's curry and chandler part IIXV and there's still room for debate.....where's the "beating the dead horse" emoticon when you need it?:boohoo:


No one loves basketball here more than kukoc4ever. Don't hate on a poster because they say negative things about Bulls management and you wish to only discuss positives.


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> Well, anything "may" have happened. Do you think that if Nocioni was there it would have happened? I like Nocioni b/c he's decent and plays with da fire and da passion, but I don't think he's the difference between the Bulls getting to the finals and them not getting to the finals.


Well, I have fond memories of the 2004-5 and 2005-6 playoffs, and most of them involve the outstanding, even star-level play of Nocioni. The Bulls lost in the first round in both years, but Nocioni was the Bulls MVP in both years. This year Nocioni also had a very good series against Miami, but unfortunately his foot injury recurred and he was horrible in the Detroit series.

Nocioni has proven that whether the competition is in the NBA, the Olympics or Euroleague that when he is uninjured he is much more than "decent". He's a prime time difference maker.

The Bulls just signed a proven star at a bargain price. 



> At the 4 and 5, its either too young or on the decline. At the 1,2,3 we're more like what you describe. Hinrich/Gordon/Deng/Curry/Chandler would have been exactly what you describe.


I wouldn't trade the Bulls current front line for the front line of Cleveland, Detroit or Miami (talk about on decline!). And I certainly wouldn't trade them for New York's front line.

With or without a free agent signed, the Bulls front line of Wallace, Nocioni, Thomas and Noah will be formidable on defense, and much more effective on offense than many here seem to think.



> I disagree. Where is the inside scoring coming from again? THe MLE? Whose minutes (Nocioni, Tyrus, Noah, Wallace) will this inside force be stealing from? Joe Smith is not good. Mihm is average at best. Guys like this don't make much difference at all.


You do realize that with a healthy Nocioni and the addition of Noah, the Bulls will probably lead the eastern conference in offensive rebounding? The inside scoring will come from Tyrus (12 ppg), Noah (8ppg) and Nocioni (16 ppg). Wallace (7 ppg) will score some too. In short, the front line will do it's share of scoring for the team.



> Do you think Wallace was a good signing?


If you consider Tim Thomas as a salary place holder for one year (which he was), it's hard to find fault with signing Wallace as the replacement for Antonio Davis. The difficulties related to replacing Chandler and Curry are unrelated IMO. 

My guess is that Chandler and Curry's futures as Bulls were doomed the minute that Paxson became GM and Skiles became the coach. It was only a matter of picking the time and circumstance to trade them. Wallace's signing was peripheral to this fact.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

McBulls said:


> Well, I have fond memories of the *2004-5* and 2005-6 playoffs, and most of them involve the outstanding, even star-level play of Nocioni. The Bulls lost in the first round in both years, but Nocioni was the *Bulls MVP in both years*.


http://www.nba.com/bulls/stats/2004/playoffs_stats.html

That doesn't look like All-Star level play to me. Clearly, Hinrich was better. Gordon and Chandler were as good.

Noch also shot 38% FG against Miami this past year. I think he was a wash for the whole playoffs.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I was finding common ground, and pointing out that I do agree with several of your points. To which you told me not to make up excuses.


No one needs an excuse to agree with me. :biggrin: I still think you have been inconsistent on this thread. 

To paraphrase, you said NO was willing to accept less from TC on O when it's clear by the quotes provided that NO and Byron Scott wants more and, based on splits, is starting to get more.

p.s. I don't care to argue about TC's worth per his contract as IMHO it's going to be crystal clear what the right call is with a year's improvement from TC and a year's decline from Wallace.


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## King Joseus (May 26, 2003)

kukoc4ever said:


> Of course it would have. Oh yah, we'd also have the 24 year odl, 7 foot tall, best rebounder in the NBA on the roster as well. Team USA.


I disagree with this sentiment, as I do not believe in the slightest that Tyson would have been the best rebounder in the NBA last season if he were on our team. It is impossible to say, but the lack of a change in scenery and coach for Tyson would have led to another year like 05-06 or worse.

What do I know, though, right?

Anyhow, BULLHITTER is correct in saying that this thread is about Nocioni and his re-signing. If posters wish to continue to discuss Chandler and Curry, they may do so in another thread intended for that purpose.


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## BULLHITTER (Dec 6, 2005)

> No one loves basketball here more than kukoc4ever. Don't hate on a poster because they say negative things about Bulls management and you wish to only discuss positives.


don't bring his name into my post when i didn't mention his name in my post. i don't attack posters, only post. 

moaning about the past doesn't make any of it come to pass in the present; maybe assessing the negatives about the knicks and the hornets is more productive since those teams are now "blessed" with the team usa forward and the second leading scoring amongnst bigs. the bulls have moved on, can you and the poster you brought up?

RIF. :cheers:


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Its clear based on that radio interview, if Schuster and KC Johnson are to be trusted, that Paxson was not willing to give up Hinrich, Gordon, Nocioni or Deng for Gasol.


If this is true, then I agree we did not pursue Gasol hard enough. I don't think this is true based on all the other reports in place about the Gasol trade, so we are arguing from different viewpoints and will obviously agree on nothing based on that. 

You seem to agree that the deals I think it would have taken to land Gasol would have been too much and I agree that if we could have done a deal like Noc + pick that we should have. So it seems like we do agree (at least in this limited circumstance) on what trades we'd do and are just disagreeing on what Paxson would do.



> Randolph was in play. Why were we not in on it?


:rofl:

I don't know, I can't think of any reason why you wouldn't want Zach Randolph.


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## Electric Slim (Jul 31, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I don't know, I can't think of any reason why you wouldn't want Zach Randolph.


John Paxson wasn't a post scorer as a player, so therefore he is jealous of players who excel in post scoring and wishes to not acquire them.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> To paraphrase, you said NO was willing to accept less from TC on O when it's clear by the quotes provided that NO and Byron Scott wants more and, based on splits, is starting to get more.


His overall stats still show him taking less shots in NO than he did in Chicago per minute. Even with Skiles and his poor coaching effect on Chandler. 



> p.s. I don't care to argue about TC's worth per his contract as IMHO it's going to be crystal clear what the right call is with a year's improvement from TC and a year's decline from Wallace.


I agree. I would take Chandler back for Wallace. However, I don't think Bulls management went into the off season with a possible plan of not using any of our 16 million in cap room. I wouldn't take Chandler back with our current cap situation as we'd almost certainly lose Gordon or Deng if that happened. 

Though I suppose in this scenario we could have let go of Nocioni and then maybe that'd save us enough luxury tax that we wouldn't have lost Gordon or Deng, or maybe not. In the end, the trading of Chandler coupled with the signing of Wallace was a quick 1-2 move to piss away all our cap space in such a manner that we'd never have to pay the luxury tax while keeping the rest of our core together and hopefully upgrading from Chandler to Wallace (which certainly seemed like a huge upgrade at the time). 

In general, I wish the Bulls organization would be willing to give up some of it's league leading profits to try and enhance it's ability to win, but I don't think that looks likely.


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## BULLHITTER (Dec 6, 2005)

> John Paxson wasn't a post scorer as a player, so therefore he is jealous of players who excel in post scoring and wishes to not acquire them.


fire pax!!:azdaja:


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

Sorry for continuing the non-Nocioni chat, I didn't see your post, until after I had entered mine already. I will cease and desist from here on out


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## Electric Slim (Jul 31, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> Sorry for continuing the non-Nocioni chat, I didn't see your post, until after I had entered mine already. I will cease and desist from here on out


Some advice for next time: Don't let what you actually truly believe get in the way of winning an innahnet argument. You should weasel around every issue until the other person gives up. 100% Guaranteed - Full Refund!!!


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## jnrjr79 (Apr 18, 2003)

McBulls said:


> Well, I have fond memories of the 2004-5 and 2005-6 playoffs, and most of them involve the outstanding, even star-level play of Nocioni. The Bulls lost in the first round in both years, but Nocioni was the Bulls MVP in both years. This year Nocioni also had a very good series against Miami, but unfortunately his foot injury recurred and he was horrible in the Detroit series.
> 
> Nocioni has proven that whether the competition is in the NBA, the Olympics or Euroleague that when he is uninjured he is much more than "decent". He's a prime time difference maker.
> 
> ...



+1


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> You should weasel around every issue until the other person gives up. 100% Guaranteed - Full Refund!!!


But I already do that now!


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## Electric Slim (Jul 31, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> But I already do that now!


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> His overall stats still show him taking less shots in NO than he did in Chicago per minute. Even with Skiles and his poor coaching effect on Chandler.


Chandler was up significantly last year compared to his last year with the Bulls. If his improvement in the 2nd half of the year holds up as I expect, he will be better than at any point with Skiles.



dougthonus said:


> I would take Chandler back for Wallace.


Sorry if I wasn't clear. I'm stating something beyond Chandler for Wallace. Chandler is going to continue to improve enough with NO such that any talk of moving him for squat for fiscal reasons will appear quite shortsighted, rather than potentially prudent.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> If this is true, then I agree we did not pursue Gasol hard enough. I don't think this is true based on all the other reports in place about the Gasol trade


What other reports are in place regarding what Paxson was willing to actually give up?

Can you at least agree that Paxson was not willing to part with Deng?




> :rofl:
> 
> I don't know, I can't think of any reason why you wouldn't want Zach Randolph.


Most productive players that are going to be on the trading block for cheaper than their level of production are going to have some baggage.

We clearly need a legit scoring 4. Randolph would fit the bill far better than anyone on this roster for next season. I agree there is risk involved and that Randolph may not be the perfect fit. I don't think the Bulls are in any position to smugly sit on the sidelines laughing when its pretty clear that scrappy smallball isn't going to get the job done.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I agree that if we could have done a deal like Noc + pick that we should have.


We're talking about our backup SF/PF and Noah for the #8 PER guy in the NBA, right?

Yes, we agree. But that kind of trade is ridiculous for a player like Gasol, IMO. If the Bulls really wanted to land Gasol, it would take more than that.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

and if we throw away Deng, another team gets KG cheap... how do you end up feeling about that?

Gasol doesnt have many suitors. there's nothing wrong with waiting it out and seeing what happens with KG. 



k4e, just to be clear, is your point that you wish we had traded Deng et al for Gasol last year? and gone into the playoffs with hobbled Noc at SF?


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> k4e, just to be clear, is your point that you wish we had traded Deng et al for Gasol last year? and gone into the playoffs with hobbled Noc at SF?


It needed to be strongly considered. But, if Deng isn't tradeable for a player like Gasol, realistically its not a non-issue. 

We got bounced from the playoffs in the 2nd round. How the trade would have affected the 2007 playoffs isn't really an issue either.

If a player like Gasol becomes realistically attainable, I don’t think waiting on Garnett is the right move. Gasol is pretty much as productive as KG now… and is better for the win later scenario. A Gasol in the hand is worth more than a crap shoot at Garnett.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> and if we throw away Deng,


Also, landing Pau Gasol isn't exactly "throwing away" Deng.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> Gasol is pretty much as productive as KG now… and is better for the win later scenario.


KG is the #1 rebounder in the NBA. and he's been on Team USA, too!! OMG OMG!

i'd like to see Gasol added to the mix of guys we have. but if we trade one of our top scores, and slot him in there... dont we become the Grizz?


we can get excited about Gasol's stats, but every team has to have a leading scorer. they've been feeding Pau extensively and have had no playoff success. i dont want to sell his talents short, but i think we do the opposite of that in giving up Luol, at his age, on the cusp of All-Star level.



i mean, Pau does something for 'win later,' yes, but what does losing Lu do to 'win later'?


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> Also, landing Pau Gasol isn't exactly "throwing away" Deng.


it's throwing away our SF for Noc, who as you say, has good-backup written all over him.


just subbing Pau in for Lu, we would be the Grizz of a few yrs ago, no? again, better if Tyrus makes that jump.... JUST like we are saying today.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> just subbing Pau in for Lu, we would be the Grizz of a few yrs ago, no?


Disagree.

Last year.
Gasol is better than Deng.
Nocioni is better than PJ Brown.

Hinrich/Gordon/Nocioni/Gasol/Wallace is better than our lineup this year, IMO.

Projecting out 3-4 years, its hard to say how good Deng will be and where he's going to develop. As much as I love the guy, top 10 in the NBA in PER is setting the bar pretty high.

Also, SF is an easier position to fill. All else equal, I'd rather have a top tier level 4/5 than a top tier level 3. And Deng isn't top tier yer. He could be there soon.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

DengNabbit said:


> i'd like to see Gasol added to the mix of guys we have. but if we trade one of our top scores, and slot him in there... dont we become the Grizz?


Grizz don't have Hinrich, Gordon, Nocioni, Wallace, Tyrus.





> i mean, Pau does something for 'win later,' yes, but what does losing Lu do to 'win later'?


Its a tough call. Gasol is a top 10 in the NBA player production wise right now. If Deng gets there as well, that will be awesome. Its an unknown at this point.


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

dougthonus said:


> It's hard for anyone to give a real answer to this. For the most part, we don't know what our options are. Maybe we could get KG or Kobe right now if we paid enough, but we don't know what it would cost or if it's possible. We don't know how much we'd have to spend on the various FAs out there either.


I think these are really good, sensible points. However, at the same time, if we don't at least try to discuss potential courses of action based on the speculation out there, we won't have a ton to discuss in this forum.



kukoc4ever said:


> So, when a deal like Gasol comes up, Paxson should be aggressively pursuing a player like that. I'm not convinced he was. I think he basically dusty phoned it. Anything other than a trade heavily lopsided for the Bulls would "disrupt the core 4." How a backup SF is part of a core 4 is beyond me.


This is probably the best support imaginable for Doug's argument above. This seems highly speculative and I'd strongly disagree with it. However, maybe there's just as strong an argument out there that my stance is equally speculative. 

In any event, I'm highly skeptical of the accounts that Pax refused to include Noc in a deal for Gasol if only because it'd be completely insane and I don't think Pax's track record strongly suggests that he's not a complete and total idiot. All the rumors floated around suggest we had legitimate talks with Memphis if nothing else. 

I completely agree with Doug's analysis of some of the supposed deals that were on the table. I still don't really believe that a deal for Lu and filler was on the table. I have a strong feeling that the supposed "filler" included major assets like Tyrus and/or the Knick's pick, if not more. I get the impression that in his last stand, West didn't want to trade Pau for less than market value which is a ton. 



johnston797 said:


> Chandler is definitely in part to blame for his poor year. Skiles and Pax are responsible for losing a valuable asset.


That's an excellent way of putting it. Chandler's gaffes don't necessarily absolve Pax from parting with a valuable asset for next to nothing. At the same time, I've always remarked that as much as I hate the Tyson/P.J. deal if Pax felt he needed to move Ty for luxury tax purposes, he might've had a small window to do so since Ty's deal started to seem increasingly cumbersome the more the he struggled. 



kukoc4ever said:


> In the end, one has to come to a conclusion about a Hinrich/Gordon/Deng/Nocioni/Wallace core for next season with a bench of youngsters, Duhon, cheap vets and a Joe Smith level MLE.
> 
> I don't think that's good enough to win the NBA Title or even make the NBA Finals out of a weak East, unless we see some strong, strong growth from Tyrus. Same plan as last year, except Wallace will likely be worse this year than last, making up weaker at the 5.


I'll touch on this more when our roster is set for next season but I plan to predict that we'll have the best record in the East next season. It's not at all because I think we're a juggernaut but the East is admittedly weak and I think we're capable of winning roughly 54 games next season. Tyrus' and Noah's ages don't concern me in the least because Tyrus performed at a higher level than most realize last season as a 20 year old rookie and I only have Noah slotted in for 12 to 15 minutes this season. Any way you cut it the front court figures to be quite a bit better than last season and I don't expect any of our other players to regress. 



kukoc4ever said:


> Quote:a trade of Nocioni, the Knicks pick and two exp deals would not be palatable from Paxson's end.
> 
> I remember this one to be particularly jaw dropping.


I guess there are two different ways to look at this. I trust and like K.C. but at the same time this just doesn't quite pass the sniff factor in my opinion. It's possible that Pax is just out of his mind and hasn't unequivocally demonstrated that yet but why would any GM in his right mind not agree to this deal? It's in the same vein as supposed offer of Noah, Noc, and Duhon (?) for Pau that McGraw "unearthed" this month. It was reported but I just refuse to believe that Wallace is anywhere near that stupid. 



kukoc4ever said:


> Its clear based on that radio interview, if Schuster and KC Johnson are to be trusted, that Paxson was not willing to give up Hinrich, Gordon, Nocioni or Deng for Gasol.
> 
> Its also clear from Johnson's article that Paxson was not willing to give up Deng for Gasol.


Yeah, I'm just not convinced that it's quite that clear cut. Whether Pax was willing to give up Lu for Pau in any deal is debatable. It's somewhat conceivable that Pax is so extremely high on Lu that he wasn't willing to pull the trigger there. Again, it just doesn't pass the sniff test that Pax wouldn't trade Noc for Gasol straight up. I love and trust K.C. but that's not completely limitless. 



kukoc4ever said:


> One can always play the "attack the source" card with any one of these reports.
> 
> I tend to trust what I hear from KC Johnson. Perhaps that trust is misplaced. I don't think it is.


I trust K.C. too but it's not limitless. The idea that Pax would turn down a Noc for Gasol deal is completely implausible to me. It's absolutely reasonable to trust certain beat writers with good reputations, just not to the point that everything they say is gospel. I place a ton of faith in K.C. but if other beat writers contradict him, I'll side towards the writer whose story is more believable. 



kukoc4ever said:


> Randolph was in play. Why were we not in on it?


I think that's entirely an issue of how valuable Randolph happens to be. It's been discussed before but if you want to start a thread about it, we can discuss it again, perhaps in more depth. 



McBulls said:


> You do realize that with a healthy Nocioni and the addition of Noah, the Bulls will probably lead the eastern conference in offensive rebounding? The inside scoring will come from Tyrus (12 ppg), Noah (8ppg) and Nocioni (16 ppg). Wallace (7 ppg) will score some too. In short, the front line will do it's share of scoring for the team.


Love the gist of your post but we have to factor in the amount of minutes played for these guys before we project their scoring averages. I think that Tyrus can average close to 12 PPG if he plays 25 PPG but he might not play that many minutes. Noc's scoring might take a hit down to around 13 or 14 PPG if his minutes drop to 25 MPG. Also, I think that Noah might only play about 15 MPG in which case I expect him to score more like 5 or 6 PPG. I'll keep my fingers crossed for that type of production from our front court though. We're in much, much better shape than last year. 



kukoc4ever said:


> If a player like Gasol becomes realistically attainable, I don’t think waiting on Garnett is the right move. Gasol is pretty much as productive as KG now… and is better for the win later scenario. A Gasol in the hand is worth more than a crap shoot at Garnett.


Agreed that Gasol is about a hundred times more valuable than someone like Garnett. I'm just not sure that Gasol has ever been available at a discounted price, and full price will gut almost any team.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> This seems highly speculative


Its not. Its based on what KC Johnson and David Schuster said during the Gasol trade talks.

If you choose to throw out what they said in this case, fine. That's your call.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> I place a ton of faith in K.C. but if other beat writers contradict him, I'll side towards the writer whose story is more believable.


Fair enough. Where is the contradiction by another writer?


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> Agreed that Gasol is about a hundred times more valuable than someone like Garnett. I'm just not sure that Gasol has ever been available at a discounted price, and full price will gut almost any team.


If this is the case for Gasol-level players, then these pie in the sky trade scenarios for top 10 in the NBA guys is a pipe dream in your world, yes?


A guy like Randolph is in the 11-30 tier. And he's haughtily laughed at for his flaws.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Yes, we agree. But that kind of trade is ridiculous for a player like Gasol, IMO. If the Bulls really wanted to land Gasol, it would take more than that.


I also think it's a ridiculous trade. So what is the non ridiculous trade you think we should have done for Gasol?


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## Wynn (Jun 3, 2002)

Responding to the initial post -- go Bull!

Am glad to see Nocioni remain on the squad -- also glad to see a reasonable contract.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> A guy like Randolph is in the 11-30 tier. And he's haughtily laughed at for his flaws.


Have you ever watched Randolph play? There is a reason why he's laughed at for his flaws. He makes everyone around him worse.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> Disagree.
> 
> Last year.
> Gasol is better than Deng.
> ...


"On paper," ok. But you take away Deng, and you're removing our one guy who can guard bigs down low and on the perimeter. You're taking away the guy who guards Lebron, the guy who guards Rasheed.

Noc isn't really good for guarding athletic SFs. or big PFs. Again, you cant just plug him into the starting lineup...he's a bench guy with energy and some skills. but not athleticism. 


So that Gasol lineup would be similar in skill level to our current one, but worse matchup wise. It would provide low post scoring, but then we lose Deng's midrange game.



Again, Pax wants to keep that midrange game and add a presence down low. It may not be Gasol, but it may get the job done and put us in the Finals. With Deng still on the roster, improving even on last yr.



Also my point about us becoming the Grizzlies.... I said we'd be the Grizz of a few years ago, not the current ones. Gasol/Bonzi/Miller/Battier/Jason Williams...... it's similar to what we would be with Gasol.



kukoc4ever said:


> Hinrich/Gordon/Nocioni/Gasol/Wallace


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

kukoc4ever said:


> Fair enough. Where is the contradiction by another writer?


I mean I can search through the archives if you want but I imagine you read the threads at the time. Up until the week of the deadline, there were reports that West asked for Gordon and Deng, Deng and another member of the core, or Deng and other significant assets (ie Tyrus, the pick, etc.). 

As I wrote, I like and trust K.C. but he's getting his information from other sources and they can be either incorrect or can purposefully provide misinformation for various reasons. Suggesting we wouldn't deal Noc and a draft pick for Gasol is like saying we refused to deal Thabo for Kobe. It just doesn't make sense and Pax has nothing to make me think he's brain dead. 



kukoc4ever said:


> If this is the case for Gasol-level players, then these pie in the sky trade scenarios for top 10 in the NBA guys is a pipe dream in your world, yes?


Full value for Gasol would be something like Gordon and Deng or Deng, Tyrus and another asset. Yes, I don't think we have a legitimate chance of winning a championship if we make one of those deals because there's just not enough talent left over. I think that we peak at 55 wins with Gasol-Gordon-Noc-Kirk-Wallace and role players.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> Up until the week of the deadline, there were reports that West asked for Gordon and Deng, Deng and another member of the core, or Deng and other significant assets (ie Tyrus, the pick, etc.).


My point has very little to do with what West was asking for. It has more to do with what Paxson was willing to give up. Which, according to KC/Schuster, didn't include any of the core 4. KC wrote an article that said that Paxson wasn't going to deal Deng.

They asked them if Noc+PJ+pick would be good for Paxson, and they said that Paxson was very leery to disrupt the core!!

If you choose to write off what they said as spoon fed misinformation or something like that, its your call.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> He makes everyone around him worse.


My goodness, if he's that bad, I'm surprised he has a job in the NBA.

Yes, I have watched him play. I'd probably agree w/ you as to what his flaws are. If he didn't have flaws, he'd be a superstar.


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## jnrjr79 (Apr 18, 2003)

So, umm, I'm glad to see Nocioni was re-signed. That's what this thread is about, right?


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

JeremyB0001 said:


> Full value for Gasol would be something like Gordon and Deng or Deng, Tyrus and another asset. Yes, I don't think we have a legitimate chance of winning a championship if we make one of those deals because there's just not enough talent left over. I think that we peak at 55 wins with Gasol-Gordon-Noc-Kirk-Wallace and role players.


The problem with trading players who are still improving every year like Gordon, Deng and especially Thomas, is that you really don't know what you are trading away. 

We know what Gasol and Randolf can do and that they probably won't get much better at it. 

So, the reasonable tendency is to discount the value of still-developing assets like Gordon, Deng and Thomas, and to overvalue stars on rotten teams like Gasol and Randolf who are the default primary scoring options and carry the primary responsibility for rebounding. Look for Randolf and Gasol to have less impressive statistical years on teams that are much better than the ones they played on last year.


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## King Joseus (May 26, 2003)

jnrjr79 said:


> So, umm, I'm glad to see Nocioni was re-signed. That's what this thread is about, right?


Once upon a time, yes.


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## jnrjr79 (Apr 18, 2003)

King Joseus said:


> Once upon a time, yes.


Haha, yep. We should probably make an effort to keep this thread Nocioni-related. If folks want to discuss the Gasol situation, that's cool by me, but it probably deserves its own thread.


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## kukoc4ever (Nov 20, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> I also think it's a ridiculous trade. So what is the non ridiculous trade you think we should have done for Gasol?


What could I possibly say where your response wouldn't be your speculative "west wouldn't do that?"

Deng + Tyrus + PJ for Gasol and Warrick. (and whatever filler needed to make the salaries work)

deal the pick to one of the teams that wanted Noah or Wright (perhaps we could get jrich). Or just grab one of the promising 3 players that would have been there. Wright, Young, Thornton. Perhaps a team would have moved up in the draft and we could have grabbed one of those guys a few slots lower.

Use the MLE for a guy like Hill or Patterson to get by as a backup until the rookie can play.

Hinrich
Gordon
Nocioni/Hill/YoungORWright
Gasol
Wallace

That gives us a better starting 5 production wise than what we'll field this season, more balance and still leaves us with a good win later group of young players.

Just one scenario. Its not a lock to win the title, but its better than what we're going to field this season, IMO. 

----


Once again though, my main concern isn't that the Gasol trade didn't go down, its that Paxson wasn't willing to trade one of "the core 4."


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## lgtwins (May 18, 2004)

K4E, you turned almost every thread into Curry thread back in 2005. You did the same thing for Chandler in 2006. And now you turn everything into Gasol thread. Give it up, man. Give it up. Please.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

kukoc4ever said:


> Once again though, my main concern isn't that the Gasol trade didn't go down, its that Paxson wasn't willing to trade one of "the core 4."


Then the report last trading deadline that Pax made a last ditch effort to get Gasol with a package involving Gordon....this assuages your fears i would think?

Plus, Pax can trade one of the core 4, and make a bad deal. He could trade one of the core 4 for Gasol...and it could be a deal that you'd find bad.

There are so many possibilities here, and we dont have evidence of anything that wouldnt have gutted the roster. Obviously they wouldve taken Ben/Deng et al for Gasol, but thats all we know.

Since we don't know more, we can't keep going with this. unless you really believe Pax's biggest sin is that he hasnt traded one of the core 4. there's ways he couldve done that.. that you wouldntve liked.


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## popeye12 (Nov 11, 2002)

This is an interesting thread, everyone can assume what the trade options for Gasol were but without having facts other than everyone knowing that Deng and Gordon were requested in return for Gasol, there is no point (IMO) to start offering Noc, PJ, and the pick. That was not an option IMO. Deng had to be included and I'm very happy that Pax didnt go through with it.

Noc signing is a very solid signing. We needed a strong bench guy that wont complain about coming off the bench and he has proven in the past that he is a great 6th man. He is also a very important piece to this puzzle. I'm quite surprised that everyone wants to blow this team up for Kobe, Garnett (if it did happen I would support it since they are both studs) but if it doesn't happen i'm very excited with this team.

I dont necessarily think that the bulls are doomed if they dont get that low post guy, is it really necessary? Who would you want to not start as a Bull to get that low post guy. I'm very happy with the proposed lineup of:

Hinrich, Gordon, Deng, Thomas, Wallace
with a bench of
Nocioni, Noah, Curry, Allen?, Du, Big Boy Gray.

I would like Mihm or Smith on the team but I dont think we desperately need one. We have a very solid rotation with the current squad and with Noah being drafted, it gives us what we lacked the most in the Detroit series - someone that guard taller athletic PF/C (rasheed). Noah can definitely help (i'm not saying can stop) if Thomas and Wallace get in foul trouble or need a break.

Go Bulls.


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## DengNabbit (Feb 23, 2005)

Another aspect of the Gasol trade that people ignore. Gasol's acquisition holds back Tyrus' minutes. 

Ben W will play. He's the defensive center. Now Gasol could one day be center, but i'd prefer not to rely on him in that role, defensively.

Meanwhile, right now we're worried about Tyrus making that next big leap. But if he does (you got Gasol for Deng, Noah, others).... then you have his minutes reduced, and you have his defense OFF the court.


To me, the best way to get this done is have Tyrus be the scoring threat alongside Wallace. That way you keep a shotblocking rebounder out there.

I'm not anti-Gasol trade... but I'm against certain scenarios for getting it done. If it's the right mix of people, I'd part with Gordon, first.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> What could I possibly say where your response wouldn't be your speculative "west wouldn't do that?"


I don't know, maybe a trade that makes sense for the Grizzlies?



> Deng + Tyrus + PJ for Gasol and Warrick. (and whatever filler needed to make the salaries work)


Whether the Grizzlies would do this depends a lot on what they think of Tyrus Thomas. Especially at the trade deadline before Nocioni's injury people were calling him a huge bust because he couldn't get on the court and wasn't playing well when he was. At that time, I think the the Grizzlies would have just said Pau > Deng and Warrick > Tyrus (if not in terms of potential, certainly in terms of current skill level).

Anyway, I would have done that trade at the deadline if the Grizzlies would have, so far we are still on the same page in what we'd trade, and only on different pages on what we think the Grizzlies would accept and the Bulls would offer.


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## DaBullz (Jul 15, 2002)

johnston797 said:


> http://www.nba.com/bulls/stats/2004/playoffs_stats.html
> 
> That doesn't look like All-Star level play to me. Clearly, Hinrich was better. Gordon and Chandler were as good.
> 
> Noch also shot 38% FG against Miami this past year. I think he was a wash for the whole playoffs.


http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/teams/chi/stats?sort=25&year=postseason_2005

Nocioni averaged 22.3 PPG on 56% FG in the playoffs.


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## ViciousFlogging (Sep 3, 2003)

jnrjr79 said:


> Haha, yep. We should probably make an effort to keep this thread Nocioni-related. If folks want to discuss the Gasol situation, that's cool by me, but it probably deserves its own thread.


I think, as Julius Caesar once said, "the die is cast." 

The very thought of sifting through this thread and creating a new one with just Gasol-related stuff gives me a headache. I think Noc's deal is loosely related to the concept of trading for Gasol, so I'm OK with leaving it alone.

but, yes, I'm also happy we resigned Noc for a relatively fair deal.


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

kukoc4ever said:


> My point has very little to do with what West was asking for. It has more to do with what Paxson was willing to give up. Which, according to KC/Schuster, didn't include any of the core 4. KC wrote an article that said that Paxson wasn't going to deal Deng.
> 
> They asked them if Noc+PJ+pick would be good for Paxson, and they said that Paxson was very leery to disrupt the core!!
> 
> If you choose to write off what they said as spoon fed misinformation or something like that, its your call.


I suppose a distinction can be made there. However, what were Pax and West talking about if West asked for Deng and Gordon and Pax refused to even part with Noc straight up? I suppose the "trade talks" could've been overblown but it seems to me that there's not enough common ground for them to discuss Gasol for more than about 90 seconds. The reports certainly suggested that the talks were more extensive than that.

We seem to agree that it would defy all logic for Pax to refuse to part with Noc in a Gasol deal under any circumstances. I guess we just have different opinions when it comes to Pax's credibility. If K.C. reported that Pax seriously considered drafting Aaron Gray with the #9 pick, I wouldn't believe it just because I think that if Pax was that incredibly stupid, he wouldn't have been able to make some of the better decisions that he has, we'd be a 25 win team right now, and he wouldn't have a job. 

I don't think it's as though I'm just discarding information because it doesn't support my position.


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## transplant (Jul 31, 2002)

JeremyB0001 said:


> I suppose a distinction can be made there. *However, what were Pax and West talking about if West asked for Deng and Gordon and Pax refused to even part with Noc straight up? I suppose the "trade talks" could've been overblown but it seems to me that there's not enough common ground for them to discuss Gasol for more than about 90 seconds. The reports certainly suggested that the talks were more extensive than that.*
> 
> We seem to agree that it would defy all logic for Pax to refuse to part with Noc in a Gasol deal under any circumstances. I guess we just have different opinions when it comes to Pax's credibility. If K.C. reported that Pax seriously considered drafting Aaron Gray with the #9 pick, I wouldn't believe it just because I think that if Pax was that incredibly stupid, he wouldn't have been able to make some of the better decisions that he has, we'd be a 25 win team right now, and he wouldn't have a job.
> 
> I don't think it's as though I'm just discarding information because it doesn't support my position.


The same thought occurred to me, but the argument seemed to be one of those "Don't tell me what you think unless you have a link" arguments, so I left it alone. Your logic is sound...there was a national buzz about a Bulls-Grizz trade for Gasol. It had legs. If Paxson nixed any consideration of the core 3 + Noce and I'm West, this is a _very short_ conversation.

Sorry, no "real" link, but MemphisX referred to an article by a Ron Tillery of the Memphis Commercial Appeal saying the Bulls-Gasol talks were dead because West wanted 2 of the core 4 and Paxson wasn't biting.

http://www.basketballforum.com/chicago-bulls/341535-gasol-chicago-dead.html

However, this does not definitively refute the charge that Paxson refused to consider offering any of the core 4. So I guess for a couple of weeks West and Paxson had the following conversation:

West: I want 2 of the core 4.
Paxson: You can't have any of the core 4.
West: I want 2 of the core 4.
Paxson: You can't have any of the core 4.
West: I want 2 of the core 4.
Paxson: You can't have any of the core 4.
...

I suppose it could have happened that way. I mean it was around the trading deadline. What else did they have to do?


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

DaBullz said:


> http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/teams/chi/stats?sort=25&year=postseason_2005
> 
> Nocioni averaged 22.3 PPG on 56% FG in the playoffs.


Right, one good post season out of three. :biggrin:


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## jnrjr79 (Apr 18, 2003)

johnston797 said:


> Right, one good post season out of three. :biggrin:


13 and 8 in his rookie season ain't too shabby either.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

jnrjr79 said:


> 13 and 8 in his rookie season ain't too shabby either.


-10.5 NET +/-

http://www.82games.com/playoffs/045PCHI.HTM

40% shooting

http://www.nba.com/bulls/stats/2004/playoffs_stats.html

Not shabby? Maybe. It's certainly not All-NBA level as claimed earlier.


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

johnston797 said:


> -10.5 NET +/-
> 
> http://www.82games.com/playoffs/045PCHI.HTM
> 
> ...


Lemme guess. You lust after Randolph and his positive +/- ratings. Right?

I guess Pargo (+24.9), Pike (+21.7) and Funderburke (+22.9) just weren't enough to put us over the top.

82games :stupid:


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

McBulls said:


> 82games :stupid:


I forgot some people see red when analytics get posted. The Bulls scrubs were +11 in raw points. One nice run. I was just using 82games to look for any outliers to outrageous claim about Noch's "star-level" play in 2004-05 Sure didn't see it. 



McBulls said:


> Well, I have fond memories of the 2004-5 and 2005-6 playoffs, and most of them involve the outstanding, even star-level play of Nocioni. The Bulls lost in the first round in both years, but Nocioni was the Bulls MVP in both years.


:lol: 

How the hell is Noch at star-level play with 40% shooting and 13/8? How the hell was he MVP over Hinrich who was 22/3.7/6 on 45% shooting?


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## JeremyB0001 (Nov 17, 2003)

McBulls said:


> Lemme guess. You lust after Randolph and his positive +/- ratings. Right?
> 
> I guess Pargo (+24.9), Pike (+21.7) and Funderburke (+22.9) just weren't enough to put us over the top.
> 
> 82games :stupid:


Heh. Don't get me started on +/-.


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## dougthonus (Jul 18, 2006)

> Right, one good post season out of three.


13/8 in his rookie year in the playoffs wasn't bad. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad.

His second season he had a great playoffs which we all seem to agree.

His third season he was injured during the playoffs and had no mobility and played poorly.

I don't know that I'm going to say he's a proven stud in the playoffs, but I certainly wouldn't make the case the other way either.


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## McBulls (Apr 28, 2005)

200 5 playoffs vs Wizards
-------mpg..pts..rbs
Game 1 47...25....18
Game 2 37...10......7
Game 3 32...12......9
Game 4 20.....5......3
Game 5 28......5......3
Game 6 38.....22.....7

Nocioni played very well and put up good stats in games that he was allowed to play extended minutes. In fact, I would argue that his defense was critical to containing Jamison.

The problem was that neither O Harrington or T Chandler could defend their very mediocre PF counterparts.

Nocioni was a bright spot on a team whose front line was overwhelmed by Washington's. I remember him as a stalwart on defense when all around him -- particularly Chandler-- were collapsing.

But then I'm growing old, my memory is failing, and the nonsense propagated by 82games clouds my vision.

All I know is that two years later Nocioni is the only player Paxson chose to keep out of the pathetic frontline crew in that series. I don't know to this day how he could have let Funderbunk go. He was a difference maker!


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

dougthonus said:


> 13/8 in his rookie year in the playoffs wasn't bad. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad.


Totally agree. It's not "star-level", but it's not bad for a rookie.


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## johnston797 (May 29, 2002)

McBulls said:


> 200 5 playoffs vs Wizards
> -------mpg..pts..rbs
> Game 1 47...25....18
> Game 2 37...10......7
> ...


So the stats including two 5 & 3 games make him the MVP, how? Or have you backed off this claim?



McBulls said:


> The problem was that neither O Harrington or T Chandler could defend their very mediocre PF counterparts.
> 
> Nocioni was a bright spot on a team whose front line was overwhelmed by Washington's. I remember him as a stalwart on defense when all around him -- particularly Chandler-- were collapsing.
> 
> ...


All I know is that off-season Paxson did sign Chandler to a much bigger contract than he just signed Noch to.


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