In a perfect world, you would like for your Point Guard to spend the majority of his time setting up his teammates, and also scoring primarily when needed or necessary. However, the world we live in is hardly flawless and in Chicago, that isn’t quite the case yet. All summer, I went on and on about how big the signing of Carlos Boozer is for the Bulls. Next to Miami, I feel that they had the best off-season because what has escaped them forever was a legit offensive-minded body on the block, because they’ve been way too perimeter oriented lately. As you know, Booz is out with a hand injury so as for right now, they almost resemble the same team from last year. That means that the scoring will come from the perimeter and Derrick Rose has to shoot more than he should be.
Without Boozer in the lineup, the only other guy on the squad who you could rely on to give you some consistent buckets is Luol Deng – another perimeter guy. Even though I’d categorize Luol as a scorer, I still temper my expectations with him. He isn’t capable of averaging 25ppg, which would be nice to get out of a guy like that. He’s more of a 17ppg guy. Yes, I am aware of his 40 point outburst the other night against Portland, but he played way over his head in that game. All of this puts indirect pressure on Derrick Rose on the offense.
Coming into last week’s home loss to the underrated Knicks, Rose was second in the league in scoring at 27.7ppg. I know we’re only a handful of games in to the season, but that’s alarming. Ideally, I don’t think you want your PG scoring so much and shouldering that significant amount of the offensive duties. Derrick Rose is fully capable of averaging 30ppg for an entire season if he wanted to. He’s that nice, but that won’t do the Bulls any good. In last week’s two games, Rose had taken 27 and 31 shots respectively. But it’s not his fault because until Boozer gets back, and aside from Deng, there’s no one who can score – especially in the half court. Not even the $60M man, Joakim Noah.
But perhaps this is part of Rose’s plan. During the summer he expressed his desire to be an MVP and Most Valuable Players are usually amongst the league leaders in scoring. Nah, I doubt it.
Even though he hasn’t played a single minute for the club yet, the Bulls miss Carlos Boozer severely. The Bulls are 2-3, but would probably 5-0 with him. Last year, the Bulls were 41 – 41 and Rose averaged 20.8ppg while dishing out 6 assists. When Boozer gets back, I’m still fine with Rose averaging 20ppg, but hopefully he won’t be the volume scorer that he is now and he can get to 20 points on half as many shots which consequently makes them a much better team.
Last season the Cavs, Magic, Celtics and Hawks were seeded one through four in the Eastern Conference Playoffs. This year, I think it will be some combination of the Heat, Celtics, Magic and Bulls. At full strength, I think the Bulls could earn home court advantage in the playoffs, but without Boozer they are the same team as last year.
If you’re looking for your everyday, predictable basketball talk, then go somewhere else, because Kevin Burke of The Kevin Burke Project brings provocative, thought provoking content about basketball as only he can. Kevin also hosts The Hoop Doctors weekly podcast show, which you can subscribe to for free on iTunes. Follow Kevin on Twitter and Facebook
