The Chicago Bulls fell to the Toronto Raptors 99-89 last night.

The reason for the Bulls loss was their lack of offensive production. The Bulls carried a 78-77 lead into the fourth quarter, but only scored 11 points in the fourth quarter en route to their second straight loss.

The Bulls took an 88-85 lead with 6:24 left in the fourth quarter on a Taj Gibson free throw. This would be the last time the Bulls would score until Kirk Hinrich hit a free throw with 10 seconds left on the game.

This is unacceptable, and the obvious elephant in the room has to be brought up, and that is, that the Bulls offense is so bad because they no longer have Ben Gordon.

Going 6:14 without scoring is unacceptable at the NBA level. To put it bluntly, if you had Ben Gordon go down the court and throw up contested jumpshots over double teams for six minutes, he is going to score, probably multiple times. It’s just amazing that an NBA team could go that long without scoring.

Joakim Noah had another solid game, getting another double double, with 12 points, 11 rebounds, and 2 blocks.

Noah did a good job guarding Chris Bosh. Yes, Chris Bosh had 28 points on 55.1 TS%, which is a very good game. But on the season, Bosh is averaging 28.9 points on 62.7 TS%, so Noah kept him below his season averages in both.

Taj Gibson had a good game, finishing with 18 points on 8-13 shooting, 5 rebounds, 2 blocks, and 2 steals.

The Bulls held Andrea Bargnani to only 16 points on 5-15 shooting, which is great.

Derrick Rose had another mediocre night, finishing with 14 points on 6-14 shooting and 6 assists. Rose did a horrible job defensively, giving Calderon easy drives to the basket, as Calderon went on to score 18 points on 8-10 shooting and dish 6 assists.

Luol Deng struggled again offensively scoring 18 points on 8-19 shooting. Deng’s offense isn’t as bad as the other members of the Bulls, but he is still playing bad offensively, scoring the basketball at an inefficient rate.

John Salmons had another terrible game, scoring 5 points on 1-11 shooting. I think it’s time for Salmons to meet the bench.

Kirk Hinrich struggled as well, finishing with 11 points on 3-10 shooting, 4 assists, and 5 turnovers.

Hedo Turkoglu finished with 11 points on 4-12 shooting.

This is a game that it looked like the Bulls would win, up until they had a complete offensive breakdown.

With the loss, the Bulls fall to 4-4 on the season.

The Chicago Bulls had another matinee game today against the Toronto Raptors today. This one was on the road.

It looked like the same road weary Bulls as usual, as they fell behind early. But behind clutch play of Ben Gordon and Derrick Rose, as well as the contributions of Kirk Hinrich, Tyrus Thomas, and Brad Miller, the Bulls were able to fight back into the game.

With the Bulls down 116 to 115 with 19 seconds left, Ben Gordon took a quick shot to try to give the Bulls the lead. He missed off back iron and Rose got the rebound and missed an easy layup. Tyrus Thomas then proceeded to be blocked.

The Bulls fouled Jose Calderon, who made two free throws to make it a 118 to 115 Raptors lead. The Raptors then fouled Derrick Rose to avoid giving up a three. Rose made both free throws to make it a 1 point game. The Bulls then fouled Anthony Parker who split a pair of free throws at the line, making it a 119 to 117 game.

Then Ben Gordon dribbled across the court and then shot a fadeaway jumper over Chris Bosh to tie the game at 119 as the time in regulation expired to bring the game into overtime.

A lot has been made out of that being a bad decision by Gordon, but I think it’s a good one. The Bulls were down by 1, so you want to take a quick shot to give yourselves the opportunity to get an offensive rebound, or foul. Gordon had a pretty good look at the basket too. The Bulls did end up getting two offensive rebound chances, and fouled, which allowed them to get the game into overtime. If Gordon takes that shot at the end of regulation and misses, the Bulls lose, no overtime.

Ben Gordon had ample space on his shot with 19 seconds left.

In overtime, Derrick Rose scored 6 points, all on layups. With 8 seconds left and the Bulls down 129 to 127, Rose turned the ball over as he tried to bounce the ball into Tyrus Thomas. The result was ugly, but it is good that Rose is thinking more on these end of posession plays, rather than just throwing up a layup that probably would have been blocked. He just had to make a better pass, but if he had treaded the pass through, Thomas would have gotten a dunk, and was in a situation in which the player who dunks usually gets fouled. So good idea by Rose, just bad execution. The Raptors would then go onto win it 134 to 129.

Ben Gordon was terrific today, scoring 37 points. He hit big shot after big shot, including the shot that brought the game into overtime. Gordon had 27 of his points in the second half.

Gordon today, is officially the greatest young three point shooter in NBA history. With his 2 three point field goals he passed Nick Van Exel for the most three pointers by a player in the first five years of their career. Gordon currently has 751 career three point field goals and has seven more games to extend that record.

Derrick Rose was great as well today, scoring 23 points on 9-13 shooting and dishing 9 assists. He hit a lot of big shots as well, and just looked good out there.

John Salmons only had 10 points. he wasn’t able to get a large volume going, but he was still efficient,

The Bulls got 16 points from Joakim Noah and 14 from Brad Miller. Tyrus Thomas had 11 points and 4 blocks.

Unfortunately for the Bulls, Chris Bosh also had a monster game. He finished with 31 points and 15 rebounds.

Andrea Bargnani poured in the points as well, scoring 28 in the game.

Jose Calderon had an impressive 22 point and 19 assist game. He tied the Raptor’s record for most assists in a game.

Shawn Marion gave the Raptors 16 points and Pops Mensah-Bonsu, who will join Gordon and Deng on the Great Britain National Team this summer.

With the loss, the Bulls fall to 36-39 on the season and fall to eighth place in the Eastern Conference.

Closing Comments

Today wasn’t a horrible day for the Bulls. Yes, they lost to a bad Toronto Raptors team (although you wouldn’t think they would be bad with the talent on their roster), but the fashion in which they lost wasn’t horrendous. The Bulls have that never say die attitude again, and that is encouraging. It was also encouraging to see Derrick Rose have another big game as we move towards the playoffs.

I thought the Raptors strategy of using Chris Bosh to guard Ben Gordon was a smart one. Gordon still made some big shots, but that’s because he’s so good at those circus shots because he practices them. But even with Gordon being good at those types of shots, a Gordon fadeaway has better odds of being a miss than a square jumper.

Overall, this is still a disappointing loss for the Bulls, as they had a lead pretty late in overtime and had a chance to steal this one. This truly would be a steal given that the Bulls didn’t have a lead in the game until overtime. It was a road game, so you somewhat expect the Bulls to lose, but the Raptors have been bad all season, although better as of late. Hopefully the Bulls can bounce back in their road game against Indiana on Tuesday.

The Chicago Bulls fell to the Toronto Raptors 114 to 94, dropping their fourth straight game.

With 3:33 left in the fourth and the Bulls down by 8, Vinny Del Negro decided to sub out Ben Gordon. From there on, the Bulls only scored 2 more points, letting Toronto run up the deficit to 20 points.

How many completely idiotic coaching decisions does Del Negro get before he gets canned? It is usually never a good idea to take Gordon out of the game in the fourth quarter. He has a history of being a great fourth quarter player. But to compound on that, Gordon was having a good fourth quarter, scoring 9 points while missing only 1 shot. Anyone who knows anything about any sport in general knows that you should continue riding the hot player when the game is on the line.

On the whole, Ben Gordon just had a decent night. Gordon scored 19 points on 5-14 shooting, but was 8-9 from the free throw line. Gordon also had 5 rebounds and 3 assists. Gordon was doing all the right things tonight. He was attacking the basket hard, and was starting to put together a nice game through his great fourth quarter play. It is hard to see what Vinny was thinking when he benched Gordon. Maybe he thinks he can save his job by keeping Gordon’s season averages down and saving the organization a little money. News flash for Vinny, Jim Boylan already tried that one, and he got fired.

Derrick Rose had a very poor outing, scoring 12 points on 5-12 shooting, grabbing 3 rebounds, dishing 4 assists, and getting 4 turnovers. This is another reason why Del Negro has got to go, Rose has developed into a really bad player under Del Negro. Derrick Rose does not contribute to winning basketball at this point in his career, and for that reason alone, Del Negro should be fired.

Kirk Hinrich had another nice game off the bench. Hinrich had 17 points, 7 assists, and 5 rebounds. He is really thriving offensively in the sixth man role. Hinrich’s defense hasn’t been that good the past few games, but the team as a whole has bad defensively, so it’s hard to knock Hinrich when it might just be the defensive schemes.

Joakim Noah and Tyrus Thomas were terrible for the most part. Their defense was just bad. Thomas though, had a really nice dunk over Jermaine O’neal. Aaron Gray was the Bulls best big off the bench, scoring 7 points and grabbing 7 rebounds.

Luol Deng was good, scoring 14 points on 4-8 shooting. Andres Nocioni had 15 points off the bench.

Jose Calderon really killed the Bulls. He had a very efficient 23 points, shooting the ball 9-10 from the field, while dishing for 10 assists. The Raptors looked like a much better team with him out there directing the office then they did a little over a week ago with Solomon Jones running the point.

The Raptors front court really killed the Bulls. Andrea Bargnani had 22 points and Chris Bosh had 17 points.

Joey Graham scored 16 points in the game.

The Bulls were rather careless with the ball, turning the ball over 23 times.

It is getting really hard to write game recaps, because the Bulls are so awful. This is not an indictment of the players though, it is an indictment of the coaching staff. The team simply is playing pickup ball. There is no noticeable offensive or defensive systems. The talent on the team is fine, there is just not a good offensive or defensive system in place for the players to excel in. The Bulls need to fire Vinny Del Negro and get a veteran coach who knows what he’s doing.

The Bulls are a horrible team, and a lot of it has to do with the horrible coaching. It is time for Reinsdorf to improve the product he’s putting on the court, or else the fans may begin to leave.

With this loss, the Bulls fall to 18-26 on the season.

With 14 seconds left in the game, Bulls up by two, Kirk Hinrich tried to force a pass into Ben Gordon on the inbound play, which was stolen by Chris Bosh, giving Toronto a shot to tie or win the game. Hinrich’s mistake didn’t matter, as Noah blocked Chris Bosh’s turnaround jumper with 5 seconds left in the game. The Raptors promptly fouled Deng, who sank both free throws to give the Bulls the 102 to 98 victory over the Toronto Raptors.

Coming into the game, Vinny Del Negro had to find the answer to the question of what you do when your roster is overloaded with guards and is lacking in the front court. The answer was quite simple for Vinny, end the Larry Hughes getting minutes as a Chicago Bull era and play a three guard lineup with Thabo Sefolosha at power forward and Andres Nocioni at center.

At first, it seemed like the return of Kirk Hinrich into the lineup would end up in disaster, with Del Negro sending Hinrich over to the scorers table to check in for Gordon within the opening minutes of the game. Del Negro came to his senses, and left Gordon in for large portions of the rest of the game, despite Gordon playing horribly. Gordon scored only 10 points on 4-13 shooting. He got a lot of good looks at the basket, but couldn’t connect on 7 of his 9 three point attempts tonight. Outside of his scoring, Gordon played solid defense and was very turnover prone in the first half.

Kirk Hinrich did pretty well in his second game back, finishing with 12 points, 6 assists, and 5 rebounds. Hinrich was a very good glue guy tonight, moving the ball, playing great defense, and directing other players on the court. All of Hinrich’s field goal attempts tonight were three pointers. Hinrich moved well off the ball, getting himself in position for some nice, open three point looks.

But the best guard tonight was the rookie, Derrick Rose, who had one of his finest games of his career, finishing with 25 points and 10 assists. When he drove to the basket, the Raptors met him with zero resistance. A trend is starting to set in with Derrick Rose. Against teams with good shotblockers, he generally struggles, and teams without shotblockers, he dominates. Rose will need to get his jumpshot going again to beat up on the teams with good interior defense.

The best part about Derrick tonight was that he made big shot after big shot in the fourth to get the Bulls the win.

Luol Deng had a really nice game tonight. He finished with 16 points, 14 rebounds, and 4 assists. Luol Deng was really active tonight, making a lot of good cuts, and the guards found him for good looks. A few days ago on Mully and Hanley John Paxson said that Luol Deng is at his best when the ball moves and Luol moves. The style Paxson described was on display tonight, and Luol did excellent in it.

The Bulls on a whole moved the ball very well, passing for 33 assists.

As usual, the Bulls got clobbered by the Raptors front court. Andrea Bargnani had 10 rebounds to go along with his career high 31 points. Chris Bosh added in 25 points, but was plagued with foul trouble throughout the game.

Andres Nocioni, who the Raptors may be targeting, had 16 points.

Anthony Parker put in 15 points for the Raptors. Thabo Sefolosha had 9 points for the Bulls.

Tonight was a nice victory, because the Bulls actually has a semblance of an offense system in place. There were a lot of new wrinkles in the offense that haven’t been seen all season. There was lots of new off the ball movement and some Aaron Gray post ups. This begs the question, what took so long Del Negro? Why did it take 39 games into the season to see this stuff?

The only real disappointment in tonight’s game, besides Gordon’s poor shooting, was not getting to see Lindsey Hunter make an appearance at power forward in the game.

With the win, the Bulls improve to 17-22 on the season.

According to Marc Stein’s Weekend Dime, the Toronto Raptors might be interested in Andres Nocioni. Here is what he wrote:

Didn’t mean to suggest the Raptors have put the phone down.

They’re still strongly against parting with Andrea Bargnani, but they’re also looking to upgrade on the wing (Chicago’s Andres Nocioni is a possibility) while trying to determine whether the Chris Bosh/Jermaine O’Neal experiment — which hasn’t worked out like a high-post/low-post combo as Toronto imagined — can be salvaged or is best abandoned quickly.

Moving O’Neal certainly won’t be easy. Yet it probably isn’t impossible because O’Neal’s $23 million salary next season is an expiring contract.

The ideal trade for the Bulls would be to use Larry Hughes and Andres Nocioni as the principle in exchange for Jermaine O’neal. Such a trade would allow the Bulls to become players in 2010 free agency while ridding themselves of the cancerous Larry Hughes.

In addition, O’neal would give the Bulls a legitimate center, something the team has sorely needed this season. O’neal is averaging 14.0 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 1.9 blocks in 28 games this season.

If the Bulls have an opportunity to trade a 2010 unfriendly contract or the cancerous Larry Hughes for Jermaine O’neal, they should jump at the opportunity.