According to the Chicago Tribune, Kirk Hinrich will visit a specialist on Monday or a thumb injury that he suffered while practicing before the Bulls game against the Blazers.

On the one hand, an MRI revealed the injured ligament remains attached to the bone, unlike last season when Hinrich tore the ulnar collateral ligament in his right thumb and missed 31 games after surgery.

On the other, Hinrich is visiting a specialist Monday, five full days after suffering the injury at a Wednesday practice in Oregon. Coach Vinny Del Negro wouldn’t rule Hinrich out for Monday’s game, but the fact he didn’t practice Saturday and still has swelling doesn’t bode well.

It is hard to get a read on how serious of an injury that Hinrich has right now. It sounds like the injury isn’t quite as bad as what he suffered last year, but how bad the injury appears to be up for debate. The following quote from Vinny Del Negro sheds some more light on the uncertainty of Hinrich’s injury.

Asked if the Bulls have any plans to sign an extra guard, Del Negro demurred.

“We’re going to wait and see what happens with that evaluation on Monday and then make a decision,” Del Negro said. “We weren’t even sure if Jannero was going to practice because of a little shoulder impingement.”

It sounds like the Bulls are completely uncertain of the extent of the injury right now. It sounds like the Bulls won’t truly know how badly Hinrich is injured until the specialist sees him.

If Kirk Hinrich is out for any type of significant period of time, it is pertinent that the Bulls sign someone, as the team will simply fail because of their lack of backcourt depth.

The Tribune lists Wally Szczerbiak, Jerry Stackhouse, and Antonio Daniels as some of the options. Another option that goes unmentioned is Rashad McCants.

Wally Szczerbiak averaged 7.0 points on 58.1 TS% last season in 74 games for Cleveland, shooting 41.1% from three point territory. Unfortunately, Szczerbiak is still rehabbing from knee surgery, and may not be able to give the Bulls immediate help.

Antonio Daniels averaged 3.1 points on 53.1 TS% last season in 61 games with the New Orleans Hornets.

Jerry Stackhouse averaged 4.2 points on 33.3 TS% last season in 10 games for Dallas.

Rashad McCants averaged 10.3 points on 55.3 TS% in 24 games after being traded to the Sacramento Kings at the trade deadline. McCants failed a physical with Houston to begin the year.

The Bulls should immediately cross Antonio Daniels and Jerry Stackhouse off their list of options. Neither player appears capable of positively impacting an NBA team at this point, and would both likely be a downgrade from Jannero Pargo.

Wally Szczerbiak is probably the most intriguing of these options because of his size and ability to shoot the three point shot. However, if he is rendered useless because of injuries, he is not an option. That would leave Rashad McCants, who has health questions of his own.

Even if McCants is healthy, he will not do much to positively contribute to the Bulls. His sole positive contributions would just be being better than Jannero Pargo and Lindsey Hunter, which isn’t much of a contribution of all.

The Bulls of course could explore signing Allen Iverson, but the Bulls front office is unlikely to sign a player like Iverson, and there is also strong rumblings that the 76ers might sign Iverson, so he may not be an option for the Bulls in a few days.

One thing is for sure, if Hinrich is out, the Bulls have to sign someone, and if Hinrich is out, the season will probably get ugly.

The Chicago Bulls defeated the Washington Wizards tonight at the United Center 117 to 110 in an ugly basketball game.

Ben Gordon had a really nice game for the Bulls. He finished with 21 points on 9-15 shooting, 7 assists, 3 rebounds, 2 steals, and 1 block. In the third quarter, Antonio Daniels made a drive to the basket and Ben Gordon met him at the rim and swatted away Daniel’s layup attempt, igniting a Bulls fastbreak. Following the block, Gordon did the Dikembe Mutumbo finger wave in Daniel’s direction. It was one of the greatest blocks in Bulls history.

His backcourt mate, Derrick Rose, also had a nice game. Rose finished the game with 15 points and 8 assists.

The third guard, Larry Hughes, also had a tremendous game. Hughes finished with 24 points, 5 assists, and 2 steals. The most impressive part about Hughes’ game tonight is that he shot 5 of 6 from three point. Hughes has just been playing great basketball as of late. Larry Hughes is not only easily the most talented potential third guard on the Bulls, but also the most effective, as he can play the point guard, shooting guard, and small forward positions, something Kirk Hinrich and Thabo Sefolosha cannot do. With Hughes’ great play, it is pretty clear that there won’t be minutes for Hinrich in the backcourt when he comes back.

Luol Deng put together a nice game for the second night in a row. Deng finished the game with 26 points on 11-19 shooting. He did his usual disappearing act in the fourth quarter, but if the Bulls get three great quarters out of Deng like in 2006-2007, then the Bulls are going to be a tough team to beat with Rose and Gordon’s great fourth quarter play.

Andres Nocioni also had a nice game, although he was bound to have one after about 9 horrific games. Nocioni finished the game with 19 points and 3 assists.

Vinny Del Negro opted to go small most of the game. It is hard to blame Vinny for this, the front court has been abominable all season long. They left Vinny with no choice. Aaron Gray got the start over Joakim Noah, who had a DNP - Coach’s Decision. Tyrus Thomas only played 5 minutes. The front court players who did play were useless for the most part, although Gooden had a solid 12 points and 10 rebounds. The front court defense is still non-existent.

Antawn Jamison had 23 points and 12 rebounds for the Wizards, and Caron Butler added in 27 points.

With the win, the Bulls improve to 9-11 on the season.

From Sam Smith’s blog on Bulls.com:

It goes back to this preseason when the Bulls, Wizards, Nuggets and Clippers were in talks for a massive player deal. Those rarely come to fruition because of so many moving parts, though sources say this one was getting serious before Hughes got hurt and then Kirk Hinrich. I usually don’t pay much attention to these scenarios since GM’s talk all the time and come up with some crazier stuff than my e-mailers. And presumably everything has changed since the Nuggets later dealt for Chauncey Billups and the Clippers for Zach Randolph. I’ve heard different versions of this, but the Bulls supposedly were getting Chris Kaman and Antonio Daniels after everything settled. Who knows how close it ever was. But despite what the Clippers have been saying, they have had long interest in dealing Kaman, now out two weeks. And I’d assume especially now with Randolph playing well with Marcus Camby.

The Bulls should continue to pursue Chris Kaman. Kaman is averaging 13.9 PPG 9.4 RPG 1.9 BPG and 1.9 APG so far this year. I still do not see why the Clippers are intent on trading Kaman, but if they want to be foolish, Paxson should pounce on the opportunity to get a good center.

Paxson should start by trying to trade for Kaman using Hinrich, Nocioni, and the young bigs. But if the Clippers don’t bite at that, Paxson should not hesitate at swapping Luol Deng for Chris Kaman. The Bulls could easily reach a trade involving Deng, despite his BYC status, by using Drew Gooden as the filler. Trades involving Tyrus Thomas as the filler are also possibly, but much harder to use, and involves exploiting a loophole in the CBA involving the minimum salary trade exception. Luol Deng and Tyrus Thomas for Chris Kaman and Brian Skinner would be an example of this.

By swapping Deng for Kaman, we get a better player at a more important position given the construct of our team, while doing no damage to our 2010 plans. If we still are unable to find a taker for Kirk Hinrich or Andres Nocioni by the start of 2009 free agency, we can turn our attention away from 2010 and focus on building through 2009 free agency and leveraging the contract of Larry Hughes.

In this scenario, we would also be able to re-sign Drew Gooden with no concerns of it messing up our 2010 plan. Losing Deng would not be that painful, as Shawn Marion and Ron Artest are likely to be available for the MLE this summer. Creating a starting lineup of Derrick Rose, Ben Gordon, Shawn Marion, Drew Gooden, and Chris Kaman would not be too bad of an alternative plan to 2010. We would have competent players at all positions.

Hopefully the Clippers remain intent on trading Chris Kaman and the Bulls get lucky and land him. He would be a great addition for this team.