The Bulls came up big in the first game of the season yesterday, defeating the San Antonio Spurs 92-85 at the United Center.

The Bulls won in a total team effort, depending on a strong team defense and an even distribution of scoring.

Tim Duncan destroyed the Bulls, going for 28 points, 16 rebounds, and 3 blocks. That was okay, as the Bulls shutdown every other key player on the Spurs. Richard Jefferson only had 9 points on 3-9 shooting, Tony Parker had 8 points on 4-11 shooting, Manu Ginobili had 12 points on 3-11 shooting, and Antonio McDyess had 1 point on 0-4 shooting.

The Bulls effort was led by Luol Deng, who scored 17 points on 8-13 shooting. This is an encouraging start to the season, and if Deng can keep it up, the Bulls could push into the mid to high 40 in wins. However, I don’t think Deng can keep it up. In last night’s game, only 2 of Deng’s makes were near the basket. He was making his long jumper last night, and that is why he was so successful offensively last night. He did the same thing during the 2006-2007 season. This is why it’s a little hard to get too excited about Luol’s game tonight, he didn’t display any new ways he can score. If his midrange shot isn’t elite, like it hasn’t been for every year except 06-07, then Deng is going to score inefficiently, and be a hindrance on the offense.

On the flipside, John Salmons struggled, scoring 10 points on 3-15 shooting. He will have a lot better shooting nights than he did tonight, just a bad game for him.

The Bulls got terrific play at the point guard spot from Derrick Rose and Kirk Hinrich. Derrick Rose finished with 13 points, 7 assists, and 7 rebounds and Kirk Hinrich scored 14 points. Kirk Hinrich is easily the best backup point guard in the game, and the Bulls should be one of the top teams in the league in point guard production for the year.

The major reason that the Bulls were able to knock off the Spurs was because of the play of their front court. The Bulls got good production from their main three big men. Tyrus Thomas was impressive with 13 points, 6 rebounds, and 3 blocks. Joakim Noah had 10 points, 10 rebounds, and 2 blocks, and Brad Miller had 9 points.

With the win, the Bulls start the season 1-0. They play the Boston Celtics later tonight in the early ESPN game.

Closing Comments and Season Outlook

The Bulls looked great in their season opener. Is this a sign that the Bulls are going to be a great team this year, and maybe take the fourth seed in the East? It could be, but I don’t think so.

The reason I don’t think so is because I don’t foresee Luol Deng playing like this every night, and even with good defense, other teams will score better than the Spurs did. Good offense beats good defense. I think what the Bulls will get out of Luol Deng is great defense, but very poor offensive production, and because of Deng’s lack of a three point shot, I think he might muddle up the offense a bit.

I think the big question of the season is how do the Bulls big men perform. That is, how do they perform on the defensive end of the court. If the Bulls big men step up, and play good interior defense, than the Bulls can be a good team, and challenge for the fourth seed in the East. If the Bulls big men play like they did last year, then this will be a forgettable year for Bulls fans.

Unfortunately, I don’t see the Bulls big men playing at an elite level on the defensive end all year. I think they will be better than last year, but the loss of Gordon will far outweigh the gains the Bulls make on the defensive end.

Where does this leave the Bulls? They won’t be a bad team, but they won’t be a very good team either. From what I have seen around the web, there is a general consensus that the Bulls will finish somewhere in this 35 to 45 win range. Las Vegas set 41.5 as the over/under for the Bulls record this season.

My personal prediction before last night was 38-44, but I’m going to ammend that to 39-43, because I didn’t think the Bulls would beat the Spurs last night. 39-43 is my prediction for the Bulls record this season, just missing out on the playoffs with the 9th seed. Hopefully I’m wrong.

The Chicago Bulls ended up in a tough match against the Detroit Pistons tonight. What made the game so difficult, was that the referees were completely on Detroit’s side, making call after call in Detroit’s favor.

Tyrus Thomas, who was frustrated for not being able to get a foul call, took out his agression on Richard Hamilton, checking him in the backcourt. From this point forward, the Pistons seemed to play a little more shaky.

Brad Miller also lost his cool over not being able to get a call, getting thrown out of the game with two technical fouls.

But even with the one sided officiating, the Bulls managed to stay relatively close to the Pistons. The Bulls trailed the Pistons 85-79 with 5:58 left in the ball game. From here on, Derrick Rose took over the game to get the Bulls back in it. He would score the Bulls next 9 points, tying the game on an up and under move on Rasheed Wallace on the fastbreak, in which he drew an and one, making the free throw.

With the game tied at 88, Rodney Stuckey pulled up for a jumpshot with 34 seconds left. Rose leaped into the air, extending his arm as high as it could go, blocking the shot. Joakim Noah grabbed the ball, got it to Rose, and the Bulls called a timeout.

And this is when that other clutch guy the Bulls have would step in. The Bulls ran a play for Ben Gordon, who found a seam in the defense. Gordon drove past Prince and right into Antonio McDyess, as he laid in the right handed layup to give the Bulls a 90-88.

Gordon’s shot would end up being the game winning basket, as the Pistons missed a few shots, and Rose made a free throw to make it a 3 point victory for the Bulls.

Derrick Rose was absolutely phenomenal, finishing with 24 points and 8 assists. Rose stepped up tonight in the clutch, scoring baskets when his team needed him to and coming up with the clutch block on Rodney Stuckey.

Ben Gordon was solid tonight as well, finishing with 19 points on 8-15 shooting, including the game winning layup. Ben Gordon was hammered by Antonio McDyess on that play. That should have been an obvious foul call, but the foul went uncalled. In the end, the Bulls didn’t need the foul call to beat the lowly Pistons, but that play just exemplified the bad officiating.

Tyrus Thomas finished with 13 points, 8 rebounds, and 2 blocks. I thought his foul on Richard Hamilton was warranted. The Pistons were playing dirty and taking shots at the Bulls which were being uncalled. It’s nice to see a player actually stand up and not take his opponents crap.

Brad Miller finished with 10 points and only 2 rebounds, and 6 turnovers. A lot of Miller’s turnovers were on travels. That wasn’t part of the bad officiating, as Miller just simply traveled. He travels a lot, with it often going uncalled. I thought Miller did the Bulls a favor by getting thrown out, because he was playing so poorly.

Joakim Noah finished with 11 points and 13 rebounds.

I wasn’t very happy with the front court tonight. They did a poor job securing rebounds. Then again, that might have just been a result of Detroit being allowed to commit looseball fouls after every shot without repercussions.

Richard Hamilton finished with 25 points. He was a tough cover for the Bulls and did a good job scoring.

Rodney Stuckey did a nice job setting up his teammates for 9 assists, but he had a tough time scoring the ball, scoring only 16 points on 6-15 shooting.

Tayshaun Prince finished with 19 points, and again, like Richard Hamilton, he has always been a tough cover for the Bulls.

Rasheed Wallace finished with 11 points and 9 rebounds.

With the win, the Bulls improve to 41-40 on the season. They have clinched at least the seventh seed in the East and took a 1/2 game lead over Philadelphia for the sixth seed in the Eastern Conference.

Closing Comments

Tonight was a good win for the Bulls. There was no excuse for them to win this game tonight. Not because they didn’t show up to play (well Brad Miller and Kirk Hinrich didn’t really show up to play, and John Salmons is still struggling with his groin injury), but because the officiating was so much in favor of the Pistons. That’s what makes this such a good win. Good teams find ways to win ugly games, that seem like a surefire loss, and that’s exactly what the Bulls did tonight.

The Bulls now have a half game lead over Philadelphia for the sixth seed. If the Bulls get the sixth seed, they get to play the Orlando Magic, who are an injury plagued team who are stumbling into the playoffs. If the Bulls get the seventh seed, they get to play the Boston Celtics, who have had their own injury problems with Kevin Garnett. The Bulls magic number for the sixth seed is 2.

Good win for the Bulls tonight.

Go Bulls!

The Chicago Bulls defeated the Detroit Pistons 99 to 91 at the United Center tonight, but that didn’t stop Kirk Hinrich from being booed at the end of the game. Kirk Hinrich was at the free throw line with a chance to bring the Bulls to 100 points with little time left in the game. Hinrich bounced his shot off the front of the rim, thus denying the Bulls fans of their precious Big Macs.

This one was a bit of an improvement though. Only half the stadium was booing Hinrich while the other half was cheering the Bulls win. Much better than getting booed by the entire stadium.

Tonight was just a very ugly game. Detroit was essentially Tayshaun Prince and Antonio McDyess plus a D-League ensemble tonight. No one on Detroit besides those two are really any good, so the Bulls didn’t have to play all that well to get the win tonight. Detroit is going to have difficulty beating anyone without Allen Iverson, Rip Hamilton, and Rasheed Wallace.

I think a lot of the Bulls ugliness came from Kirk Hinrich at the point guard. He just doesn’t run the team as well as Derrick Rose, who missed the game with an injury tonight. Hinrich didn’t seem to know when to look to score and when to pass. Hinrich scored 24 points in the game, but he took 23 shots to get it. When playing point guard, he has to look to set up his teammates more. Hinrich did have 8 assists, and his defense was pretty good.

The Bulls got good production from both of their young big men tonight. Tyrus Thomas finished with 18 points, 12 rebounds, and 5 assists. Joakim Noah finished with 15 points and 10 rebounds. The two finished well inside when set up and played very good defense.

Ben Gordon was solid tonight scoring 19 points and dishing 6 assists. Gordon forced up some shots tonight. I think that was a result of him feeling ignored by Hinrich a lot of times on offense. Gordon also has that continuing problem of missing good three point looks. He needs to start making his three point shots soon.

John Salmons had a tough game. He finished with 16 points on 5-14 shooting. Tayshaun Prince really bothered him with his length.

For the Pistons Tayshaun Prince had 20 points and 6 assists and Antonio McDyess had 16 points and 8 rebounds. Those two got some help from Will Bynum tonight who had 20 points and 9 assists. The Bulls didn’t seem too concerned with stopping him after they gathered their big lead in the second half.

Outside of those three, the Pistons were terrible. Stuckey played poorly as usual, scoring 14 points on 5-14 shooting and passing for only 3 assists. I never understood why Stuckey got so much hype, as he wasn’t very good as a rookie. They traded Billups on the premise that Stuckey was their point guard of the future, but the guy clearly isn’t that good, averaging 13.5 points on a poor 51.1 TS% for the season. The scary part about Stuckey being so bad is that it could push the Pistons to spend their cap space on Ben Gordon this summer, especially if Boozer doesn’t opt out or re-signs with the Jazz quickly.

The worst part of tonight’s game was when Lindsey Hunter was getting minutes in the first half. He was just horrible. The Bulls survived Lindsey Hunter’s reign of terror and were able to escape with a victory.

With the win, the Bulls improve to 34-38 on the season. They now have a 2 game lead on the Bobcats for the eighth spot in the East. They now trail the Pistons by 1 game for the seventh spot in the East.

Closing Comments

Things are looking up for the Bulls now. They are now only 1 game behind the Pistons for the seventh spot, and with the Bulls soft schedule and the Piston’s injury problems, I think the Bulls can catch them.

A few weeks ago I challenged Vinny Del Negro to get the Bulls to .500, otherwise he should be fired. It looks like Vinny might just pull it off. If he gets the Bulls to .500, I won’t call for his firing this offseason. Vinny is no longer doing a terrible job. Ever since being given Salmon and Miller and having Deng go down, the Bulls have looked really good. Vinny has the Bulls competing and headed in an upward direction. If he gets the Bulls back to .500, we should all say good job. It really is pretty solid for a rookie coach who took over a 33 win team. But if he doesn’t have the Bulls heading towards further improvements the next year, his job should not be safe.

Good win to the Bulls tonight. As long as they keep winning the games they are supposed to, they will surely make the playoffs, and might even be able to get in the 5th or 6th spots if they’re lucky.