John Paxson appeared on the Mully and Hanley show on 670 the Score this morning. Paxson talked about the state of the team, the looming trade deadline, and addressing the roster logjams. Here is a recap of what he had to say:

• Doesn’t want for a young player, especially Derrick Rose, who is committed to winning, to be affected by the Bulls’ losing.  Points to Kevin Durant, with Oklahoma City, having only 5 wins and Kevin Love, in Minnesota, only having 10 wins.  You have to look at the individual and what they’re made of.  Derrick has a really good base.  While it’s a concern, Paxson doesn’t think that Derrick is the type that will let it affect him.  Will he get frustrated?  Absolutely, but in the long run, he will be okay.
• Recognizes that the roster is overloaded with guards and wings.  It has been difficult for guys to get a lot of consistent minutes, especially with all the injuries.  Would love to move some pieces to alleviate the logjam and give some guys on the roster the opportunity to play.
• Some players have spoken out and some are not happy in their roles.  That means that they’re not happy with the minutes they’re getting.  It bothers him that for these players, it’s not totally about the team and trying to win, but more about what the individual needs.
• At some point, and that days coming soon, he is going to clear some issues up by making a trade, or just saying to the players, “Look, these are the guys who are going to play.”  and having a tighter rotation and living with the consequences that brings.
• The defensive end of the floor has been very poor.  Vinny, the staff, and players have to get on the same page and work hard on it in practice.  Has had some excellent talks with Vinny about how to get better.  Vinny feels that they need to simplify what they’re doing out there.  They need to continue to hammer home the basic foundation on the defensive end.  The foundation has to be grounded on a daily basis on the practice floor.
• Paxson’s main concern is that they’re giving up to many easy baskets at the rim.
• Thinks the Bulls score the ball enough.  Thinks that they take too many uick shots and wants a little more discipline to not shoot the ball too quickly.
• Paxson thinks that a lot of Luol Deng’s struggles are attributable to the quick shots, as Luol is not a quick shot player.  Paxson sees Deng being at his best when the ball moves and Luol moves.  When the ball moves, Luol is a very good player.  He thinks when the ball starts moving more, Luol’s numbers will go up.
• First, he feels that right now, the ball is not moving on offense.  Secondly, the Bulls do a lot off the dribble in screen and roll action.  Thinks they will get better at what they do off the dribble and off the pass.
• Right now, Luol’s frustrated.  Paxson has talked to Luol about his body language and how people view him.
• Thinks that double teams should be effecting ball movement.  It’s simple basketball, as all of a sudden, you have 4 guys against 3.  That’s when you should move the ball.  That’s where Vinny and his staff have to keep demanding and getting the players to do that.
• When players take quick shots and are not moving the ball, that shows you what’s on their mind.  Because the Bulls have so many guys who think they should play 35 minutes a night, they feel that they need to shoot it right away.  That’s not a winning formula.
• Thinks that the defense suffers from the quick shots.  The defensive balance is always way off when you take a quick shot, and that leads to bad things.
• Lately, Tyrus Thomas and Joakim Noah have been getting big minutes.  There are times during games where Tyrus tries to do a little bit too much.  There is a fine line for Tyrus between helping the team and looking at the individual part of the game.  Thinks that Tyrus has played well.  Needs to see Joakim start playing.
• Is going to have to make decisions when they get everyone back.  He is trying to do some things to alleviate that.  As the team gets healthy, things will be addressed.

You can listen to the interview on 670thescore.com

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The Chicago Bulls fell to the Detroit Pistons 104 to 98 last night in Detroit.

The Bulls lost in large part because of the referees. The referees chose to call ticky tack or non-existent fouls on the Bulls all night long. One gregarious call was a reach in call on Ben Gordon to give him his fourth foul, where Gordon got caught on a pick, putting Iverson out of his reach, making a reach in foul impossible.

Derrick Rose, Ben Gordon, and Andres Nocioni all fouled out.

Ben Gordon had a nice game, finishing with 18 points, 7 assists, and 7 rebounds. He did have 6 turnovers, but it wasn’t as bad as it looks when you take into account that some were on unfair offensive fouls, and one was on an inbounds pass where Gordon was the inbounder and no one went to go get the ball.

Derrick Rose was solid, finishing with 10 points, 5 assists, and 4 rebounds. Rose was frustrated with foul trouble all night long.

This was a game where Luol Deng should have stepped up with Rose and Gordon in foul trouble, but he didn’t. Deng shot 2-7 and only scored 6 points. If Deng doesn’t begin to turn it around, Paxson might need to look into trading Deng early on in his contract.

Tyrus Thomas, once again, had a good game. Thomas had 16 points, 12 rebounds, and 2 blocks. Hopefully this is Thomas starting to put things together. Thomas is a player that makes an impact on the game, so it is good to have him get going. The Bulls will still need to address the center position, and get a defensive anchor there, but the more we play Thomas over Gooden, the better our defense will be.

Larry Hughes and Andres Nocioni also put in good games. Hughes had 19 points and 5 assists and Nocioni added in 18 points.

Rodney Stuckey was completely unstoppable. Stuckey burned the Bulls for 40 points. It didn’t matter if it was Gordon, Hughes, Sefolosha, or Deng guarding him, he was going to score no matter what.

The Bulls held Allen Iverson to only 5 points, but Iverson did his damage to the Bulls in concert with the referees.

With the loss, the Bulls fall to 13-15 on the season. If this is as good as the Pistons are with great help from the referees, than no team should fear them in the playoffs.

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.

The Chicago Bulls fell to the Milwaukee Bucks 97 to 90 at the Bradley Center early tonight.

The Bulls got a great performance out of their perimeter tonight. Derrick Rose, Ben Gordon, Larry Hughes, and Luol Deng combined for 74 of the Bulls’ 90 points. Unfortunately, the Bulls only got 16 points out of their front court.

It should be clear what the team’s problem is. It’s definitely not Ben Gordon and likewise, definitely not Derrick Rose. It’s not Larry Hughes, and not really Luol Deng either, although he hasn’t been spectacular. It’s the horrible big men. Paxson needs to make some kind of trade soon, because the Bulls’ big men have few redeeming qualities.

Ben Gordon was especially spectacular tonight. He didn’t have a great overall game, but he scored 15 straight points for the Bulls in the third quarter to rally the Bulls back into the game by himself. Gordon finished with 22 points, 6 rebounds, and 4 assists. Gordon has been rebounding the ball very well as of late, similar to what Jason Kidd does, albeit, not as good. This might not be a bad thing, given how bad our big men are at rebounding. Gordon also did a solid job on Michael Redd, limiting him to 13 points on 6-11 shooting.

Scott Skiles did a good job adjusting to Gordon’s hot scoring. Skiles began to meet Gordon with double teams and switched Luc Mbah a Moute onto Gordon, which helped slow him down.

Luol Deng had a good game for the first time in a long while. Hopefully this wasn’t just a one time occasion, in which Deng wanted to have a big game against his former coach. Deng had 21 points on 9-14 shooting, although he did his usual fourth quarter disappearing act. Disappearing act or not, any production out of Deng like this is great. This is the player we expected Luol Deng to be all year. It is pretty simple, Luol Deng has to make his jumpshots to be an effective player.

Derrick Rose was solid tonight. Rose finished with 18 points, 9 assists, and 4 steals. Unfortunately, Rose was sloppy with the ball tonight, turning it over 5 times. A lot of Rose’s assists had nothing to do with anything he was doing, but rather he got them by passing to Gordon off screens who was on fire in the third. Rose did have two very nice alley-oop passes though; one to Deng and one to Thomas.

Larry Hughes had 13 points off the bench, and did a good job from long range, hitting 3 of 4 three point shots.

Luke Ridnour had a solid game for Milwaukee, scoring 12 points and dishing 10 assists. Richard Jefferson added in 21 points.

Charlie Villanueva and Dan Gadzuric tore up the Bulls front court. Villanueva had 23 points and 10 rebounds and Dan Gadzuric had 11 points, 14 rebounds, and 3 blocks. Gadzuric did a good job of altering some of Rose’s layup attempts.

As usual, the Bulls need major front court changes before they can be a consistently good team.