Bulls settle for 99-89 loss

The Bulls aren’t an offensive juggernaut. And until Derrick Rose can consistently hit a jump shot, it’s tough to see how this core group of players even resembles one. The Bulls’ offense doesn’t just rely on jump shots — that statement isn’t nearly strong enough; the Bulls’ offense is non-existent without jumpers falling.

Rose is the most capable of getting to the basket (I’ll discuss this more later) and the offense looks best when he has more control of the ball, but everyone else’s primary role is to find an open spot on the floor and shoot if the ball happens to come to them. Just look at the shot selection in the last six minutes of the game against the Raptors:

• Rose misses 22-foot jumper
• Deng misses 20-foot jumper
• Deng misses 21-foot jumper
• Hinrich misses 19-foot jumper
• Hinrich misses 22-foot jumper
• Rose misses 20-foot jumper
• Rose misses driving layup
• Salmons misses 14-foot jumper
• Salmons misses 25-foot three-point jumper

This list doesn’t do the Bulls’ offense justice. Not only did these shots come far away from the basket, but they came with little or no ball movement. Each one deserved to be accompanied with a, “Why are you doing that?” from fans at home. These shots came with the game on the line too. A game in which the Bulls were up by 11 points at one time was slipping through their hands. The Bulls decided that 20-foot jumpers were the best thing to do.

The Bulls weren’t forced to take these shots –  if you watch the Raptors they’re more than happy to let opponents cut through them if they attack their defense — but settled for the first semi-open thing that was available. Besides the driving layup and the 14-foot jumper, this meant shooting deep jumpers, many of which never had a chance to go in.

The Bulls did settle for a lot of these shots, but a defensive change did make attacking the basket more difficult. Starting in the second half, the Raptors began switching on every screen-roll with Rose. Since Noah and Gibson do most of the screening, Rose was often matched up against Chris Bosh and Andrea Bargnani after the screen; neither of these guys are great on the ball defenders, but it looked like they bothered Rose. I kept screaming for Rose to take either of them off the dribble, but he never did it. I assume it was because their length and athleticism for their size prevented Rose from being more aggressive.

In the second quarter when the Bulls put up 35 points, Rose was able to get inside much easier. And with Rose penetrating the 19 and 20-foot jumpers were more open after the kick out and set the Raptors scrambling to cover everyone and created lanes for Bulls besides Rose to attack the basket.

Still, there’s no reason the Raptors were able to deny the Bulls as often as they did. By simply moving the ball, Bosh or Bargnani are chasing Rose through screens, or trying to switch back with Jose Calderon. Instead Rose would settle for a shot over the Raptors’ big guys or make one pass before the recipient put up a shot.