In the midst of football season, the Bulls abruptly got my basketball attention.
In back-to-back losses to the Cavaliers and Rockets on Friday and Sunday, the Bulls gave up 144 and 143 points. That’s 287 points in two games. That’s a big ‘‘wow.’’
Me, I remember when the Michael Jordan-led Bulls were giving up 88 and 86 points in Games 2 and 3 — and 75 in the clinching Game 6 — to the SuperSonics in the 1996 NBA Finals. Stone Age, I guess.
Yes, the Bulls have allowed more points than the 144 they yielded against the Cavs, including a team-record 161 to the Hawks in 2019. But that was in four overtimes. And, astoundingly, the Bulls won the shoot-a-thon with 168 points.
But this recent stretch of wretchedness hints at something far out of whack for the Bulls. You could start with the fact that human tick Alex Caruso was traded to the Thunder in the offseason for young Australian guard Josh Giddey.
Giddey is 6-8 and fluid on offense, but he is to Caruso — an NBA All-Defensive first-team member last season — what a Pekingese is to a pit bull. So Giddey is getting a lot of blame for the Bulls’ defensive softness. And it’s deserved, to a point. But in those two recent pitiful blowouts, he played only 36 minutes total. The scoring mess took an entire team to produce.
The Bulls showed big improvement defensively in a 122-112 victory Monday against the Pistons, but it didn’t mean much against a sub-.500 team.
As guard Coby White said after the debacle against the Rockets: ‘‘Giving up 140-plus in back-to-back games is unacceptable. It’s embarrassing. It’s a disservice to the organization, a disservice to the fan base.’’
No argument here.
There is also a larger element at work. The NBA game has become a circus of three-point shots. When a giant such as the Spurs’ 7-4 Victor Wembanyama makes eight three-pointers, as he did recently against the Wizards, en route to 50 points, you know the world has changed.
The Bulls launched a franchise-record 56 three-pointers Sunday in their desperate attempt to stay relevant. But they made only 14, creating a defensive issue with long rebounds and fast breaks the other way.
Defense is desire and toughness. Everybody knows that. But it’s also built around athletes with instinctive anticipatory skill combined with long arms, quick hands and quicker feet. The Bulls aren’t constructed that way. Witness the shipping off of Caruso. And neither center Nikola Vucevic nor guard Zach LaVine — nor, frankly, anybody else on the team — ever has been thought of as a really good defender.
In truth, the essence of the Bulls as an offensive-over-defensive club fell apart nearly years ago in a way that never has been remedied. Sadly, point guard Lonzo Ball, the man who would be the motor for the dynamic offense, injured his left knee in January 2022, his first season with the Bulls. He barely has played since.
Ball’s zenith came almost exactly three years ago when, on Nov. 15, 2021, he played 38 minutes,
put up 27 points, seven rebounds, eight assists and two steals and led the Bulls in a rout over the Lakers. Two months later, he was done.
Even now, after endless knee rehab, Ball is out again with a wrist injury that might require surgery. Since joining the Bulls in 2021, he has played in 38 games and missed 222. It’s like a main beam in a new house never was delivered. And the whole thing tilts like a cardboard box in the rain.
Ball is now 27, young enough but damaged, likely forever. Giddey is 22, a pro for four years already, having started his NBA career as a teenager straight out of Melbourne. He’s loaded with offensive skills, but he needs to learn — needs to want to learn — defensive skills. None of that is fun. And almost nobody is heralded as a superstar-to-be based on defensive ability. Which is kind of sad.
It’s all offense these days. Until it isn’t, and you give up long shots and points in the lane like a bunch of matadors welcoming bulls with satin capes. And you get smoked in games because of it.
Ball’s brother LaMelo is an offensive star averaging almost 30 points for the Hornets. There’s family skill there. But the Bulls-Lonzo dream might be over.
A team that gave up 49 points to the Cavs — in the first quarter — needs a major reboot.
Defense, anyone?