BULLS HOLDING THOMAS BACK

by Alex Hryhorczuk, arh7@georgetown.edu

If you have been following Bulls basketball this season, I feel sorry for you. While it's obvious that we don't have the right mix of players, the problem is and has always been coaching and management (and idiot windbags like Jay Marriotti assuming they are the voice of the people of Chicago, rather than informing the people, which is his job.) John Paxson is a terrible GM. Jim Boylan is a worse coach and is making the same mistakes Skiles did. To try and demonstrate my point, I will profile one player, Tyrus Thomas, essentially picked 2nd overall by Chicago two years ago, and someone who has hardly become close to the player many fans envisioned when we drafted him (though I don't know what the front office 'envisioned' for him since they seem to lack any vision whatsoever.) I picked Thomas because while he has his faults, he is the most athletic player on the team and the most fun to watch when he is on the floor. And at the end of the day, the whole point of following the NBA is it's supposed to be fun to watch.

This chart shows the dispersion of minutes per game for Tyrus Thomas (blue) and LaMarcus Aldridge (red). I use Aldridge because the Bulls swapped him with Portland straight up and so they will forever be linked. Many people argue it was a mistake to take Thomas over Aldridge and they certainly have an argument, as Aldridge has established himself as a starter and a vital part of a resurgent Trail Blazers team. He is a better natural post scorer, which the Bulls desperately lack. Fine. I believe however that if Thomas stayed with the Blazers he would be on his way to superstardom by now, and Aldridge would not be near the player we see in Portland today. Take a look at the graph. There is no consistency or even trend to Tyrus Thomas' minutes. Aldridge plays consistently between 30-40 minutes a night with a few exceptions. Without getting too technical, standard deviation (SD) measures how widely spread the values in a data set are, or, how much deviation there is from the average. The SD of Aldridge's minutes (absent the 5 games he was injured since this would skew the data and make it useless) is 5.07. So, Aldridge can reasonably expect to play 34.5 minutes (his average) give or take 5 minutes (the SD). Looking at Thomas, on the other hand, he can expect to play 17 minutes (his average- fine) give or take 9.5 minutes (the SD- what!). In other words he does not know what the hell to expect and it's pretty clear the result is going to be that he is pissed off. The SD 9.5 does not include the games Thomas played 0 minutes due to team imposed suspensions, though maybe it should since this doesn't unfairly skew the statistic in the same way injury does. If you count the games he was suspended by the team the SD is closer to 10.0. So his SD is twice what Aldridge's is and he plays half the minutes! You don't need to be a statistics nerd for that to blow your mind. In other words, Thomas should reasonably expect to play between 7 and 27 minutes every night, i.e. he doesn't know what to expect. I wonder what he is thinking while he sits on the bench without a clue and if that's good for the team.

The next thing I looked for are trends- there are none. The statistics don't demonstrate a steady increase in minutes, they are completely scattered at random, and demonstrate just that, a team that has no idea where it is going or what it is doing with its parts. It is the reason there is so much resentment toward the front office and why the coach is losing the players. You don't follow a leader simply because he is in charge (or because he is signing your checks- the worst argument of all, more on that later), you follow him because you believe he is taking you somewhere. Thank God we don't have players who "fall into line" at the nonsensical whims of our idiot coach. Most great teams need a guy who you know will give you all he's got, whether you need him for 5 minutes or 20 (think Adam Burish). That guy is not your star. That guy should not be Tyrus Thomas, and management should not treat Thomas that way just to make a point about his immaturity.

The point of this graph is not to show how many more minutes Aldridge plays than Thomas (though it certainly does that, to date 2035 minutes this year to Thomas' 933. I wonder why he is further along as a player?). The point is really in the drastic deviation of how many minutes Ty Thomas plays a game- 28 minutes one night, 3 minutes the next, etc. It is enough to drive anyone crazy, let alone a 20 year-old freakishly athletic kid. To say that Thomas should just do what is expected of him is a poor argument, because how can he even begin to know what is reasonably expected of him? Do what you're told?? Please. This is the NBA. For Paxson to say that we sign his checks and therefore he should do what is asked of him and nothing more is saying that we the coaches and front office have zero accountability to our players. I don't think that is true. If the office you work at is run that way, quit now. Don't waste time waiting because it is never getting better for you. This is especially true if you don't have a clearly defined role where you work. Think about your job description. I bet it is pretty clearly defined and I bet you like it that way. It keeps management off your back and most importantly (and this may seem paradoxical) it allows you freedom to do things your own way and truly shine. It brings out the qualities that make you indispensable to your company (let's hope) and management cannot do this for you by redefining your role every day.

Drafting and cap management are extremely important, and I believe the Bulls have done a pretty good job with that (Artest, Brand, Jay Williams, Hinrich, Gordon, Curry, Chandler, Thomas, Noah). But player development is maybe the most important, and ours is abysmal and that is at root the management's fault. Apparently there are only 300 people in the world good enough to play at this level. Every team is drafting from the same pool. What you do with that talent says everything about the success of your organization.

It is true these are professionals and they need to act professionally. I am not making excuses for Thomas' or some other players' behavior. If you are siding with management on this issue I think the root of your frustration most likely boils down to the results on the floor, and I believe we are arguing from the same point of view. The problem though is with management, not with the players.

I could run into a little bit of a chicken or the egg argument with Thomas, because good play is rewarded with more minutes (theoretically) and so saying that a guy doesn't play enough is the reason he isn't better is a bad argument because maybe it is his own fault. But the erratic nature of Thomas' playing time is a result of idiotic management, because there can be no other explanation for it. I could track Thomas' numbers from the night before when his PT takes significant hits, but that would be pointless, because using the starting lineup or minutes played as some kind of reward/punishment for quality of play game in and game out is an idiotic way to run a team, too, no matter if the statistics support that or not.

If the Bulls don't want to develop talent, they should not draft projects. Don't draft a kid who has played 1 year of organized basketball (did Thomas even play in high school?), then unconscionably screw with his minutes, then blame him for being immature and complain that he doesn't have the post moves you're looking for. The Bulls have a serious issue with valuing their assets. They did the same thing with Tyson Chandler, a player they gave up Elton Brand to get. Then they got rid of him to get Ben Wallace. If they want to frustrate their players then turn the blame on them, they're doing a great job.