A Departure of Complacency

By: Chicago Sports Review

I’m not sure if it was the fact that he didn’t have to guard Shaq for another night, or the 67 million options that could occupy his off-season, or even the chance to shake the Reverend Jesse’s hand outside the locker room, but I do remember distinctly what was a real lack of dejection from Tyson Chandler following Game Six of the Bulls-Heat series.

The Bulls had just been knocked out of the playoffs, and Chandler was getting dressed, answering questions, and, based on what I saw, ready to move on. He wasn’t doing handstands, but he smiled here and there. Perhaps his was the smile of a man looking forward toward a bright Bulls future. I don’t know. Yet it wasn’t a look of pain.

You couldn’t compare it to a barely audible Kirk Hinrich, or an equally dour Ben Gordon, whose locker is next to Captain Kirk’s.

I like Chandler, but I’m not sure he’s wired the way the others are.

The way Ben Wallace is.

And it’s odd that Chandler would have the look of a “happy to be here” when that should be the phrase on Big Ben’s business card considering where they came from. And yet it’s not that way, which is why the Bulls are a vastly different team right now.

Ben Wallace is everything Tyson Chandler could be, which is still everything he’s not. It’s passion - which Chandler sometimes had, and urgency, which he certainly didn’t have.

When Wallace was Chandler’s age, he was wrapping up a Division II basketball career at Virginia Union. His NBA future was like the prospect of a Woody Allen flick shot in a weight room. It wasn’t even a consideration. Whereas Chandler was made by others, famously traded for, and had hope fastened to his freakishly athletic frame from the second he stepped onto the Berto Center floor, Wallace made himself.

Chandler’s gameday attitude often remained a mystery, whereas Wallace’s is all you can count on.

The Bulls over the last two years have been a team of intriguing pieces without a discernable identity. The likely leading scorer on a given night? Could be one of a handful of players.

They are a puzzle where the perimeters are in place but the middle is still muddled. Scott skiles thus must piece it all together differently each night based on the way the players fit, and who can hit shots, and wait for a solution to present itself.

And it’s a maddening thing, particularly when the playoffs are on the schedule. NBA teams always have their hot shooter, but they live and die with the one or two players that inevitably take the big shots. The Bulls take half the game to decide just what the mix will be for that night, who will be the savior, who is just off, who will be the energy guy, who might take over. They’re a pile of solid ingredients that can make 20 different dishes.

It’s time they specialize in just one.

So call Ben Wallance the flour. The eggs. Whatever. He’s the one that is always in there, and he’s no garnish. Wallace fills that role because he is remarkably limited but incredibly dependable. On a team with so few sure things from game to game, he is an anchor that the others can cling to as they define their own careers.

And it’s time they did.

John Paxson is smart to grab a core player that doesn’t demand the ball. The Bulls have enough scoring — if not a scoring star — and need instead to find a regular rhythm. They are dangerous because they are hard to scout for all the variables they bring, but that’s also dangerous for them, because they don’t know which variables will come to play.

Wallace always will, in a way the Bulls could have only hoped for in Chandler, and that could be the difference.

You could contend that stars still win championships, but Wallace would tell you otherwise.

He was at the center of the Pistons when they demolished the Lakers in the Finals. And though all championships have their stars, in Detroit’s case, the stardom for certain players was born of the championship, not the other way around.

The Bulls also have players ready to become stars. Kirk Hinrich was called into Team USA action last week. Ben Gordon is only the word “consistency” away from his place in the Microwave realm. Andres Nocioni is well on his way to carving a spot in the Manu Ginobli mold. Tyrus Thomas has, if not stardom, a McDyess-like look to him. Luol Deng could be a senior at Duke next year. And there are others.

And Wallace is just Wallace. Which is exactly what the Bulls need.

If if the man for whom the bell tolls does anything for this team, it should be too deepen the despair that accompanies failure. John Paxson, if he has done anything with this expensive move, has created a more profound sense of accountability, and has cooled the critics who still believe in sneaking up on people as a mantra.

And if it all merely means tears instead of consoling grins inside a locker room after a knock-out loss, for this franchise, that’ll mean something.

When Jerry Krause brought Chandler and Eddy Curry to the fold, and essentially told fans that a painful incubation was in store, the playoffs we knew were years away. When those playoffs arrived, with mostly a new cast involved, the satisfaction was apparent, but so was a lack of urgency.

Paxson has effectively cut ties with that mode of thinking, and Ben Wallace is as much a symbol of urgency as he is a standard for effort.

Life of the Pity Party

It’s hard to feel for Cubs fans. At least the ones who show up.

On Sunday, Dusty Baker was forced to start Sean Marshall — a player whose only consistent professional success is at Double-A — and then watched him get pummeled. So did about 40,000 fans.

So Dusty brought in Roberto Novoa, another player with not a smidgen of pro success. Novoa got crushed.

And the Mets did the pounding, they of the best record in the National League.

So the chants started, “Goodbye Dusty,” and a legion of over-served fans enjoyed their moment of rhetorical mastery.

But you wonder, when they showed up, what did they expect? The team the Cubs fielded is vastly inferior, the pitching staff, not even close. Injuries heavily in play, it’s been that way for months.

It’s time the fans got what they deserved, which is a winner, but it’s also time they pulled their heads out of the sand and did more chanting on the outside of the stadium.

Perhaps with signs in hand, and demanding far more than merely a new manager. Dusty can’t steer this thing any longer, sure, but he’s driving a ride with flat tires.

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