Chicago Sports Review

Last week it was a sure thing, as likely as John Daley super-sizing his Big Mac or Devin Hester cruising right by a tackler. Now it’s over, with both sides saying that it just wasn’t meant to be.

It appears former Bulls coach Doug Collins will not become the next Bulls coach. After a week and a half of speculation, Collins and team owner Jerry Reinsdorf each said that it was best for both the coach and the team to go their separate ways. Collins said he didn’t want to hurt his friend Reinsdorf by making such a difficult choice, and the owner happily agreed.

So now the league’s youngest team and the owners of the number one pick in the June 26 draft is without a coach yet again. They went through two last season, Scott Skiles and Jim Boylan, and have missed out on two this spring, Mike D’Antoni and Collins. At such an important crossroad for the team it would seem important to have a guy in charge. So that is why I am here to make this important announcement:

I am offering up my services to Reinsdorf and General Manager John Paxson to be the next head coach of the Chicago Bulls.

Now before you hurt yourself laughing, let me explain my rationale. I know basketball, having nearly 15 years of experience of watching, reading and occasionally playing the game. I understand the way the league works, both from doing that same watching and reading but also by playing countless hours of NBA Live video games. And last but not least, my hiring would create about 1,000 times more buzz than a guy like Dwane Casey or Vinny Del Negro would in the barbershops, sports bars and neighborhood basketball courts of the Windy City.

Obviously I wouldn’t be able to do this alone, and I would work with Paxson to help get a smart group of assistants to assist me. It may take them a while for these assistants to comprehend that they are working for a 20-year old, but that shouldn’t be too much of a shock. Seven players on the Bulls roster are less than two and a half years older than I am, not to mention either Derrick Rose or Michael Beasley, the two rumored top picks, both of whom were born over a year after I was.

From what I have analyzed, coaching in the NBA is not extremely difficult. In football, the coach has a week to prepare a complex game plan, has 52 players to deal with, and three different units that all have to be playing perfectly for three hours in order to achieve victory. In soccer, a coach has only three substitutions to use and must make perfect switches to avoid wearing out the roster. And in baseball, a manager has so many games to work with and so many statistics to pour over that skippers tends to out-think themselves. But in hoops, there are only 12 players, only 82 games, and not much confusion when it comes to calling plays. Do you switch on pick-and-rolls or stay with your man? Is the point guard going to try set up shots for others or look for his own points? How deep will the bench be? Not really rocket science.

Yet it seems that many coaches have confusion on some of the simple aspects of the game. So to prove my worth, here’s what I would teach my team: Let LeBron James shoot jumpers, but foul him hard if he drives to the hoop. Never leave Michael Redd open behind the three-point line. If we are up three with less than 30 seconds left, foul the opponent before they get a shot off. When Amare Stodumire has a clear lane to the basket, get out of the way to avoid being on a poster. Give the ball to the man being guarded by J.R. Smith. Save at least two timeouts for the final minutes of the game. And never, I repeat NEVER even guard Ben Wallace when his team has the ball.

Of course getting the Bulls job is a long shot, mainly because I never played in the league. I never averaged nine points a game in my NBA career like Del Negro did, never brought down five rebounds a game like Chuck Person did and never played for ten franchises like Tyron Corbin did. Then again, the lack of playing experience shouldn’t really be a factor in my coaching skills. Gregg Popovich, the head coach of the San Antonio Spurs and a four-time world champion, never stepped foot on an NBA court as a player. Neither did Jeff Van Gundy, one of the smartest coaches in the league over the past decade and current announcer of the NBA Finals, or his brother Stan, now the coach of the Orlando Magic

Plus, I am a lifelong fan of the Bulls, lived through the ultimate highs (six titles in eight years) and lows (Tim Floyd) of the franchise and even have “Sirius” by the Alan Parson Project as my cell phone ringtone. I plan on naming my first kid after Michael Jordan, regardless if it’s male or female. And to this day, I’d still probably trip John Starks if I saw him walking down the street.

So how about it John and Jerry? Won’t you give a kid a chance? With me on the bench, Derrick Rose running the point and 20,000 rabid fans at the United Center every night, we can’t lose. Heck, since I know money’s always been an issue, you can make me the lowest paid coach in the league. The move will get the casual fans talking while the diehards will be happy that one of their own will be in charge. I may not have the playing experience of some of the other candidates, but this job requires coaching defense, not playing it. I could get Ben Gordon to guard somebody, teach Tyrus Thomas to shoot a jumper and convince Kirk Hinrich that the best way to play point guard is to not turn the ball over. Hey, I know it’s a long shot. But compared to the sure things the Bulls had earlier this spring, I can’t be that bad of a choice.

Tags: Chicago Bulls, Doug Collins, head coach, Jerry Reinsdorf, Mike D'Antoni

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 8th, 2008 at 10:01 am and is filed under Bulls. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.