Baffoe: We And The Bulls Need A Break
By Tim Baffoe--
(CBS) Just get to the motel.
The Clear Your Head Inn. The Welcome Break Hotel. Whatever roach shack you want to name the All-Star break that the Chicago Bulls so desperately need right now, use it.
This team is a family vacation in a rickety station wagon with a rogue balogna sandwich that found its way to that unreachable section under the back seat. And the stink is unbearable right now.
Most of us who watch this team would probably agree that a vacation from observing the team would be pretty welcome, too. Watching the Bulls -- losers of 12 of their last 17 and now just 1.5 games clear of the ninth-place Hornets in the East -- has become work, and we need a long, free weekend.
Because nobody in the car likes each other. The vein at coach/dad Fred Hoiberg's temple is visibly pulsing in sync with the dribble-up "De-FENSE" music the opposing arena plays after the home team just walked through the Bulls' tissue paper defense for an easy layup.
"At some point, this is who we are,'' Pau Gasol told the Tribune, sighing from the shotgun seat after losing to Michael Jordan's perpetual construction Charlotte Hornets on Monday, 108-91.
He wasn't exactly referring to this road-weary family with Tony Snell covered in sticky melted ice cream and Doug McDermott moaning that he really has to pee. But he kind of was.
"There's no mystery," Gasol said, according to the Tribune. "The results speak for themselves, and there's a situation we're dealing with. How do we face it? Do we accept it, do we embrace it or do we try to improve and change it? This is who we've been for the last year and a half or so. I feel when we are full throttle and the guys are available, we can be as good as anyone.''
Meanwhile, older siblings Derrick Rose and Jimmy Butler are doing their own things, eyes glazed on separate phone screens and with earbuds snugly tuning out the whole quest for family bonding and fun. Rose sat out this mile's singalong Monday night with "general soreness," while Butler is recovering from a sprained knee and big Denver Broncos win.
Gasol's right, though, on his last point. For as laborious as watching the Bulls has been in the new year, it's a beaten-up team as much as a beaten one. With a relatively healthy lineup (we know Joakim Noah isn't coming back, but when playing in 2015-'16, he was amid his worst season as a pro anyway), they can be relatively respectable in an Eastern Conference that still doesn't scare anyone.
So just get to the break. Park the station wagon for a weekend and maybe run a vacuum through it. And gas up, because this team is physically on empty right now.
"Four games in six days in four different time zones," father Hoiberg said Monday night about the end of a disastrous 2-5 road trip that saw the Bulls blow three games late. "That's tough. It took a toll on our guys. "
The needle is past warning-light conditions psychologically, too.
"We lost that game in the first quarter," Hoiberg said with that face that disappointed dads show in public while screaming on the inside. "They were comfortable out there. They scored 38 points on us. We dug ourselves that hole and it's hard to climb out."
In other words, "For the love of God, why did I marry this team and have kids? Is this the best I'll ever do? Telling Cameron Bairstow's headband it needs to be ready for serious minutes?"
Maybe the second leg of the marathon season nightmare ends in ironic happy fashion a la a National Lampoon movie I've tried not directly mentioning during this extended metaphor. That wouldn't be winning the East. Oh hell no. Even that franchise of films always ends in pyrrhic victory at best.
But "happy" would be better than 1.5 games above missing the playoffs, as the Bulls sit at the moment. The sudden panic of seeing Chicago that low in the standings is a cute bolt of energy in fans who right now will take feeling anything, even shock, over ennui. But everyone is lying to themselves if they believe this is where the Bulls stay or even continue to sink for the duration.
There's enough talent here that can keep the tires just inflated enough to be mediocre enough to maybe have home court in at least one playoff series. Butler, Gasol, a solid Taj Gibson and one of the few joys to watch on this team, Bobby Portis, can still create a net positive in this season despite a Nikola Mirotic who has been the opposite of expectations and Snell and McDermott seeming to be busts of draft picks.
It's a lot of theoreticals, and much of it is wishful thinking, but turning the car around and going home isn't a viable option.
Just get to the break. This team needs rest, physical and mental. The rest of us who choose to watch them probably do, too.
