Bulls Have Worse Defensive Rank Than Last Year

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The Bulls are now ranked 19th in Defensive Rating. They finished last season ranked 18th. The Bulls have about a 1.0 better D-Rtg than last season, but they're worse relative to the rest of the league.

So in losing Ben Gordon, the Bulls not only made themselves one of the worst offensive teams in the league (Ranked 27th), but they also did nothing to improve defensively, and may be worse off defensively than the team that finished last season at a 50 win pace.

 

[clonetrooper264]

Does this have anything to do with the fact that they've been blown out 6 times in the past 8 games or something like that?

 

[TheStig]

You are taking our ratings out of context. What was our rating last year after the circus trip? We have played one of the hardest schedules to date so far.

 

[Shakes]

Also compared to this time last year, we're playing Gibson instead of Tyrus, and Hunter instead of Hughes. I know Tyrus and Hughes get/got a lot of flack, but they're both miles better than those alternatives.

But it wouldn't be bullspodcasters.com without finding a way to make it a BG thread.

 

[Fred]

TheStig wrote:

You are taking our ratings out of context. What was our rating last year after the circus trip? We have played one of the hardest schedules to date so far.

Drew No-Gooden was a starter on that West Coast trip last year, and he is one of the worst defenders I've ever seen. We didn't have Miller, our best fundamental interior defender, on that West Coast trip. We had a completely different Noah...one who couldn't run 5 minutes without needing CPR. We didn't have Salmons. We had a CBA version of Luol Deng. And we didn't have Kirk on that West Coast trip last year. He did play in 3 of the blowout losses this year on the West Coast. So, we should be ranked a lot better defensively.

 

[TheStig]

Fred wrote:

TheStig wrote:

You are taking our ratings out of context. What was our rating last year after the circus trip? We have played one of the hardest schedules to date so far.

Drew No-Gooden was a starter on that West Coast trip last year, and he is one of the worst defenders I've ever seen. We didn't have Miller, our best fundamental interior defender, on that West Coast trip. We had a completely different Noah...one who couldn't run 5 minutes without needing CPR. We didn't have Salmons. We had a CBA version of Luol Deng. And we didn't have Kirk on that West Coast trip last year. He did play in 3 of the blowout losses this year on the West Coast. So, we should be ranked a lot better defensively.

Fred, this is after our hardest stretch of the year. Of course they should be better but he isn't comparing apples to apples. That was after a whole year. If he would have showen a drating after 18 games last year it would have been much worse.

 

[engies]

It will be sad yet funny if the Bulls do end up worse off defensively just to point out to those who thought Ben was such a detriment to our defense

However I do believe that the Bulls are suffering on that end due to Kirk and Tyrus being out. Even if both aren't perfect, we can't afford to have them injured. I for one can't wait for both of them to be back. Anybody seen the latest prognosis on there return?

 

[Shakes]

I don't have the patience to work out what the Bulls defensive rank was over the first 18 games last year, but I can add up points per game and say they gave up slightly fewer over the first 18 games than the entire season. Now since most teams offense gets better as the season goes along (and hence points per position tends to go up over the year), and assuming the Bulls pace was much the same, I'd guess the theory that the Bulls defense really sucked at the start of last year and got better towards the end is incorrect.

 

[JimmyBulls]

82 games