This One's For You Pax!

[mlewinth]

Wow, I disagree, I don't think the jury's still out on Beasley/Rose. No one thought Beasley was the right pick come draft day. Rose was the favorite and he has had a rookie season that puts Beasley's to absolute shame.

With regards to the Miller/Salmons trade, you have your head up your keister if you thought that trade fell in Paxson's lap. Salmons was on MANY teams radars and many teams made a effort to get him. Miller is extremely desirable too, due to his expiring contract. We got that package FOR ANDRES NOCCIONI AND DREW GOODEN. Gooden had a expiring contract, but Noch had many years left on his. Paxson pulled off the trade of the century. He got sought after players, for a mediocre player with a bad contract and an expiring contract. Pax deserves a little more credit then he is give for that. Great body of work, Pax.

 

[mlewinth]

One side note. That being said, I would like to acknowledge that Pax had a major bailout with Rose. The experiment was about to go haywire. Imagine if we don't get Rose. Deng still gets injured. Kirk is still our starting PG (who missed a big chunk of the season). This team has 30 wins without Rose. Now, I don't blame Pax for things going haywire. It all started with Wallace being a douch. Then spread to Larry Hughes, then to Deng turing into a elietest schmo, who is made of glass. Without Rose, we are scratching our head looking for answers. With Rose, we are 2 years away from being a top team in the east.

 

[Shakes]

If you're a critic of Paxson and you weren't before the 07/08 season then IMO you have no right to complain now. Most of the vocal critics seem to be the same people who thought Pax had assembled a team capable of being the Eastern champs. When it went wrong suddenly they're acting like they're Nostrodamus and knew Pax didn't have a clue all along.

 

[dougthonus]

I'm 18 and I don't see one player on there - exception of Rose - that has a confident guaranteed future in terms of Bulls regard. Did they get us into the post-season... no, if it wasn't for Rose, we wouldn't be here.

You don't seem to appreciate well where this team was the year before Paxson took over, we had averaged 18 wins for 5 years. We were over the salary cap, we had multiple cancer players on massive deals, and we had no quality talent on the roster.

In a year Paxson turned over virtually the entire roster, fixed the salary cap situation, and brought in a ton of talented players and got us to the playoffs for three straight years while keeping the team young with a window of improvement ahead.

Most of the complaints about Paxson are hindsight thinking or speculations on things he didn't do (he didn't trade for xyz) without regard for whether that thing was possible. Akin to me saying you didn't play the right lotto numbers last week, you're a loser.

There are a few legit mistakes like drafting Tyrus Thomas and paying too much for Andres Nocioni as a FA (though he turned that into a positive by moving him and gooden for Miller/Salmons). Luol Deng's contract was a mistake, but Paxson didn't negotiate that Reinsdorf and Gar Foreman did. Wallace was a mistake, but bringing him in was a Reinsdorf decision not a Paxson one.

Paxson's record over his time here is actually fairly amazing when you factor out the things that Reinsdorf did for the team beyond his control. Granted, Paxson may have agreed completely with those decisions, but we don't really know for sure.

 

[??? ??????]

mlewinth wrote:

One side note. That being said, I would like to acknowledge that Pax had a major bailout with Rose. The experiment was about to go haywire. Imagine if we don't get Rose. Deng still gets injured. Kirk is still our starting PG (who missed a big chunk of the season). This team has 30 wins without Rose. Now, I don't blame Pax for things going haywire. It all started with Wallace being a douch. Then spread to Larry Hughes, then to Deng turing into a elietest schmo, who is made of glass. Without Rose, we are scratching our head looking for answers. With Rose, we are 2 years away from being a top team in the east.

Kirk wouldn't get injured, because things would be altered, not leading to the freak injury.

Luol Deng? If not the current injury, probably something else.

 

[engies]

mlewinth wrote:

I really hope that John Paxson is enjoying every second of this series. I feel that Paxson has been an amazing GM and during last season and the begining of this season, he got RIPPED. So many assholes tried to call for Paxson to be thrown outta town. Fred and I went to a lunch with Pax a year ago and Pax looked on the verge of jumping off a bridge. I went up to him after the lunch and just said "I just want you to know, I think you have done a great job here".

You could tell the dude was effected by all the media pressure. Paxson has lost all his hair in the last year. He looks about 50 years older now, then he did 2 years ago and he always looks pissed off. He also almost had a trade deadline breakdown and resigned!

I wanna make it clear that no matter how much I have questioned the team, at any point, I have NEVER questioned Pax. Hindsight is 20-20 and I have agreed with almost all of his moves at the time the move was made. I agreed with paying Deng last offseason (for many reasons, I won't get into now....obviously hindsight is 20/20). I agreed with the Wallace signing. The only move I personally didn't agree with was Tyrus at the time, it was made (i wanted Roy or Aldridge). However, I will give Pax the benefit of the doubt because we were HORRIBLE when he took over and he had us in the playoffs within 2 years of his arrival,riding his draft pics. Those pics he made in 03-04 that made our old (so called) "core" are the same picks making a big difference in this series and in series, past. Good work Pax and lets thank the lord one more time for Rose.

Well said

I dislike the Paxson haters even if its just an opinion its the wrong one. His done so much better with what he has than any other GM IMO. & lets make it clear that Wallace was a Krause move, even Deng was a Krause move, not signing Ben was a Krause move.

Its so hard to build a good nba team or transform an ugly situation & those who hate IMO are just ungrateful arm chair GM's

On top of that his contributions as a player especially in some crucial moments (Game 6 in PHX 1993 is one of a number of them) that he deserves more respect

 

[collisrost]

As Doug is so fond of saying, Paxson always makes moves that make sense at the time. The "mistakes" he made are only mistakes in hindsight. I think Paxson has been the most sensible GM in the league over the last few years. He may be conservative, he may have stingy ownership, but you can never argue with his moves based on his situation.

 

[Ralphb07]

Newskoolbulls wrote:

If I ever met Paxson I would thank him for bringing us back to the playoffs. I never got a chance to see him play as I didnt get into basketball till late 94 but he is up there as one of my favorite Bulls. I hope he stays with this organization forever like Magic has with the Lakers.

Paxson is actually my favorite Bull player. I got to see about 3 years of his playing career but he was my favorite all time Bull

 

[Diddy1122]

Ralphb07 wrote:

Newskoolbulls wrote:

If I ever met Paxson I would thank him for bringing us back to the playoffs. I never got a chance to see him play as I didnt get into basketball till late 94 but he is up there as one of my favorite Bulls. I hope he stays with this organization forever like Magic has with the Lakers.

Paxson is actually my favorite Bull player. I got to see about 3 years of his playing career but he was my favorite all time Bull

MJ said he was his favorite teammates. I always loved watching Pax play because he always played smart, knew his role and excelled at it, and left it all out on the floor everytime. I'm sure alot of people your age are probably more familiar with Steve Kerr, but before Kerr, it was Pax making all those big 3's to win games for us.

If only he kept his wicked moustache. It was a thing of beauty.

 

[Diddy1122]

My bad Ralph, you're like the same age as me. Its too bad you got into the Bulls at a later age cuz you missed some amazing players like Brad Sellers, Dave Corzine, Quintin Dailey, and Orlando Woolridge.

Just Kidding.

 

[Kush77]

I called for Pax to be let go after this season. But i will give him credit for making the trade with Sacramento that turned this season from blah to exciting.

But there's still more to be done. If the Bulls lose tonight it would be the end of Pax's sixth full season as GM. And all the Bulls would have to show for it is one trip to the second round. Not many GM's get that much time with that little success.

 

[Diddy1122]

Kush77 wrote:

I called for Pax to be let go after this season. But i will give him credit for making the trade with Sacramento that turned this season from blah to exciting.

But there's still more to be done. If the Bulls lose tonight it would be the end of Pax's sixth full season as GM. And all the Bulls would have to show for it is one trip to the second round. Not many GM's get that much time with that little success.

Kevin McHale anyone?

 

[Dpauley23]

Tons of Gm stick around for long time. How the hell did Millen stay for like eight years?

 

[Bullsman24]

well first, paxson began with NOTHING. ZERO.

second of all, he's got a good nucleus going here. they're on the verge in the public's eyes.

third, he's reinsdorf's yes man most of the time anyway.

 

[Dpauley23]

How would you like to be gm where your owner doesn't even let you make trades. He freaking put mandate on Salmons and Miller trade saying that he had to make to 2 round because it cost Jerry money. He's made one bad deal and that was TT.

 

[B1LLIONAIREKR3W]

How in the hell some of you guys want a new GM? paxson is good for the job hes the one makeing the right picks. what we really need is a new owner kick jerry out of town! let someone whos really willing to spend money the team.

 

[kukoc4ever]

The Sacramento trade was a clear win for the Bulls, assuming that taking on those contracts does not mean bye bye Ben.

But, at the end of the day, this team was a .500 squad who made the playoffs b/c they are in a bad conference and got knocked out in the first round of the playoffs by a team that was missing a MVP caliber player.

And it also goes to show how light the talent base around here really is, if Miller and Salmons could make the impact they did. Its not like either one of those guys are close to elite players at this point.

A fun playoffs series. Another humdrum, good but not great season courtesy of John Paxson.

 

[hfritz32]

You cant give Paxson credit for Rose. That was pure luck. Rose was a lucky gift that we had no buisness recieving. Some people say O, well he chose him over Beasly. No he didnt choose Rose, the people of Chicago chose Rose for him. If Rose was not the selection draftnight, Paxson would of been ran out of town and he knows it. I mean im a fan of John Paxson but I believe for all these good pieces people have gave him credit for bringing in, they have underachieved greatly. He did take a team to the playoffs which we have been missing for a long time, but the next year he also took probably the favorites to win the east and sent them back into the lottery. I know you cant blame that all on Paxson, but if you want to give him the credit for the team doing good then you have to give him the blame when the team does bad.
Overall I would still give Paxson a B for what hes done, but now with a great stroke of luck rose fallen in his lap this team needs to do a lot more than a first round playoff appearence next year for him to retain that B.

 

[anorexorcist]

Paxson is such a nice human being, every time he talks, even when it's something I've heard a million times already, I'll sit down and listen because I have that much respect for him. This year the guy finally defied expectations by proving that he doesn't fall in love with his players, trading Thabo and Nocioni, two long time cogs of the Bulls, for the two pieces that helped us get to the playoffs (Miller and Salmons).

I would also give him huge credit on Tyrus, I don't think it was a mistake at all. By next year I honestly think Tyrus will be playing at Aldridge's level. Aldridge honestly, IMO, reached his peak last year. This year was about the same kind of production he was getting before, and I just don't see him being any better (meaning he'll just always be an 18/10 guy). Tyrus has at least 3-4 more years to improve/get to his peak and while everyone is bashing on him right now they seem to have forgotten he was a huge part of our late season run and why we got into the playoffs in the first place.

 

[dougthonus]

But there's still more to be done. If the Bulls lose tonight it would be the end of Pax's sixth full season as GM. And all the Bulls would have to show for it is one trip to the second round. Not many GM's get that much time with that little success.

Huh?

Tons of GMs stick around that long with even less success. Especially given the situation he started from.