Bulls thinking offense these days
For the 1969-70 season, the Bulls added a veteran forward (Chet Walker) via trade and watched one of their young players (Bob Love) make dramatic offensive improvement.
That sounds a little like the current Bulls team, which added Pau Gasol and watched Jimmy Butler's scoring average soar.
Actually, Butler's improvement is a long way from matching Love's. In his fourth NBA season, Love's scoring average went from 5.1 to 21.0 points. Butler has risen from 13.1 to 22.0 points.
Walker ended up leading the Bulls in scoring at 21.5 points per game after being acquired from Philadelphia just before the season began.
What else does that 1969-70 team have in common with the current squad? It made the biggest one-year offensive improvement in franchise history. The Bulls jumped by 10.2 points, going from 104.7 points per game to 114.9.
The current Bulls are trying to beat that mark, moving from 93.7 points last season - worst in the league - to 103.5 points through Saturday.
"Offensively, this is definitely the best team I've ever been a part of," Joakim Noah said after Saturday's 107-100 win over New Orleans. "Now that we're so good offensively, this is not the best defensive team I've been on, and I think it has the potential.
"Just because we're better offensively than we were in the past … we have to get better defensively, and we all have to have that belief."
In some ways, the improved offense is a happy accident for the Bulls. They pursued high-scoring forward Carmelo Anthony in free agency and struck out.
Instead, Butler has been scoring like Anthony, the Bulls added a low-post threat in Pau Gasol, and they were able to build a deep bench by signing Nikola Mirotic and Aaron Brooks, among others. The Bulls probably would have had to send guys away to create the cap room to sign Anthony.
There is a significant difference between these Bulls and the historic version. The classic 1970s lineup got better when Norm Van Lier arrived but finished just 39-43 in 1969-70 and lost in the first round of the playoffs. This year's squad has higher aspirations.
If the goal is to win an NBA championship, the Bulls are approaching things the right way.
No matter how good the defense, being the league's worst offensive team won't get it done. The highest-scoring team usually does not win the title (exception: Bulls in 1996 and '97), but championships do require some offensive competence.
Over the past 20 years, the average offensive rank of NBA champions is 8.6, with a low of 24 by the 2004 Detroit Pistons. The average rank of an NBA finalist is 9.3.
The Bulls (21-9) were seventh in the league as of Sunday morning. They've scored at least 100 points in 13 of the last 16 games and have won six in a row. They seem to be on the right track, as long as bad health is kept to a minimum.
"Six in a row is great. We're not satisfied," Noah said. "We know we have another gear."
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