Nothing in Bulls that can't be fixed
The Bulls tend to take losses hard, starting with coach Tom Thibodeau, who didn't want to hear about how his team was playing its fourth game in five nights on Thursday against Orlando.
“You're faced with a challenge every night, if you look hard enough,” Thibodeau said after the contest. “We've got to be ready to play. We got in a hole that we shouldn't have been in.”
At least they stay on the same page. Inside the locker room, Rose repeated Thibodeau's message almost word-for-word following the 99-94 loss, which snapped the Bulls' eight-game win streak.
“There are no excuses,” Rose said. “We know that we had a chance to win this game tonight and we just didn't win it. Usually in the past, that's how we get up on them, pushing the ball and making Dwight (Howard) run. That's what we didn't do tonight.”
Losing as infrequently as the Bulls have the past two seasons, the defeats serve as a shock to the system. There's obviously nothing wrong — they had a tough night against a good opponent and lost for the first time in nine games. The Bulls (33-9) stayed even in the loss column with Miami and Oklahoma City for the league's best record.
But there are some concerns. Luol Deng finally admitted that his injured left wrist has been painful in recent days. Richard Hamilton could be out for up to a month with his right shoulder injury. And Kyle Korver missed 5 open looks from 3-point range in the final 4:29 of Thursday's contest.
There's almost no chance the Bulls make a big splash and trade for someone like Howard or the Lakers' Pau Gasol.
They're also not going to trade one of their big men for an extra shooting guard. Depth is a significant asset, but moving Taj Gibson or Omer Asik would erase the depth on the front line, which is not a formula for playoff success.
Another highly unlikely move is trading one of the team's future assets — the rights to 2011 draft pick Nikola Mirotic or the future draft pick coming from Charlotte in the Tyrus Thomas trade.
There might be some ways to smooth out these rough patches. One that was displayed Thursday was more playing time for rookie forward Jimmy Butler, who had 5 points and 4 rebounds in nine minutes.
If Deng needs more rest to get his wrist right, give it to him. Maybe in the process, Butler will gain the experience he needs to help out in a playoff series against Miami.
For a 3-point specialist, the Bulls aren't going to improve on Korver. He had a rough finish against Orlando and missed some chances against the Heat last year in the conference finals, but he's still shooting better than 40 percent (. 411) from behind the arc this year.
“Kyle taking those shots, we'll live with that all day,” teammate Joakim Noah said. “Kyle getting an open look, there's no better offense than that in the whole NBA. I don't care what anybody says.”
Rose had tough shooting nights for two straight games, going a combined 14 for 44 (. 318) against the Bucks and Magic. His back may still be bothering him, but at least the schedule slows down during the next few weeks, with only one set of back-to-back games the rest of this month.
“Just missing shots. Just missing them,” Rose said. “It's definitely not going to stop me. I've shot worse before.
“It was kind of weird being out there not being able to hit my layups and not getting into the groove of the game. All my shots were short.”
The Bulls wouldn't mind adding some insurance in the backcourt. Before signing Mike James for the rest of the season, they may wait until the trade deadline passes next Thursday.
What they'll be looking for are players that might agree to contract buyouts and set free by their current teams. Those candidates tend to be in the final year of their deal and playing for losing teams.
Here are three candidates — Toronto's Leandro Barbosa, Cleveland's Anthony Parker and Washington's Roger Mason Jr.
Those guys wouldn't transform the Bulls into an instant powerhouse, but there's not much that's wrong right now.
mmcgraw@dailyherald.com