Can Thibodeau make Bulls learn to love defense?

Everything always sounds great on Day 1.

It's always optimistic and exciting, and nearly everything new Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau said Wednesday sounded - wait for it - great, optimistic and exciting.

It should since he was the best of what was out there, and therefore a good hire for John Paxson and the Bulls, light-years ahead of Vinny Del Negro.

He's a defensive genius, goes the song, but in reality the trick isn't really coaching defense. There's a lot of guys who can teach defense in the NBA.

Let's not pretend, for the love of Jerry Sloan and all that's holy, that defense is a new idea, or that Thibodeau was first to propose the theory that if the other team can't score, your team can't lose.

No, the trick for Thibodeau is getting players to love defense.

That's what the great ones do. That's just one of the reasons Phil Jackson has been so successful.

He has taken the greatest players of all time and convinced them that playing defense is fun, sexy and exciting, and that playing defense leads to transition buckets that bring the house down and get you on the highlights every night.

But best of all, he convinced them to love playing defense because that leads to winning, and winning leads to everything good in life.

And that's what this is all about.

So welcome to Chicago, Tom Thibodeau, where you have precisely one player, Joakim Noah, who loves playing defense, and that's mostly because he can't for the life of him play any offense.

Thibodeau's got some others with defensive ability, like Kirk Hinrich and Luol Deng, but their futures are up in the air, as should be their playing time.

The rest of the group will need coaching, teaching and convincing, no one more so than Derrick Rose, because if your best player doesn't love defense, or in Rose's case doesn't make the commitment to play defense, the whole notion falls flat rather quickly.

"Personnel plays a big part in it," Thibodeau admitted Wednesday, as he was introduced to Chicago. "Obviously, in Boston we had Kevin Garnett, Kendrick Perkins and Paul Pierce, and Ray Allen became a terrific defender.

"The big thing is we had great veteran leadership from Kevin, Paul and Ray. Right from the start they committed to (playing) defense."

If it sounds like Thibodeau is knowledgeable, that's because he has put in nearly two decades as an NBA assistant and has a clue, unlike the previous coach.

The first question when Paxson hired Del Negro was, "Who?" Then, "Why?" And, of course, "He was doing what?"

There are no such questions this time, so it's a big upgrade. In fact, Thibodeau already knows Hinrich's first name, something the last coach never figured out.

What not even Thibodeau knows is how he'll handle the bad times, and Thibodeau is known for being a bit of a loon when things get ugly.

Not Scott Skiles loony, but wacky nonetheless.

So in his first NBA head-coaching job, there will be some learning, but nothing like that facing the players.

Thibodeau will need the commitment - get used to that word - from the players on defense, and he'll need smarter Bulls management - which has been bad the last few years - and some big help in free agency.

If he gets all that then he can go about the job of convincing his players that they love to play defense.

And in the NBA, that is always easier said than done.

brozner@dailyherald.com

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