Long Overdue (Bulls edition)

Again, even though I KNOW no one follows this blog, here's what I got for...Da Bulls [insert SuperFans here].

Derrick Rose....that's all you need to say. So what if we lucked out with the #1 pick with only a 1.3% chance of getting it. Call it destiny. The kid grew up in Chicago, won 2 state titles in Chicago at Simeon HS, you'd think he was bound to end up on the Bulls. In that 2006 Class AA State Title game (which I watched in its entirety by the way), Rose as a junior hit the game-winning floater lay-up in overtime for the win over Peoria Richwoods, 31-29. Some beat writers around Chicago were calling for a shot clock in high school basketball, but I just kept thinking: I just witnessed probably one of the best high school basketballs games I will ever see, and they want to change that? It still surprises me that I actually know EXACTLY where I was when I was watching it.

But on to his pro career. For a short moment, I thought the Bulls would take Michael Beasley out of K-State, simply for the fact that the guy could flat out score inside, which is what we desperately needed. But then it was...Why would I DO that?! Rose, as I found out in his year at Memphis, was a 1-guard that only comes around once or twice a decade. Like the quarterback in football is often called the Field General, that's what I saw in Rose. The hometown flava only sweetened the deal, and soon after the Bulls pulled off the improbable, my hope was that Derrick Rose would end up in the Madhouse on Madison.

As it currently stands, the Bulls are 11-12, sitting in #8 seed in the Eastern Conference (and even though I drink the Kool-Aid of Chicago sports I personally would not put the Bulls in the playoffs with a losing record, but that's another blog for another day). Those loyal to Chicago, part of this record can be contributed to the annual Circus Road Trip that the Bulls take every year for the namesake Barnum & Bailey Circus that comes to the United Center every November. Why they come every year during the start of basketball season I will never know, but I see this nugget in the 2008-09 Bulls: a 3-4 trip is the best, and even the first time with more than one win, since the glory days of Jordan, Pippen, and the rest.

So aside from my man-crush on D-Rose (who is the namesake of my fantasy basketball league), I say that my Bulls definitely have some potential to make some noise in the East, despite every analyst's apparent love for the Celtics and the Cavs in the conference finals. By the way, I would like to point out that when such a unanimous choice comes from these so-called experts, I find solace and a warm feeling inside me when the opposite happens (I personally, being an actuarial science major, trust the statheads like the folks at Accuscore than I do Tim Legler, Bill Walton, Jamal Mashburn and the rest at ESPN). So what was I talking about? I swear this happens way more often than it should.....oh yeah, the Bulls chances this season not counting the sheer awesomeness of Derrick Rose. With the starting five of the freakishly athletic Tyrus Thomas, the insane, seemingly endless amount of energy of Andres Nocioni and Joakim Noah, the streak shooting Ben Gordon (although he should generally come off the bench (I give you the 2005 Sixth Man of the Year.)), you have a lot a potential, and all that's needed is a way to put it allllllll together.

I'm not going to say I'm guaranteeing a conference (or even a division) championship, but the Bulls have a Field General at the point guard for years to come who is an all-out fuckin' balla, I can't help but have slightly high expectations.