Jul
8
NBA summer league play kicked off Monday afternoon with who else but the number one and two picks of the 2008 NBA Draft — Derrick Rose of the Chicago Bulls and Michael Beasley of the Miami Heat — facing off at the RDV Sportsplex in Orlando.
While the game was not televised and only accessible via various “live blogging” streams, Beasley reportedly stood out as he dominated Chicago ’s second-year forward Joakim Noah and third-year enigma Tyrus Thomas for 28 points in 23 minutes during the Heat’s 94-70 walloping of the Bulls (clearly picking up where last season started and ended).
As for Rose, all accounts portrayed his performance as being erratic, scoring 10 points on 3-of-8 shooting while accounting for 4 assists and a more dubious 5 turnovers (a game high).
While it’s clear that Beasley was the star in the debuts of these intriguing rookies, Chicago fans should not get a case of revisionist history at this point and start panicking that beleaguered General Manager John Paxson made the wrong selection less than two weeks ago when choosing the hometown Rose with the top pick in the draft.
While Beasley will challenge Portland’s Greg Oden for Rookie of the Year and put up better statistics than Rose, the NBA is quickly becoming a game dominated by the point guard position, where there is a much higher learning curve but also a much higher reward.
Rose is only 19 years old and will go through his fair share of lumps, as his reported nerves demonstrated today; however, imagine his potential to control games for years to come once he catches on in the league, whether that be at the end of his first year, the middle of his second year or even during his third year.
What today’s game showed more than anything is that Paxson would be foolish to go into next season with the front line as currently assembled. The Bulls have plenty of pieces to trade in order to get an established big man and it’s time to package Thomas’ potential before this guy busts out at the end of next season and his value is not as highly perceived around the league.
Sure, Thomas has all of the physical attributes in the world to be an elite player, but he doesn’t have the mental toughness, basketball smarts or tenacity to be a consistent presence game in, game out. Unfortunately, Thomas’ tantalizing athleticism will always leave fans with great expectations and wanting more.
At this point, Chicago has a glut of players with decent trade value (Thomas, Kirk Hinrich, Andres Nocioni, Ben Gordon, Luol Deng, Drew Gooden and his expiring contract) and a player in Larry Hughes (bloated contract) who must go but will reportedly be hard to move.
While no one on Chicago (with the exception of Rose) should be untouchhable, the Bulls would be best to move Thomas, Hinrich and either Nocioni or Gooden for some semblance of a guy who could score in the post. Who that player is at this point is anyone’s guess…if the Bulls were shrewd, they should have been rectifying a past mistake and pursuing Elton Brand in a massive sign-and-trade, but that is obviously not going to happen.
But the Bulls are being the Bulls — standing pat until the contract situations with Ben Gordon and Luol Deng are settled and missing out on truly making a major splash this off-season after lucking into the Rose pick.
chris@hoops4thesoul.com
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