what are we doing?

Tough being a Chicago sports fan these days. All of our teams have been dog crap for years. The Cubs will hopefully be a 90+ wins team this year. The Blackhawks are young and seemingly getting better as the season wears on. I don’t follow hockey as closely but, this seems to be the case. The Bears got the belle of the ball in Ben Johnson and that will hopefully lead to a better year in 2025. I’m not a White Sox fan and they absolutely stunk last year.

The Bulls however…what the actual **** are they doing? I can’t stand when teams have zero direction. Every one clowned the 76er’s for “the process”, but they at least had a clear vision. What is that vision for the Bulls? They don’t want to start a clean rebuild which is what they should have done at the 2024 trade deadline. But they aren’t good enough to compete for championships either. Which is what you should strive for as a sporting organization. They are just kind of meh.

At one point, they had a vision. And it was a good one. The Bulls owners finally fired GarPax and hired Arturas Karnisovas from the Denver organization. They hired Billy Donovan and as much as his tenure with OKC did not end well at all, he was a huge upgrade from Jim Boylan. They traded for Vucevic. Then the following offseason they traded for Demar DeRozan and signed Lonzo Ball. They also signed the criminally under-rated Alex Caruso.

The first 40 games of the ‘21-’22 season had many Chicago fans as optimistic as they were during the Rose years. They were 27-13 after 40 games which was number one in the Eastern Conference. Why is 40 games so significant? That was the last game that Lonzo Ball would play until he was shut down for the rest of the season. But, the Bulls weren’t just Lonzo Ball. And after 60 games, they still held onto a slim lead atop the Eastern Conference Standings. With a record of 39-21, they held a .5 game lead over the Miami Heat.

And then it all fell apart. They went on a 5 game losing streak and lost eight out of ten. They won just 7 games out of the final twenty-two. Then lost to Milwaukee in 5 games in the first round of the playoffs.

They had a plan. So, what went wrong? When it became obvious that Lonzo wasn’t coming back from his major health crisis, the Bulls front office never adjusted. He missed the entirety of the next season. Fans were left wondering what was going on with Lonzo. There wasn’t much news coming out about what the injury actually was. Which is fine because fans don’t need to be privy to that information anyway. But, the front office had to have known what was going on. Why didn’t they shift gears?

The following year, the Bulls were 40-42 in the regular season. They beat Toronto in the first play-in game and then fell to the Heat in the second one to get the 8th seed in the playoffs. The year after that, in the 2023-2024 season, the Bulls were 39-43. Beat the Atlanta Hawks in the first play-in, only to lose the the Miami Heat again to miss the playoffs.

And while I could understand not adjusting the vision the first year that Lonzo missed the entire season; why didn’t they do anything at the trade deadline the second entire season he was going to miss? They should have had an everything must go sale. It was reported that they had a trade agreed upon to send LaVine to Detroit but, LaVine opted for season ending surgery instead. But even outside of that. They should have traded DeRozan, Vucevic, Andre Drummond, Alex Caruso and anyone else that could gain assets. Now Vuc was playing like crap and wasn’t going to fetch much. But if the reports are to be believed, Drummond could have gotten a couple second round picks. Caruso may have yielded a first round pick.

Instead, they let Drummond walk for nothing in return. The Bulls did trade Caruso for Josh Giddey. And while Giddey is a nice player, Caruso is much better. You couldn’t get at least one first round pick for him? They also traded Demar DeRozan finally. For Chris Duarte and two second round picks. The seconds are ok but, you couldn’t get a first for going from DeRozan to Duarte?

At this year’s trade deadline, they finally dealt LaVine. The haul is laughable at best. The Spurs got DeAaron Fox, the Kings got LaVine and SIX total picks. The Bulls get their own pick back and three jags…or Just Another Guy as they are referred to on Inside the NBA. The sad part about the pick that the Bulls got back is that it was their own pick from when they traded for DeRozan to begin with. It was top eight protected but had they started the rebuild a year earlier, they would have kept it anyway.

It’s maddening that they had Caruso, DeRozan and LaVine and turned them into Chris Duarte (who was released btw), Josh Giddey, their own first round pick, and two second round picks. The Brooklyn Nets turned Mikal Bridges into Bojan Bogdanovic, 5 first round picks, a pick swap and a second round pick. I think it’s safe to say the DeRozan and LaVine individually are better than Mikal Bridges. And yet, you wouldn’t think so by the trades.

I know, this post comes off incredibly salty; and yes, I am salty. I was a Bulls fan even before Michael Jordan. And if it wasn’t for the Jordan years and the brief time with DRose; could you imagine how terrible the Bulls legacy would be right now? People would still be talking about the glory years of Bob Love and Jerry Sloan. It is sad that fans have a clearer vision than the people that actually get paid to do this stuff. I guess NBA 2K will just have to tide me over.

Speaking of not having a vision, All Elite Wrestling. They are struggling folks. And that is their number one problem in my opinion. What’s the vision? What are they trying to accomplish? When they first started, the accomplishment was having the right pieces to secure a tv deal. Tony Khan had the money. Chris Jericho and Cody Rhodes had the name recognition. The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega were the internet/New Japan darlings.

Then they got Jon Moxley (formerly known as Dean Ambrose in WWE) and they started to really take off. They were putting on really great television programming. There was a clear vision for where they wanted the company to go. And it got there. What happened?

Every one wants to point at the CM Punk situation as the catalyst for how far AEW has fallen but it started before that. It’s been reported that Tony Khan let the convicts run the asylum. He was too much of a friend to the few. And those few ran the yard. A guy like CM Punk needs structure. Say what you will about the WWE during CM Punk’s first run, it definitely had structure. And what about the report that Tony Khan stood on the desk in the gorilla position and chanted “CM Punk, CM Punk” over and over. While I’m sure Punk got a kick out of that, how could you respect your boss when he does that? And, how do the rest of the workers feel about that? Not to great I’m sure.

AEW had good viewership numbers before Punk arrived and then they got even higher after that. There may have been a little bit of jealousy with the Young Bucks, Adam Page, Jack Perry and others. But Tony Khan created the beast by not handling those issues from the start.

This brings us to today. AEW has lost some great talents in the last year, because it is reported that they are all disgruntled. Either they were promised some thing that didn’t happen. Or they just don’t want to be in AEW anymore. People like Ethan Page, Andrade, Miro, Penta, Rey Fenix, Ricky Starks, Malachi Black, Jade Cargill…just to name a few. There are wrestlers that you absolutely have to sign if given the opportunity. Sting, Adam Copeland, Christian, Bryan Danielson, Adam Cole, Mercedes Mone, ect. But at what expense? There was plenty of room for the WWE castoffs and the other wrestlers that helped get you to the higher viewer counts right?

So now, what is the direction of AEW? Admittedly, I haven’t watch Dynamite in a couple of weeks. I love Moxley and the Death Riders. But, what is their purpose right now? What are they trying to accomplish? The only good thing about AEW right now is the Mariah May/Toni Storm thing. Kenny Omega being back is nice as well but the May/Storm thing is amazing.

2025 will be an interesting year to see if AEW can turn it around. They won’t come close to their peak viewership counts of around 1.1 million people watching dynamite every week. Reportedly Turner Sports are happy with the 600K viewers that they average now. They must be happy since they re-signed AEW to a new tv contract. I do worry that some of those 600K viewers may start to tire of the product in it’s current state. AEW won’t fold any time soon. It would just be nice to have a product to enjoy again.