Chicago Bulls Talk: Aaron Brooks Will Have Impact
By Paul Steeno
The high profile additions of Pau Gasol, Nikola Mirotic and Doug McDermott have taken some of the thunder away from the Bulls adding point guard Aaron Brooks to the roster. Yes, he is a third string point guard, but no, he isn’t some scrub that the Bulls picked off the street and gave a uniform. Brooks has prolific scoring ability, and has shown throughout his long career that he can carry the burden offensively for a team at times. The Chicago Bulls finished dead last in points per game last season, so the addition of yet another scorer boosts the team’s chance of righting their biggest weakness from a season ago.
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For those that don’t know, Brooks was brought into Chicago primarily as a safety net in case his injury prone teammates above him on the depth chart live up to their reputation. He is a third string point guard—on every other NBA team this would make him irrelevant. But, think about this for a second, throughout his career Brooks has served major roles on his former teams. Seven times during his career he has averaged more than 20 minutes per game, overriding the claim that he is a low impact bench player. The only reason he clearly resides as the number three point guard in the rotation with Chicago is the fact that he plays behind a former MVP (Rose) and an NBA veteran that has earned the complete trust of Coach Thibodeau (Hinrich).
Oct 6, 2014; Chicago, IL, USA; Chicago Bulls guard Aaron Brooks (0) shoots the ball against Washington Wizards center Kevin Seraphin (13) during the second half at the United Center. The Washington Wizards defeat the Chicago Bulls 85-81. Mandatory Credit: Mike DiNovo-USA TODAY Sports
The fact of the matter is that Brooks can flat out play. It isn’t even an instance of a player on the tail-end of his career looking for one last chance at a championship.Brooks has enjoyed success within the last couple seasons. He is a small, lightning quick point guard that can provide instant offense coming off of the bench. He is like a second version of Nate Robinson…except Brooks willingly distributes the ball to his teammates. He probably won’t pose when going in for a layup like Nate did; but, you can be assured that he will provide energy inducing offense when this team needs scoring.
The Bulls preseason opener substantiate my claims about Brooks. Aaron had 6 points on two made three point shots. Although his shooting percentage was an ugly 2-7, he showed Nate Robinson-like flashes throughout the game. Right now, he is an unharnessed talent that visibly looked uncomfortable in the Bulls new system. As he continues to learn the ways of the Bulls, expect his production to amplify. There were times during the 2012-2013 regular season where I wanted to strangle Nate (dramatic but it hammers home the point ) because of his idiotic shot selection. But, as the season progressed, Nate found his role within the offense and learned how to balance shooting with running the offensive sets as a point guard. When the games started to matter, Nate Robinson pulled through. I expect a similar learning curve for Brooks.
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Here are Brooks’ career stats. As you can see, this man clearly has a knack for scoring the basketball.
| Player Averages | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Player | G | GS | MPG | FG% | 3p% | FT% | OFF | DEF | TOT | APG | SPG | BPG | TO | PF | PPG |
| Carlos Boozer | 6 | 6 | 31.0 | ||||||||||||
| Luol Deng | 6 | 6 | 36.2 | ||||||||||||
| Derrick Rose | 6 | 6 | 31.5 | ||||||||||||
| Jimmy Butler | 6 | 6 | 31.3 | ||||||||||||
| Taj Gibson | 6 | 0 | 25.7 | ||||||||||||
| Mike Dunleavy | 6 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Joakim Noah | 6 | 6 | |||||||||||||
| Kirk Hinrich | 6 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Nazr Mohammed | 6 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Erik Murphy | 2 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Marquis Teague | 2 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Mike James | 2 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Tony Snell | 4 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Team Averages | 6 | 0 | |||||||||||||
| Opponents | 6 | 0 |
Further increasing Brooks’ chances of being successful with his new team is the fact that the Chicago Bulls have developed a reputation for resurrecting the careers of irrelevant point guards. I mean, who had heard of John Lucas III before he came to the Chicago Bulls and hit that shot over LeBron? An even better example than Lucas III is the case of DJ Augustin, a player that most fans remember from a season ago. Augustin’s career had come to a virtual roadblock during the 2012-2013 season when he had a disastrous year playing for the Indiana Pacers. The following season with Toronto, Augustin fared even worse and some people began to question his future in the NBA. After the devastating loss of Derrick Rose to another major knee injury, the Chicago Bulls picked up DJ Augustin off of waivers on December 13, 2013. Augustin thrived under the Chicago Bulls system; his play coupled with the leadership of Noah and Thibodeau were major factors in the amazing season the Bulls had that year considering the circumstance. Augustin was a finalist for NBA Most Improved Player of the 2013-2014 season.
Just because I’m feeling nostalgic and this was one of the best plays in the history of the Chicago Bulls (joking but not really), lets take a quick look at that shot over Lebron James. Really though, although the fade-away over LeBron will always be how little John Lucas is remembered, he was still a productive player with the Chicago Bulls during his brief stay in the windy city. During the 2011-2012 season, JL III averaged career highs in points and assists per game and shooting percentage. This phenomenon isn’t a one time thing for Chicago Bulls point guards either; Nate Robinson, CJ Watson and, most notably, DJ Augustin had their career completely resuscitated during their time in Chicago.
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Back to the topic. Many of the writers here at Pippen Ain’t Easy were disappointed when the Bulls chose to forgo resigning DJ Augustin, instead letting him walk for nothing. During the off-season, DJ Augustin signed with the Detroit Pistons to a 2 year $6 million deal. Kirk Hinrich signed with Chicago for approximately the same amount of money (within a few thousand of dollars). Augustin wanted to resign with Chicago but the Bulls weren’t having it. In retrospect, this failed marriage is disappointing but I think the Bulls are still in a very good situation with Brooks taking the controls at the point guard position. Still don’t believe me? Bull’s insider Sam Smith is high on Brooks as well.
Aaron Brooks (@Thirty2zero) brings a spark to the Bulls, writes @SamSmithHoops: http://t.co/30X1DfHmdS pic.twitter.com/GseYT2jqqD
— Chicago Bulls (@chicagobulls) October 3, 2014
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As the season drags on expect Aaron Brooks to have a much bigger impact on this offense. Although re-signing DJ would have been an ideal situation, Brooks isn’t a bad consolation prize. No matter who is wearing that red, black and white uniform, Coach Thibodeau will always believe that the Bulls have more than enough to win games.