Chicago Bulls Midseason Grades: Butler shines, Wade and Rondo shrug

Robin Lopez

Stats: 28.1 minutes, 9.4 points, 6.9 rebounds, 1.7 blocks, 48.9 FG%, 67.7 FT%

Grade: B

Robin Lopez has been huge for the Bulls on the boards all season, especially offensively. He’s the main reason why Chicago is leading the NBA in rebounds, and he continues to be a force under the rim on both ends of the floor.

Chicago Bulls

On offense, Lopez is exceedingly crafty. His hook shots are a thing of beauty, a relic from an NBA of old. On defense, he’s an effective rim protector and battles well against opposing ground-bound big men.

His struggles defending in space have been well documented, so I won’t go into great detail. I will say that it’s not entirely fair to condemn Lopez for having trouble doing something that hardly any traditional centers can do, and if Lopez didn’t play as much with defenders like Rondo and Wade, we wouldn’t be hearing as much about his defensive weaknesses.

Add in the fact that he’s on a very friendly contract (if you don’t think so, look at Joakim Noah’s), and Lopez is a very good asset for Chicago. Lopez is often touted to be very moveable, and we’ll see if that turns out to be true when the trade deadline rolls around.