There’s been a common trend with the Chicago Bulls through four preseason games. If they’re making 3-pointers, they look like a team with potential down the line. If they’re not making 3-pointers, they’re one of the league’s worst teams.
Through four preseason games, the Chicago Bulls are looking like the Great Value version of the Houston Rockets. They’ve been taking more mid-range jumpers than Daryl Morey would like for his Rockets bunch, but the Bulls are letting the triples fly at a ridiculous rate compared to last season.
During the Bulls’ drama-filled season with the “Three Alphas” last year, the Bulls shot 22.3 3-pointers per game. That was 29th in the entire NBA.
In the first four preseason games for the Bulls, the new-look Bulls have attempted 34.75 attempts from 3-point range. Based off last season’s numbers in the NBA, that would put the Bulls second only behind … the Houston Rockets and their 40.3 attempts per game.
If you factored in their total shooting percentage from 3-point land — 51-for-139, which is roughly 36.7 percent — that would’ve been good for 12th-best in the NBA last season, compared to 25th-best where they actually were.
The Bulls have joined the modern NBA game and although it probably won’t result in a lot of wins right now, it could be the key to unlocking a promising future for the Bulls.
“It’s a new game right now — faster, everybody can shoot a 3, spread the floor,” Nikola Mirotic said during media availability before the preseason began for the Bulls.
Here’s the issue, though. The Bulls have been extremely up-and-down from deep in just a small four-game sample size for games that don’t even count.
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In the comeback victory over the New Orleans Pelicans for the preseason opener, the Bulls hit 16-of-35 shots from long range.
During the home preseason opener on Friday night against the Milwaukee Bucks, the Bulls hit 17 of their 34 attempts.
But, in the other two games, the Bulls hit just 18 of their 70 attempts against the Dallas Mavericks and the Pelicans again on Sunday.
It makes sense that the Bulls won the first two games mentioned where they shot the freakin’ lights out and lost the latter two games, doesn’t it?
There’s an old expression in basketball that goes, “Live by the 3, die by the 3.”
That’s going to be the case for the Bulls this season. In the games that they do actually win — which won’t be too many, but that’s another story — they’re likely going to get hot and shoot it well. In the games they don’t win, it’ll be as ugly as this roster looks on paper.
The upside for the Bulls is that the roster is more suited for what Fred Hoiberg wants to do. When Hoiberg’s teams were finding success in the Big XII at Iowa State with the likes of Royce White, DeAndre Kane, Georges Niang and Monte Morris, his teams showed a lot of versatility offensively with their ball-handlers and their ability to create open shots in the half-court, along with getting out and running for easy buckets at the basket.
“If our (guards) aren’t going to play fast and get us up the floor quickly, I’m going to assume they’re tired and I’m going to have to make a change,” Hoiberg told reporters after the Bucks win last Friday.”
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In the end, the bread and butter of Hoiberg’s teams were how well they’d shoot it from long range. That’s the case for the Bulls, at least so far in the preseason.