Chicago Bulls: Next head coach needs to create a winning culture

The Chicago Bulls need to find a head coach who can establish a clear personality and identity for the franchise moving forward.

When Jim Boylen was relieved of his duties as head coach of the Chicago Bulls, he took with him more than just his own controversial track record. Like it or not, he also took what little identity this Bulls team has with him as well.

Say what you want about Boylen’s style, you can’t deny he created a strong personality for this team. His old-school defensive mentality combined with his even more traditionalist coaching style may not have been a good fit for the Bulls, or any modern NBA team for that matter, but it was still something you could count on.

With Boylen at the helm, you knew this was going to be a team that was pushed to chase every loose ball and relentlessly hound people on defense. In Boylen’s perfect world, his team was going to be like a Patrick Beverley cloning experiment gone wrong. All-out defense, chuck some threes, and then just grit your teeth and do it again.

Boylen should have been the head coach that shaped this team of young players into the kind of squad that had the fortitude necessary to become real playoff contenders, even if they weren’t necessarily the most talented team in the league.

As we all know, that didn’t happen though.

On the opposite end of the coaching spectrum was Boylen’s predecessor, Fred Hoiberg. Unlike the punch-the-clock mentality that Boylen literally installed in Chicago, Hoiberg was much more soft-spoken. Depending upon who you ask, specifically if you happen to have Jimmy Butler on speed dial, Hoiberg may have taken that approach too far however.

Hoiberg didn’t have even a hint of the abrasive side that a Boylen or even a Tom Thibodeau had. Instead, he had a modern approach to the game similar to that of the Golden State Warriors. He was all about playing with high-tempo and launching open threes.

In other words, Hoiberg should have been the coach the transitioning Bulls needed to bring them into the modern NBA once and for all. Hoiberg should have been the coach that helped the Bulls look like a team that an attention-grabbing free agent might want to play for.

As we all know, that didn’t happen either.

That brings us to where the Bulls are at today. They’re back looking for a head coach who can install the kind of system and culture that can attract big-name free agents and grow developing young players into legitimate all-stars.

They need a head coach who can accomplish what neither Boylen nor Hoiberg could with a team that’s likely going to look awfully similar to the ones those former coaches were familiar with. The questions this raises are then obvious.

How will this time be any different? How can Bulls fans be comforted by the thought of a new head coach when the past two hires have only wrought failed concepts of what this team could be?

The answer lies primarily with the Bulls new management. Executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley need to pay close attention to the mistakes that their infamous predecessors in the front office made in order to pick the right person for the job.

It’s up to them to evaluate the available coaching candidates to find someone who can strike the right balance between the wildly conflicting styles that Boylen and Hoiberg brought to Chicago. Someone who can take a young group of players lacking identity on the court and firmly guide them into becoming a real NBA playoff team that could reasonably attract a major free agent to the Bulls for the first time in years.

It’s a lofty goal for a team that’s toiled at the bottom of the standings for this long, but one that’s necessary considering the impending conflux of cap space and high quality free agents available to the Bulls in 2021.

Even if this new head coach fails in getting this team into the playoffs though, his most important task will be to create a culture for this franchise that can become a template for how to get them there in the future once they get more help. More than anything, that’s perhaps the biggest key the Bulls have been missing for so long under their last coaches.

If Jerry Reinsdorf’s new front office can find a coach who can help erase some of the unpleasant parts of the Bulls recent history and make this franchise feel like one that can succeed in the next decade, then that would likely go further than any new draft pick or emerging all-star ever could in finally convincing a star free agent to make Chicago his new home.

Simply put, If Karnisovas and Eversley have truly learned from the mistakes of the past, the start of a bright new future for the Bulls could begin with their head coaching search this offseason.