With the NBA season past its halfway point and beginning to come down the home stretch, now is a good time to start looking at some players who could be in the running for some form of awards at season’s end. The Chicago Bulls aren’t playing all that well of late, losing eight of their last nine games following their April 2 road loss to the Utah Jazz.
Still, the end of the regular season is in sight, and this team has improved greatly since last season. The rebuild got a jolt in the past calendar year thanks to the addition of the trio of executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas, general manager Marc Eversley, and head coach Billy Donovan.
With this in mind, here’s a look into three Bulls players who could be awarded this season.
Chicago Bulls Award Candidates for the 2020-21 season
Before we get into this, let’s take a moment to look back on the season so far. The Bulls hold a record of 19-28 following their April 2 loss to the Jazz. They’ve started to slip in the Eastern Conference standings of late but still remain in the playoff picture at this point of the season.
Thaddeus Young – Sixth Man of the Year
While Thaddeus Young has begun to start for the Bulls this season, league rules state that you have to come off the bench in at least half of your teams games to be considered eligible for Sixth Man of the Year. So far this season, Young has came off the bench in 33 of 41 games, so as of this moment he is eligible for the award.
And if coach Donovan decides to move him back to the bench for any reason, he would only need to come off there 3 times to qualify for the award at the end of the season.
Looking at his on-court production, Young is a lot different to other conventional sixth men. Unlike the Jordan Clarkson’s or Montrezl Harrell’s, Young isn’t a scoring bench player, but rather a swiss army knife who can do it all for the Bulls.
Averaging 12.2 points, 6.5 rebounds and 4.4 assists this season, he gives the team a little bit of everything either off the bench or in the starting lineup. More specifically, his passing ability has been especially useful for the Bulls, considering they have been crying out for a secondary ball-handler outside of star shooting guard Zach LaVine (even going as far as to insert Tomas Satoransky into the starting lineup at the expense of Coby White).
In reality though, the odds of Young winning this award are a massive long shot, but to even be nominated for it would do justice to what am excellent job he has done for this team this season.