A few weeks ago, I wrote a piece on one possible European coaching candidate to replace Billy Donovan as the head coach of the Chicago Bulls. Although Sarunas Jasikevicius is intriguing, he’s far from the only quality international option. This time, we’ll be covering another very interesting candidate the Bulls should closely examine, and he goes by the name of Andrea Trinchieri.
Andrea Trinchieri’s offense is predicated on precision and spacing. It’s not post-up heavy, maybe because he never really had a dominant big man. Usually, it’s guard-oriented. He likes to use a three-man game on the strong side. In this case, shooting is extremely important, because you need to keep defense honest and prevent help. Sometimes, Trinchieri even likes to use a back screen on the weak side, to prevent help defense. That’s how you get the shooter open, and leave more space to play pick-and-roll on the strong side.
I think Zach LaVine, in particular, would thrive in this kind of offense. Because he would have a lot of space to operate, he’d not only have more room to shoot but would also be able to attack inside the three-point line a bit more often, where he could use his athleticism to his advantage. Or after the initial pindown in a diamond set, he could be a second recipient on the reverse ball screen and attack the basket full speed with defense in scrambles.
The same applies to Bulls two-time All-Star DeMar DeRozan. Instead of ISO situations or high pick-and-rolls, Trinchieri would put him on the wing more often, to keep the defense guessing.
Under Trinchieri’s guidance in the Bundesliga and EuroLeague, Bayern Munich wasn’t much of a high-volume three-point shooting team. In 2021, they’ve ranked dead last in threes attempted, by averaging almost 19 a game. Next year, that number went up to almost 25 a game. But both times, his team has made the playoffs.
Andrea Trinchieri makes his players better. Whether it was Wade Baldwin IV, Jalen Reynolds, or Darrun Hilliard, they all had career years under him. Two of those players were guards. He gives his perimeter players enough freedom, so I think the Bulls stars would be happy.
As the Bulls continue stacking up on European talent, perhaps an ideal head coach replacement is also waiting overseas.
On defense, he likes to switch a lot. If the big guy is not mobile enough, then he uses step-out or flat defense, but those are rare exceptions. On pick-and-rolls, most of the time his team will switch. It’s pretty common in the NBA to switch. Especially in the regular season. But it’s not just a simple switch.
Since you are putting a big man on the guard, you are creating a mismatch. The same goes the other way too, where the guard goes against the center. In this case, it’s extremely important, that the big guy could contain penetration and make a guard take a contested jumpshot.
Where it gets a bit tricky is on the glass. You can’t expect the guard to box out center. The size mismatch is simply impossible to ignore. So it’s important that the guard would box out the center as best as he can, and then the third player, whether it’s a guard or forward, jumps to the ball and then tries to tip it or grab it, depending on the circumstances. It requires multiple players’ effort, and it may take time to implement that, but throughout the season, I think a team would pick it up.
Now, even Coach Trinchieri has his flaws too. He’s sometimes too lax and doesn’t bother to call out players if necessary. Trinchieri also appears to like the additional attention his job offers. He doesn’t mind being the biggest star of the team. How that would fit in the NBA? Any coach, but especially a new one, won’t last long if he tries to be the star of the team.
That being said, Coach Trinchieri is tough as nails. He won’t succumb to demands from his players or shrivel up in the face of petty locker room feuds, like the Bulls have struggled with in the past. Regardless of their status. He is extremely smart and most importantly, he is a player’s coach. Sure, he may have disagreements and things might get a bit emotional, but that’s okay. It’s professional basketball.
At the end of the day, I’d say the possibility of him becoming an NBA coach is slim at this point in time. He would be a good NBA coach, I have very little doubt about that, but you need to have connections in the league if you want to become a head coach. Should the Bulls consider him as an assistant? Maybe. But I’m not sure that Coach Trinchieri would accept that. However, It’s worth a try, Chicago is in a dire situation and must be willing to pull out all the stops to return to prominence in the East.