Area of the schedule that has been particularly cruel to the Bulls

The Chicago Bulls’ offseason has come to a standstill while they wait for a trade market to develop for Zach LaVine and Nikola Vucevic. 

The Bulls finally acknowledged that they weren’t going anywhere and started to trade off their parts, so the dream season for Chicago should include bottoming out and keeping their top-10 protected pick in the 2025 NBA Draft. 

A brutal early schedule should make that decision easier, as the Bulls could get into a quick hole that speeds up their plans and makes the teardown inevitable. 

The Bulls haven’t been done any favors by the league when it comes to scheduling over the years, as was shown in some recent data, and a quick look at the 2024-24 schedule shows more of the same. 

Chicago Bulls schedule: Back to backs 

A recent article in Hoopshype broke down how many back-to-back games each NBA team has had over the last 20 seasons and the data was interesting. 

The Chicago Bulls had the 4th-most back-to-back games in that span with 384, just behind the Pacers (386), Bucks (390) and Hawks (393). 

To put it in perspective, the LA Lakers, the team with the fewest back-to-back games over the last 20 seasons, played just 336 in that span. 

That comes out to around 2.5 more back-to-back games per season for the Bulls, which is a distinct disadvantage. 

Collecting data from several sources, teams on the second game of a back-to-back tend to win around 43 percent of the time. 

Back-to-backs can also have a significant impact on injuries, which is why so many teams use them to load manage their stars. If you are buying tickets for any game, it’s always best to check if either of the teams are on a back-to-back, as you may not see some of the stars. 

The league has tried to mitigate this by reducing back-to-backs, as the Bulls only have 13 next season (around league average) compared to 23 in both the 2010-11 and 2011-12 seasons. 

Can you think of a Bulls player who suffered a significant injury at that time? You can’t solely blame back-to-back games for Derrick Rose’s catastrophic injury, but playing that many couldn’t have helped.

After playing 81 games in his MVP season in 2010-11, Rose started missing games, playing just 39 (in a shortened season) the year after that and missing the entire 2012-13 season with an ACL injury. 

The NBA has smartly tried to reduce both injuries and players sitting out to prevent them, but 13 back-to-back games is still enough that teams are going to use them to rest their guys, so it's a problem the league will have to continue to address.