Anthony Davis and Pelicans Fall Hard to Bulls

February 8, 2015 @ admin → No Comments

Sunday smorgasbord: Well, what do you know? The Chicago Bulls can handle the New Orleans Pelicans. Especially when Pelicans star Anthony Davis sits out the second half because of shoulder injury (suffered on a second-quarter dunk). But, hey, at this point the Bulls will take what they can get. Which Saturday night was a 107-72 road victory.

Video below from Maxim magazine of the lovely Joanna Krupa.

* Reserve Tony Snell led the Bulls — in minutes played (29). Well, with the exception of Jimmy Butler, who played 34 minutes. Apparently Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau believes it’s an NBA rule that he must select one specific player to lead the team in minutes played for at least 95 percent of the team’s games — and Butler is the guy, having replaced Luol Deng since the latter was traded last season.

* Speaking of Snell, he came one field goal shy of leading the team in scoring. He had 19 points, while starters Pau Gasol and Derrick Rose each scored 20. Snell made 5-of-6 three-point attempts. Whether his effort will give him meaningful minutes in Sunday’s game at Orlando should be known soon (provided that you’re reading this before the contest against the Magic).

* Speaking of starters logging the most minutes, Rose and Gasol each played 28. Gasol also had 15 rebounds, three blocks and four assists. Rose also had four assists and only two turnovers. Break out the champagne. OK, club soda, maybe?

* Speaking of playing time, Doug McDermott had some for the Bulls and scored nine points in the final four minutes, going 3-for-3 from the field (including a three-pointer). Which means, of course, if he had played all 48 minutes of the game, he would have had 108 points. OK, maybe not. Points-per-48-minutes are pretty much meaningless, although occasionally entertaining.

* Speaking of McDermott, his performance may encourage Thibodeau to use him in the waning minutes of any game the Bulls are winning by more than 25 points. At some point (when the team is not up or down by that many points), McDermott needs to show he can perform in the NBA like a first-round draft pick. A successful first-round pick. Probably won’t be Sunday against Orlando, though.

* If you want to see one of the better passes of the season, check out Nikola Mirotic setting up an E’Twaun Moore dunk (video below).

* Rest in peace, Billy Casper. The golfing great, who died Feb. 7 at his home in Utah, was 83. If you don’t know who he was, look him up on the internet. Of all his accomplishments, perhaps his greatest came off the golf course. He and wife Shirley, whom he married in 1952, had 11 children — with six of them adopted.

* A baseball note: With the White Sox saying goodbye to Dayan Viciedo, the outfielder/third baseman may be of interest to a few teams. Among those who conceivably would sign him are San Francisco, Philadelphia, New York Yankees and Sox American League Central rival Detroit. The Tigers could use a right-handed power bat with Victor Martinez likely to miss at least spring training because of surgery. Some of us would like to see Viciedo sign with the Tigers if for no other reason than to see what sort of greeting Sox fans would give hime when Detroit visits U.S. Cellular Field.

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