The Bulls are having a decent year based off off preseason expectations, but they can’t avoid the injury bug. Injuries have been a big problem all year long, and it is taking a toll on the depth of the Bulls. Patrick Williams and Zach LaVine are both out for the season, and that creates some issues for Chicago in terms of lineups.
Chicago has a consistent starting five right now that is healthy, but depth is certainly a concern. The Bulls have to put out some unique lineups, and in terms of the sixth man, it is going to have to be a team effort. The Bulls tested out Terry Taylor a little bit against the New Orleans Pelicans on Sunday, but it will be a bit of an experiment throughout the remainder of the season.
“We will probably [use the power forward by committee] moving forward,” Billy Donovan told the media on Tuesday. “With Alex [Caruso], we’re just trying to manage him. It was probably unrealistic for him to be an entire game matchup on Zion [Williamson], and obviously we needed another bigger body and wanted to try early in the game to see what Terry [Taylor] would look like. I thought he did a good job while he was in [the game]. He played well and made some good plays on both ends of the floor. So, I thought for the limited time he played, he gave us pretty good minutes. But with where we’re at with Torrey [Craig] and Patrick [Williams], and the size – whether it’s playing Andre [Drummond] and ‘Vuc’ [Nikola Vucevic] together or sometimes using Terry [Taylor] – we feel like we have a little bit of flexibility to utilize both those guys.”
It’s going to be interesting to see what the Bulls are able to do down the stretch, and hopefully they can keep everyone healthy in the process.
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