They don’t shoot very well, hitting just barely more than 42 percent of their shots, which is as poorly as NBA teams shot almost 40 years ago.
The average shooting percentage in the NBA hasn’t been lower than that since 1961.
But their opponents shoot worse, just 38.6 percent, and they average just more than 82 points per game, which is what the scoring average was in the early 1950s before the NBA introduced the 24-second shot clock.
Their games are slow.
They don’t push the ball for fast breaks because they don’t have their best ballhandler from last season.
They may be the most boring team in the NBA.
Yes, that well could be the introduction for the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Except it’s also a description of the Bulls, who head to Cleveland Tuesday.
Have the Bulls become the Cavaliers?
Without Scottie Pippen, it’s beginning to look like it.
The Bulls, who led the league in scoring the last two seasons, never have averaged fewer than 103 points per game in winning a title. This season they are averaging just 89.5 points per game, which ranks 22nd in the NBA.
They have yet to score 100 points in a game and, if not for overtime, would have scored less than 80 in two of their six games.
Their shooting, better than 50 percent when they won their first two titles in 1991 and 1992 and never lower than 47.3 percent in winning a title, is a pathetic 42.5 percent this season, 23rd in the league.
Poor shooting is becoming a leaguewide epidemic and the Bulls are chief among those contributing to the malaise.
It’s not impossible to play interesting, fast-paced basketball.
Heck, even the Miami Heat is averaging more than 100 points per game this season and shooting better than 48 percent.
But, overall, no matter the changes the league continues to make to speed up the game, scoring and shooting continue to decline.
Shooting averages are down to 44.2 percent, the lowest since the late 1960s and has been in decline almost every year for the last 10.
Last season, teams shot 46.5 percent and averaged 96.9 points per game, the lowest average point total per team since the second season of the shot clock in 1955-56.
This season teams are scoring 94.5 points per game, threatening the shot-clock low of 93.1 per game set in 1954-55.
Many reasons have been postulated the last decade as scoring has decreased since 1988-89, when it was 109.2 per team.
There has been the influx of college underclassmen, many of whom have poor fundamentals. There has been the increase in three-point attempts. The result, say many, is a loss of the easier, midrange jump shot. Some even blame the TV highlight shows that feature mainly dunks and three-pointers, so young players don’t work on anything else. There’s the two-man-game offenses. And there’s the coaches’ explanation: They teach better defense. This doesn’t fool everyone.
“Coaches want to say the lack of points is because the defense is better,” said Pacers coach Larry Bird. “But it’s because the teams are watered down (with) guys moving from place to place.”
All of it, of course, produces bad and boring basketball, to which even the Bulls have fallen victim.
And then there are the teams that have made massive changes in their lineups and have yet to adjust to one another, helping explain their uneven performance.
Yes, meet the Cleveland Cavaliers.
“We are going to push the ball and play aggressive,” said former SuperSonic Shawn Kemp, leading the Cavaliers in scoring at 25 points per game.
And what do you know, the Cavaliers are running, considerably more than the Bulls, for example.
They just miss all their layups.
“You don’t see Mike (Fratello) making six calls a game,” said former Magic coach and now Celtics scout Richie Adubato.
Fratello, of course, was the coach who perfected slowdown basketball in the NBA with his Cavaliers the last two years.
That all has changed.
They’re fast-breaking now. But their only legitimate point guard is rookie Brevin Knight. And they have five new starters with Kemp, Wesley Person, Derek Anderson and Zydrunas Ilgauskas to go with Knight or Bob Sura.
“They’ve put a lot of energy on the floor,” Fratello said. “But as far as being where we have to be, we’re not even close. We have a long way to work. We need to iron out some things, because right now it doesn’t look very good out there all the time.”
Just like the Bulls.
