Luol Deng’s steady-as-a-metronome scoring last season helped him reach double figures in 78 of the Bulls’ 82 games. When Deng let fly with an open mid-range jumper, the surprise came when he missed.
Ben Gordon scored more than 20 points 53 times last season, surpassed 30 on 15 occasions and topped 40 three times. When he failed to make an offensive impact is when he stood out.
Kirk Hinrich shot a career-best 44.8 percent last season and played so well on defense that NBA coaches picked him second-team all-defense. Rare was the game he didn’t contribute on at least one end.
As the Bulls have struggled to an 0-3 start, their so-called core is getting torched defensively and turning the ball over with shocking consistency. Worse, all three players look lost and appear to lack confidence on offense.
“Well, then, you print that,” coach Scott Skiles said. “I didn’t say that.”
Agreeing with at least the lost part, Hinrich did.
“We aren’t playing with any kind of composure on offense,” he said. “We’re helter-skelter. We need to do a better job of playing together and moving the ball. It seems like we’re rushing a lot. The more we miss, the more we rush.”
The Bulls are going nowhere fast offensively. They’re shooting 37.8 percent, a major contributor to the poor start. There’s more than enough blame to go around. But plenty of it rests with Deng, Gordon and Hinrich, who own 31 of the Bulls’ 51 turnovers.
Gordon is averaging a team-high 22.3 points but is shooting just 38.6 percent and 34.8 on three-pointers.
“There are nights in the NBA when you can’t buy a bucket,” Gordon said. “But you have to do something to get yourself going, whether it’s transition baskets or getting to the line.”
Deng is next at 13.3 points, but he’s shooting a very uncharacteristic 42.5 percent, far below his career mark of 48 percent.
“If I’m open, I’m going to shoot it,” Deng said. “But I need to try to find a way to get easy baskets to get going. All my shots are long. I just need to take more [practice] shots and look at what I’m doing wrong.”
It’s impossible not to wonder if Deng’s and Gordon’s struggles are related to their decisions to turn down multimillion-dollar contract extensions and their mention in frequent Kobe Bryant trade rumors. “The contract and the trade rumors, I try to focus on my game,” Deng said. “I don’t want to blame me struggling on something like that.”
So how do they fix the offensive woes?
“We have to move the ball even better,” Deng said. “We have to get each other better shots. We have to create for each other. Right now, we’re trying to create for ourselves too much. We’re not that type of team. We’re better with ball movement.”
The Bulls had Sunday off. Players went to the Berto Center for shooting anyway. It’s a start.
“It’s not going to get any easier, and nobody is going to feel sorry for us,” Hinrich said.
