Chicago Bulls Fire Head Coach Vinny Del Negro
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010 | Boston Celtics, Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, NBA, Sports
The Chicago Bulls fired head coach Vinny Del Negro on Monday night – it was a move long-expected (even as early as mid-December when the Bulls got off to another slow start).
GM Gar Forman and Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations John Paxson announced the move at a Tuesday morning press conference at the Barto Center in Deerfield.
Del Negro finished each of his 2 seasons as Bulls head coach with a 41-41 record. He took the Boston Celtics to 7-games in the first round of the 2009 NBA playoffs, but this season, the Bulls only won 1 game in the 1st round against the Cleveland Cavaliers. He had 1-year left on his contract.
Some of the news conference centered around John Paxson’s actions against Del Negro following a March 30th loss to the Phoenix Suns at the United Center. Supposedly Paxson attacked Del Negro for not obeying the club’s orders to limit Joakim Noah’s minutes because of a painful, lingering foot injury. While Paxson would not go into details about the altercation, he said he wasn’t proud of his actions — “I’m not at all proud of how I handled the situation. I felt that at the time, I was representing and standing up for a policy that we had put in place. I felt that way, but I was wrong in how I handled it.” While it’s great that he apologized to Del Negro, it still leaves a lot to be desired and even begs the question as to whether Paxson should still be in the organization.
Right from the start, the Del Negro era had a bad feel to it.
It is an important time for the Bulls organization. Derrick Rose is a superstar in the making, and Joakim Noah is emerging as a star in his own right. Luol Deng, Kirk Hinrich and Taj Gibson provide a good supporting cast, but if the Bulls can add one of the big free agents on the market this summer — Lebron James, Dwayne Wade, Chris Bosh, Amare Stoudamire, Joe Johnson, Carlos Boozer, David Lee — then they would instantly become one of the favorite teams in the weak Eastern Conference. Landing the big name free agent and finding the right head coach to take them to the next level will be keys to the future success of the franchise. Forman and Paxson will look great if they make the right moves over the next few months. If not, each could be looking for a job by 2011…
