The Chicago Bulls have a new head coach in Billy Donovan who takes over from Jim Boylen. Though Donovan showed he could turn things around for a struggling team like the Oklahoma City Thunder, former Bulls player Scottie Pippen is far from impressed.
Pippen knows what it takes to win. It all starts with a good coach. For his part, he had that luxury with Phil Jackson and playing alongside Michael Jordan. But based on how he was talking in a report from Forbes, it appears that Donovan is nowhere near what Jackson had done for the Bulls during his prime.
"If you’re looking at it from a fan perspective, I’m not impressed with what they did," Pippen said. “I like Billy Donovan as a person but I don’t think he’s proved anything in the NBA that proves he’s worth investing in and bringing a team up that needs help like Chicago does."
Pippen knows the history of Donovan. Although he has led the Thunder to the playoffs in the five years he was at the helm, the 55-year-old coach managed to go beyond the first round only once.
Aside from that, Pippen pointed out how Donovan had at his control Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant. Despite having two NBA MVPs in tow, OKC still came up short of winning the NBA title. Donovan owns a 243-157 win-loss record in the five seasons he was calling the shots for the Thunder.
For Pippen, Donovan hardly fits the x-factor that the Bulls are looking for. Though he is no longer part of the Bulls brain thrust, winning is what Pippen is more concerned about. For him, the choice of vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas is unlikely to fly.
"[The Bulls are] a team that has been struggling for a long time. To me, I don’t see the value he brings to them. He’s going to be a coach but there are a lot of them out there. He didn’t do anything special in OKC that warranted him a second opportunity. That’s just my opinion," Pippen said.
Pippen’s swipe at the Bulls is understandable. Some may side with him while others may not. It is not far from his comments on the NBA bubble, calling it nothing more than “pickup basketball” in an interview with Business Insider.
"Well, I'm going to be honest. It's not NBA basketball. It's not the hard grind. It's not the travel. It's not the fans. It's not the distractions. Really, to me, it's pickup basketball. It's going to the gym. Yeah, you already got your team. Y'all practicing together. But it's a more of a pickup type of basketball game, because there's no fans in the stands. So there is no distraction. There's no real noise. There's no pressure on the players, you know. Prime example: I looked at Rondo. Rondo ain't made three pointers in his whole NBA career. Now, all of a sudden, he's in a bubble, he's probably a 50% three point shooter. I haven't even checked the stats," Pippen’s statement read.
