For twelve seasons, beginning in 1986-87 and ending in 1997-98, the Chicago Bulls boasted a positive efficiency differential (offensive efficiency – defensive efficiency) every year. And not surprisingly, this team was quite successful, winning 69% of its regular season contests.
Then in 1998 we saw the great exodus. Michael Jordan, Dennis Rodman, Scottie Pippen, and Phil Jackson all departed the Windy City. Over the next six seasons this franchise had a negative efficiency differential, and again not surprisingly, only won 26% of its games.
Going from Bad to Average to Good
As detailed in The Wages of Wins (the following excerpt appears on p.156 of the paperback), in 2004-05 this team had a surprising turn-around:
The 2004-05 season appeared to continue the decline. After nine games the team had secured zero wins. After nineteen contests, the Bulls record was only 4-15, a pace that would give the team seventeen wins by season’s end. At this point, the Bulls became transformed. Over the remaining 63 games of the 2004-05 season, Chicago won 43 contests, for a winning percentage of 68%. Had the Bulls played at this pace the entire season the team would have won 55 games, a total that rivaled a few teams led by Jordan. In the end, their 47 regular season wins were good enough to return playoff basketball to Chicago.
This is a great story. But let’s delve a little deeper. When we look at offensive and defensive efficiency we see that that the Bulls were not a typical 47 win team. On offense the team scored 98.2 points per possession. But on defense Chicago allowed 97.1 points per possession. With an efficiency differential of only 1.1 (98.2-97.1), the Bulls should have expected to win only 43.7 games (if you wish to see the equation, please click HERE).
This is important to note, because the next year the team only won 41 games. Dropping six games in the standings suggested that Chicago had taken a step back. But the efficiency differential of the 2005-06 squad was 0.7, which should have translated into 42.6 wins. In other words, in terms of efficiency differential, the team only declined by about one victory from 2004-05 to 2005-06. And any way you look at it, although the Bad Bulls of 1998-99 to 2003-04 had departed, Chicago from 2004-05 and 2005-06 were really little better than an average NBA squad.
Last year, though, this team took a big step forward. Yes, in the standings the team progressed to 49 victories, the franchise’s highest wins total since 1997-98. When we look at efficiency differential, though, we see an even bigger leap. The Bulls scored 102.2 points per possession while allowing 97.0 points per possession. The efficiency differential of 5.2 was better than the differential offered by the Pistons and Cavaliers. So while the Pistons and Cavaliers won a few more games, it’s not a stretch to say the Bulls last year were the class of the East (even if only by a slight margin).
Going from the Team to the Players or the Players to the Team
Wins Produced is the model that links a team’s efficiency differential back to the players. When we look at the Wins Produced of Chicago’s players over the past two years we can see why the Bulls improved.
Table One: The Chicago Bulls in 2006-07 and 2005-06
The big addition to this squad was Big Ben Wallace. Wallace posted a 0.335 WP48 (Wins Produced per 48 minutes) in 2005-06 with the Pistons. With the Bulls he was not quite as good. Still, both his 15.8 Wins Produced and 0.281 WP48 led the team. And both marks were an improvement over what Tyson Chandler offered in 2005-06 (although not over what Chandler did in 2006-07).
Beyond Big Ben, the Bulls also were bolstered by the improvement seen in the play of Luol Deng (who went from great to greater) and Ben Gordon (who went from below average to close to average).
Going Forward
One player who was added in 2006-07 that did not help was P.J. Brown. Looking back at the 1992 draft, Brown is second in this class – to Shaquille O’Neal – in career Wins Produced. So Brown has generally been very good. But now he is just generally very old. After offering only -0.7 Wins Produced last year, Brown has been let go by Chicago.
There are three candidates to take his minutes: Tyrus Thomas, Joakim Noah, and Joe Smith. Let’s start with Smith. After being taken with the number one pick in the 1995 draft, Smith embarked on a career where often he has been a bit below average. His career WP48 stands at 0.065 while last year he had a mark of 0.083. Given that average is 0.100, acquiring Smith should not make anyone that excited. Still, he is likely to be more productive than Brown.
What might make Chicago fans excited – at least if “potential” is your thing (and I argued earlier in the week it shouldn’t be, so I am not being consistent here) – is the acquisition of both Thomas and Noah. Each player came as part of the Eddy Curry trade. Given the poor performance of Curry in his career, having either one of these players would be a bit of a steal. Getting both is grand larceny (or some such term meaning more than a bit of a steal).
To see this point, consider what each did his last year in college. As a freshman in 2005-06, Thomas posted a 0.452 Win Score per-minute. Last year, as a junior, Noah posted a 0.398 mark. To put these numbers in perspective, Greg Oden had a 0.402 mark last year. Yes, I still expect Oden to be good. And yes, there is a good chance that both Noah and Thomas will develop into above average players.
Last year we saw a glimpse of this potential. In only 966 minutes, Thomas posted a 0.105 mark. Okay, that’s only slightly above average. Still, that is better than anything Curry has ever done.
With Thomas, Noah, and Smith assisting Wallace in the frontcourt, it looks like the Bulls can make another step forward in 2007-08. Of course we have to assume that Wallace doesn’t decline further (perhaps a big if). But if Wallace is steady, the Bulls should be better without Brown.
And since the efficiency differential of the team told us 54 wins in 2006-07, it looks like this team should clearly be a strong contender to win the East in 2007-08.
Can they hold off the improved Celtics, as well as the Pistons and Cavaliers (or anyone else)? Well, this is why they play the games. Still, just looking at what this roster did in the past – which is a good but not perfect predictor of the future in the NBA – Chicago fans should expect a team that surpasses 54 wins. And that means the Bulls — or Da Bulls — have returned.
– DJ
For a discussion of other teams see NBA Team Reviews: 2006-07
Our research on the NBA was summarized HERE.
Wins Produced and Win Score are Discussed in the Following Posts
Simple Models of Player Performance
What Wins Produced Says and What It Does Not Say
Wages of Wins Journal 
Ron J.
September 27, 2007
Dave (hope you don’t mind the first name),
Thanks. I’m a Bulls fan. Rosenthal has announced he is going to savage you tomorrow in a paper he is preparing to publish. Are you going to respond or let it roll off your back?
dberri
September 27, 2007
Ron J.
Let me respond this way. Your welcome. Glad you liked the post.
Jeff
September 27, 2007
Hi Dave,
Thanks for doing the blog on the Bulls. I’ve been eagerly anticipating it for a while now.
Jeff
September 27, 2007
Hi Dave,
Are you going to do any predictions of the 2007/2008 season? Predicting what the past numbers suggest teams will achive this season?
Thanks
Tim
September 27, 2007
Thanks! I have some questions and comments.
First, you didn’t really contradict yourself about potential, as I see it. You just said that Thomas and Noah, based on their college stats, seem to have more potential than the rookies and sophomores playing for Portland. Isn’t that right?
I do hope Skiles gives the young guys a chance, though. His use of P.J. Brown over Thomas last year frustrated many Bulls fans. If Nocioni hadn’t gotten hurt, Thomas might never have seen playing time. Even if Wallace returns to form and Deng gets better, the Bulls need to develop that third All-Star-caliber player. Thomas and Noah seem like the best hopes. If Thomas can just develop a mid-range shot, he could be unstoppable, and perhaps Noah can slowly make up for an aging Wallace, and eventually replace him.
I think the Bulls are well aware of Gordon’s limitations, so it will be interesting to see how they handle his contract negotiations. Deng is a no-brainer, but Gordon probably thinks he is worth more than he is because of the way scorers are valued in the NBA. Still, I must say that I have a hard time telling myself that Gordon is worth less to the team than Duhon or any of the other options at shooting guard. I think if the Bulls let Gordon go to free agency and re-signed Duhon, the fans would scream. Yet the Bulls could certainly get Duhon, or any of a number of other guards, cheaper than Gordon. What say you, if Gordon demands market value, which by your system would be too much, should Paxson ignore public opinion and let Gordon walk?
dberri
September 27, 2007
Tim,
I would let Gordon walk. There is no way he is worth what his scoring demands on the current NBA market.
Rick Downs
September 27, 2007
I sure hope Bill ” The D-Bag Simmons” reads this one. I’m so sick of him tearing down Paxson when he has obviously done a great job. Thomas, Noah, Wallace, Noce, and Kirk at the same time….they’ll simply run anybody over with all of that energy! Da Bulls are back, finally.
Tim
September 27, 2007
I looked at your previous articles about the Bulls at the beginning of last season and in the middle of last season. At the beginning, you fearlessly predicted (well, perhaps less than fearlessly, considering a number of qualifiers) 64 wins.
https://dberri.wordpress.com/2006/07/21/making-ben-gordon-rich/
In December 2006, you noted that while a number of your assumptions had been valid, two had not, and accounted for the Bulls not winning at the pace you expected. First, P.J. Brown had played much worse than you had expected. Second, Tyrus Thomas had not played as well as you had expected, or as much as you had expected.
https://dberri.wordpress.com/2006/12/27/reviewing-the-signing-of-big-ben/
So, what about this year? P.J. Brown is gone, and whoever replaces his minutes (Smith, Thomas, Noah) should be closer to the old numbers for Brown. Thomas may get more minutes and play like he did at the end of last year or during college. Why not 64 wins?
I suspect the answer is that you cannot throw out Thomas’s disappointing overall numbers from last year, despite his flashes of brilliance at the end of the season. And I would guess that Joe Smith’s lifetime average is not as good as P.J. Brown’s lifetime average. Also, perhaps there is the matter of Ben Wallace’s decline, even though he is still a dominant player.
But if that is correct, there’s a chance that Tyrus Thomas could “live up to his potential.” He is, after all, very young, and he did have great numbers in college and at the end of last year. So there’s some evidence that his limited minutes in the first half of last year were an aberration. There’s also a chance that Noah would provide a consistent back-up for the aging Wallace, with little loss of productivity. If Thomas and Noah live up to their college potential, in other words, and get the minutes to go with it, could we see 64 wins?
Shubidupdup
September 27, 2007
I’ve been reading the stuff on this site for about a month now, including past articles. Great stuff, although I don’t agree with all of it (the whole “inflated rebound value” bit).
I wondered once if someone should get more credit for a certain shooting percentage the more shots he takes. After all, it’s harder to shoot 40% out of 30 attempts than it is out of 5, right?
This relates to Ben Gordon. Instinctually, for people who have played basketball for a long time, he’s a very good player. According to you, he’s very overrated. Maybe if his shots were redistributed, his teammates would shoot worse overall? Maybe putting up a lot of shots takes talent? This is in defense of volume scorers, whom I like.
dberri
September 27, 2007
Shub…
If you search for material on Allen Iverson you will see that this issue has been discussed at length. The short summary… we were unable to find evidence that shot attempts and shooting efficiency are related.
Tim,
64 wins is possible, although I liked my forecast: “more than 54”.
Cleve
September 27, 2007
“I would let Gordon walk. There is no way he is worth what his scoring demands on the current NBA market.” – dberri
Totally agree with you! I often saw the articles from media members or bloggers hyped Gordon, and wondered why? It is refreshing to see there are some smart people like you out there who can see Gordon actually hurts the Bulls’ chance to win big. For every good shooting game Gordon had, he had two below average games (eg, shot 2 for 12 or 4 for 19, particularly he did not contribute much anything else either). It is also extremely frustrated to see Gordon often gave up more baskets than he scored. I also think your prediction of 54 wins is reasonable, except that I do not know whether Skiles is smart enough to coach the Bulls to win 54 or more games. Last season, there were at least 6 games the Bulls should certainly win, had Skiles take Gordon out of the game (because he was so ineffective and over-matched by the opposing SGs). But Skiles still left him in the game for 35-40 min. Had Skiles put someone who can defend the opposing SG (eg, Thabo) in the game, they would definitely win minimal 6 more games (because all it took was to shut down the opposing SGs a little in those games). Although no analysis is perfect, your analysis is the smartest one I have seen so far.
Owen
September 27, 2007
I totally agree with what DB said above. However it’s fair to note that Gordon actually made a somewhat dramatic advance this year in scoring efficiency over his first two seasons. His True Shooting % went from 53% to 57%, so its difficult to fault him on that score. However, he certainly hurt his team in other areas, rebounding and turnovers especially.
I think the Gordon contract talks will be fascinating. The Bulls are offensively challenged, they had only the 20th best offense in the league. I think the Bulls might struggle to believe that losing a scorer like Gordon wouldn’t hamstring them. Will be interesting to see how it plays out when it happens….
Richard
September 27, 2007
Dave,
This is the first time checking out this site and I must admit- the angle you take and the logic of it is great. I was an Econ major and I don’t think I’ve ever read sports like this before!
Following Tyson throughout last season (I never liked Tyson Chandler and was glad we got rid of him, though I think we could’ve got a good draft pick or two included with the trade), I winced when seeing him do well. Even when the Hornets played vs. the Bulls, he jabbered with Ben Gordon (saying he’d stuff Gordon if he ever drove in on him.. Ben drove in and beautifully sank 3-4 floaters and asked Tyson, “When are you going to block me now?). In any case, is there any part of the formula that factors in intangibles? Leadership, heart, charisma, emotion are some that seem to charge a team as scrappy as the Bulls.
In any case, if you get to answer this, that’d be cool; but if it’s okay with you, I’d like to link your website from my blogsite so everyone else can read it as well.
Thanks!
dberri
September 27, 2007
Richard,
Thanks for the nice compliments.
When we look at the numbers we see that scoring is not the only thing that drives wins. My sense is that much of what people think of as chemistry, intangibles, etc.. is really just the influence of non-scoring factors (rebounds, turnovers, etc…).
Mark
September 28, 2007
Is there much in this article aside from lots of numbers?
skoalla
September 28, 2007
man u guys suck !!!
go SUNS !!
Pat
September 28, 2007
DB, I know being a pistons fan you got to see how productive Ben Wallace can be in person and on paper. So I ask this: is it possible that Noah or Thomas could (I know the numbers don’t always translate) replace Wallace’s production after Ben becomes ineffective?
Looking to the future, would this be the best line up for lets say the 2009-10 Bulls? —>
Hinrich
Duhon
Deng
Thomas
Noah
Thanks for all the research you do.
dberri
September 28, 2007
Pat,
You have identified a big issue for the Bulls. Wallace is a short-term solution. In a couple of years can this team replace his 15 wins? I think Thomas and Noah have potential, but I don’t think it is a certainty that either can replace Wallace. It is possible, but not a sure thing.
fajriyansah
December 20, 2010
love reading your work Ken! It often times makes me laugh out loud at work and I get strange looks! Keep it up!