VINNY DEL NEGRO???

Vinny Del Negro??? Those were the exact words I said to myself after I heard the Bulls made him the Head Coach today. After all these months, and the 103949 candidates John Paxson interviewed, Vinny Del Negro was the best the Bulls could do?

Now we all remember Vinny as a Basketball Player. He was a scrappy guard who played on the Spurs in his best seasons. I remember him as a nice shooter, a good defender, and a great teammate. We all even have his Basketball Card, I'm even pretty sure it was a so called Common back then. Honestly, I have nothing against the guy, and even liked him as a player, but Vinny the Head Coach? This is a guy we know nothing about when it comes to his Coaching Philosophy.

I mean, am I missing something here? Is the Bulls Head Coaching job not a desirable position? We have the second youngest team in the game, the Number 1 draft pick in the upcoming Draft, a big market city like Chicago, and a great fan base. It really boggles me that we can't land a big named Coach here in Chicago. We have to be missing something right? Or, it might be the fact that Management did not want to go that route of paying a big named Head Coach a lot of money this year, especially because we still owe Skiles a boatload of money from his Bulls contract. Whatever the fact is, Vinny Del Negro was definitely not what most Chicago Bulls fans were expecting.

To me, if the Bulls were going to wait this long to hire someone, they should have at least just waited another 2 weeks to interview Boston's Tom Thibodeau right? Or if they were going to go with someone with no Coaching experience at all, like Vinny, at least bring in Former Knicks player Mark Jackson for an interview right? If they were just choosing from the best possible candidate out there, at least bring in Avery Johnson and Jeff Van Gundy to hear what they have to say right? Those are just some of the things us Bulls fans would have done in regards to this Coaching Position, but I guess Bulls Brass disagrees. He must really be great in interviews I guess, because I would never hire someone with no experience.

I mention that fact again, because people I know keep bringing up the point that Phil Jackson never had experience and neither did Pop and some other greats. But, that actually is not true. They just never had NBA Head Coaching experience, but both had coached and won on other levels before. Vinny has absolutely 0 Head Coaching experience on any level, and that is what worries me about him.

But, on the other hand, sometimes it does help a franchise if they go in a completely new direction, as it did with the Bulls and Spurs in the past. Maybe Vinny's Basketball Philosophy was just what Pax and Reinsdorf were looking for, who knows. I did read somewhere that Vinny was a proponent of Coach D'Antoni's style in Phoenix. I also did read that while he liked the Seven seconds or less philosophy, he wanted to focus more on defense at the same time. Now I don't know how you can combine the two styles, but if he can somehow do that, the Bulls will definitely be in good shape come next season.

Right now, all us Bulls fans can do is hope and pray that John Paxson made the right move for our franchise. Hopefully Vinny turns out to be a solid Head Coach, who can work well with young talent, and take the Bulls to the promise land. Then we can laugh about this post, and many others when that time comes. But for now, all we can do as fans is just wait and see, and hope and pray.

Now, with the Coaching vacancy taken care of, hopefully the Bulls can focus on the draft soon. I just hope they don't have us scratching our heads after the Draft, like they did with this Head Coaching issue...