Billy Donovan: Bulls have 'lost the analytical battle' in recent years

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00:00Last year, I was pretty honest from the standpoint that, you know, we were not a team that was built to play really fast.

00:07We just weren't built that way. And I think, you know, as a coach, you always want to try to play to your players' strengths.

00:12And obviously, the job that Demar did for the time that he was here was remarkable.

00:17And he was great closing out games and a total pro. And he was great with the younger players.

00:21I think as some of the roster has changed, there is a mix of younger players and there's a mix of some older players.

00:27And how well we can gel and mesh together. I think the other part is going through the experience in Oklahoma City

00:33when we had Chris Paul, Shea Gilders-Alexander, and Dennis Schreuder. We played all those three guards together.

00:38You know, and I think when you look at our backcourt situation, we have some talented backcourt players,

00:43but they're only effective if the ball's in their hands, right?

00:45So what kind of sacrifices can we make individually, you know, where we're not going to have one guy with the ball in his hands all the time.

00:52We're going to have to be able to sacrifice and try to play to each other's strengths.

00:56I think the other part of that now is I think the way the team is constructed with the mix of some older guys and some younger guys,

01:03we have to play faster. I think one of the things we've battled the last couple of years is in some ways,

01:09and Arturs and I have talked about this, we've lost the analytical battle.

01:12You know, we just were not a high volume, three-point shooting team.

01:15And there was games we walked into where you've got teams that are taking an enormous amount of three-point shots

01:20and we're not able to even keep up with that rate.

01:23And it's not so much about necessarily just bombing up three-point shots,

01:26but you don't want to be up against it on a continual basis because you're just not generating enough of them.

01:32Because listen, everybody, when you say DeMar DeRozan, they always say this mid-range killer,

01:37and he's unbelievable. It's the reason why he's going to be a Hall of Fame player is because that's what he does do.

01:42And you don't want to sit there and try to make a player be somebody he's not.

01:45So I do think that the tempo that Arturs and I have talked about, you know, over the summer, we've got to play that way.

01:51And we have, you know, you go back and hopefully he'll be able to get on the court.

01:55Lonzo, he's moving in that direction.

01:57But he was really a guy that enabled us to play faster, you know, moving the ball up the floor.

02:01I think the same thing can be said for Josh Giddey.

02:03You know, he's a guy that can really, really push the tempo and he does it a lot with the advanced pass.

02:08And I think for those two guys, players love playing with them because they know if they run, they're going to find him.