So who needs Pau Gasol?
Not a team that runs out the league’s best team the way the Bulls did Thursday night, dominating the Dallas Mavericks in a 96-85 victory.
Right?
Not the way Ben Gordon blew by dazed defenders and pulled up for killer jumpers on the way to 30 points.
Not the way Luol Deng slashed and lasered his way between Dallas’ big men for 21 points and nine rebounds and not the way Kirk Hinrich stepped out for a pair of devastating three-pointers down the stretch after the Mavs got within three.
“Beautiful basketball,” Mavs guard Jerry Stackhouse admired in defeat. “There was one play we covered as good as we could defend. They drove and kicked around the horn all the way to the corner and got an open three. You have to love that. You don’t want to lose the game, but sometimes the other team plays good.”
It also was All-Star day in the NBA on Thursday with the starters for the Feb. 18 game announced, the coaches’ selection of reserves to be revealed Thursday.
The Bulls’ leading vote-getter was Ben Wallace, third among the centers, although he played like an All-Star again against the Mavs with 17 rebounds and four blocks.
It was a national TV game, against the best team in the league, and what do you know, Wallace woke up as the Bulls outhustled and outshot the Mavs.
His performance bodes well for the playoffs.
“It would be disappointing to not have somebody representing this team,” Luol Deng said.
And, perhaps, it would be a first.
The Bulls are a game out of first place in the Eastern Conference and, according to the Elias Sports Bureau, the team with the best record in the conference going into the All-Star Game always has had at least one All-Star.
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Which brings us, as it will be for the Bulls for the next month, to All-Star Gasol.
Is he the final piece?
“They go to another level overall with a guy like Pau,” Stackhouse said.
Games like Thursday night’s against the Mavs make you think the Bulls are best sticking with what they have in Gordon, Deng and Hinrich.
How could the Bulls give up any of them?
You can be sure they would have to if they want Gasol, even if none of them has been offered in preliminary discussions.
The Grizzlies are shopping Gasol actively, teams officials confirm.
The Memphis reaction has been critical of Gasol asking out. Smaller cities get insulted easier.
Gasol will be traded.
The Lakers didn’t have to give up Shaquille O’Neal, but they did. Vince Carter, Tracy McGrady, Allen Iverson. Go down the list.
Teams simply don’t have the stomach to put up with a player who wants out. My guess is the Grizzlies told Gasol to keep quiet and they will get him out.
It has happened throughout the history of the league: Oscar Robertson, Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Charles Barkley.
The only player I can remember asking out, not being traded and then returning to All-Star form was Hakeem Olajuwon in the early 1990s.
By most accounts, no one has more to offer that Memphis wants than the Bulls, who were terrific Thursday in outplaying a Mavericks team that plays much the same way–pick and roll, drive and kick, aggressive on defense.
But the Mavs, at the end of an Eastern trip, were a step slow and shooting poorly. Josh Howard was 1 of 15 when he was benched before he hurt anyone.
The Bulls closed quickly on the shooters, chasing the Mavs into their lowest scoring quarter and shooting game of the season. They ran out at every opportunity, jumped the Mavs’ pick and roll, didn’t allow the guards easy openings for shots and were relentless on the boards.
“We’d get close and most teams would crack,” Stackhouse said. “Give them credit. They made long shots. P.J. Brown, taking nothing away from him, but we’ve been watching tape and he hasn’t been doing anything and he’s making turnaround jumpers at the end, Ben Wallace hitting free throws . . . “
It was the kind of night where you think that maybe a little tweak here, a little growth there and . . . it’s not like the Mavs look more talented, just hardened by maturity and disappointment.
“What they do, somebody is not going to be as effective,” Stackhouse said when asked what Gasol might be like with the Bulls. “A guy like Deng cuts and slashes because you try to pay attention to their pick and roll. You throw a guy in the post and it’s a different effect.
“Hinrich and Gordon, those guys won’t have the ball in their hands as much and that’s their strength, playing off the dribble. Pau’s a handful, and he can cover a lot of ills, but you don’t get a whole lot of defense with him.”
So how much can you give up? What can you give up? Or do you even bother?
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