In Defense of the Sixers.

Editor's Note:  This is a guest post by Symbol Lai.  She is a frequent contributor to The Diss.

*****

There seems to be a lot of unsupported, misplaced anger directe at the Philadelphia 76ers here at The Diss and in the basketball world at large lately.  Something must be said.

Understandably much of the "Sixers suck," "No sane analyst will pick the Sixers," and "They will be chased out of the stadium by Boston or Atlanta" prognoses stem from Philadelphia's unlikely victory over the top-seeded Bulls team that was both heavily favored to take the championship and the new NBA darling next to Oklahoma City.  Without a doubt, the Sixers were buoyed by injuries to the Bulls' two best players, Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah.  However, as a skeptical Sixers fan, who is not only doubtful of the organization's plan to build around coach Doug Collins, but also held out on joining the wave of Sixers playoff frenzy until tonight, when Andre Iguodala finally became the clutch player that the city had always wanted him to be, here is why I am not ashamed to be happy for our advance to the second round.

You see, despite the injures to Rose and Noah, the Bulls still could have -- no, should have -- won this series.  This Bulls team had an incredible season.  They managed to pull off the best record in the NBA despite a consistent string of injuries to key players.  They were very well constructed, with role players who could and did step up when needed.  They were extremely well coached by Tom Thibodeau, who almost won Coach of the Year an unprecedented two consecutive times.

This was a Bulls team whose opponent were the Philadelphia 76ers, who, while up and coming, are not complicated and rather predictable, perhaps due to a front office and coach that appear a little averse to change.  The same problems that I pointed out before All-Star break were the same problems that became painfully apparent as the season progressed.

1.  We have no half-court offense; if we want offense, we must create and convert fast break opportunities.

2.  We have no presence in the paint.  While Spencer Hawes is our 7-footer, he is by no means an indomitable force.  This is a guy that prefers shooting jump shots when he's literally two feet away from the basket rather than going for the surefire dunk.  (He usually misses those jump shots too).  And, for all his gifted passing abilities, I've only seen those skills on display in a handful of games.  Hawes simply hasn't been consistent since returning from his Achilles injury, particularly against opponents who are willing to apply some physical pressure.

3.  We are a skittish, young team, prone to make silly mistakes under pressure and likely to succumb to doomsday scenarios after a few missed shots.

Again, the 76ers are not a terrible, unwatchable team (when playing well, we're rather intriguing to watch I think).  But we are not all that hard to figure out.  This is not rocket science.  Any sports analyst, knowledgable Sixers fan -- hell, even I, a PhD student in History, who is not paid to break down basketball strategies  -- could have told this to the Bulls.  In fact, I daresay someone probably did in light of how Omer Asik and Carlos Boozer's physical play gave the Sixers fits in Games 5 and 6.

All this to say: in this series, the Bulls, who, under similar circumstances, had picked apart many worthy opponents in the past, simply did not perform.  They could have won, given how noticeable the Sixers' persistent weaknesses were.  They should have won, given an overall roster that is superior to the inexperienced and therefore inconsistent Sixers.  And they didn't.

This wasn't a question of the Sixers doing anything exceptionally well, but rather a matter of the Bulls not doing what they needed to do -- what they were fully capable of doing.  As such, I think a setting aside of our froofy playoff basketball tastes and re-evaluation of people's collective resentment towards the Sixers are in order.  Simply put, lower your noses and point those fingers elsewhere.  Finally, for the record, the Sixers took the series against Boston during the regular season.  We might not win, but it will be competitive.

The Diss Presents: The First Annual NBA Analyst Awards.

Editor's Note:  Kurt Scott's back again to deliver The Diss' First Annual NBA Analyst awards.  This is Kurt's second piece on our humble little blog.  As always, you can follow Kurt on Twitter here.

*****

It's NBA awards season.  And coming off a condensed season that has asked more of all of us -- analysts, fans, and players to slightly varying degrees -- we would be remiss if we didn't take this opportunity to honor the best of talking head-dom, as well as a few efforts that fell short.

So here they are:

The 2011-2012 NBA Analyst Awards

Best Newcomer: Dennis Scott

This is Scott's second year with NBA TV, but he's truly come into his own this season as a multi-format performer.  Besides being cooler than a fan, he has a knack for balancing his goofy sense of humor with real basketball insight without forcing the issue with either, and he's equally comfortable on NBA Gametime and Fantasy Insider (the latter being the real testament to his preparation). 

If you consider NBA TV the minor leagues to TNT's "Big Show", the temptation to make your mark and get called-up must be considerable.  But whatever 3-D's career ambition may be, he won't act outside of himself to get to the next level, which is to be admired.

Honorable Mention: Rex Chapman

The (MUCH) Less is More Award: Shaquille O'Neal

A friend of mine -- and by friend I mean a dude from a RealGM message board whose real name I'll never know -- put it best a few weeks back: "I used to look forward to watching NBA TV on Friday mornings when they replayed the previous night's Inside the NBA.  Now, I get resentful that I can't watch the far superior Gametime.  That's the Shaq effect."  Indeed.

Shaq has been killed on virtually every NBA fan forum imaginable for his petty, ham-fisted performances on Inside, and rightly so.  But let's face facts: he isn't going anywhere until he wants to.  So, with an eye toward improvement, here are several habits you'd do well to break, Mr. O'Neal, if you want to earn the respect (or tolerance) of the NBA faithful:

1.  Lose the "Shaq Voice".  We've all experimented with a bad schtick at some point or another.  But because most of us aren't multi-millionaires or the most dominant center of all time, someone has probably told us to cut it out.  In Shaq's case, though, the bit where he overenunciates his consonants while raising his voice to an obnoxious volume (and repeats himself when the joke doesn't hit home the first time) has lived on, to the annoyance of his viewership who cringe not just at the voice itself but at the tendency of his fellow analysts (ahem, Greg Anthony -- more on you later) to laugh through it.

2.  Tone Down the Agendas. In fairness, Shaq has come a long way on this since the beginning of the season when the casual observer might have guessed that Dwight Howard had eaten his children.  He is still a legacy-campaigner, and will always be a legacy-campaigner, so the key, here, is limit his pot-shots at current and former players to an acceptable level.  Like say four or five times a segment.

3.  Keep your ****ing Clothes On.  Need I say more?

Eliminate those habits and what you'll have left won't be a perfect or even good analyst, just one that isn't sinking the best ship in the fleet.

Honorable Mention: No one.  Here, as in so many realms, Shaq is peerless.

The Heir to the Throne Award: Jalen Rose

If you haven't noticed that Jalen Rose is coming on like a boss, you haven't been paying attention.  An insightful presence on ESPN's NBA Coast to Coast for the last several seasons, he's also put together a string of successful hits on SportsCenter, the NBA Today podcast, and, most notably, First Take, where he took Skip Bayless to task for embellishing his high school basketball "career".

And that's before you get to his excellent turn as documentary subject in ESPN's The Fab 5.  Almost more impressive than his candor in the film was his willingess to take on all corners after it aired.  Regardless of which side you came down on, his much publicized kerfuffle with Grant Hill over the perception of Duke players in the 90's showed Rose to be a rarity in basketball commentary: a voice with both the seriousness of purpose to take on the game's heavy issues, as well as the juice among his peers to make that voice heard.

Honorable Mention:  Fittingly, former Fab 5 teammate Chris Webber.

The "Mr. Conventional Wisdom" Award: Magic Johnson

Maybe some of us need reminding that Kobe should get Bynum and Gasol the ball or that Miami is a better team when LeBron takes over in the fourth.  But I'll go out on a limb and say those bases are covered.  And so it'd be awfully nice if someone -- a producer, an analyst, a dear friend -- convinced Magic to tap into the knowledge that made him the best floor general of all time.  Until then, he'll remain the biggest reason why the ABC halftime show is the most staid studio team covering the game today.

Honorable Mention:  Sam Mitchell

The Company You Keep Award: Greg Anthony

There are two Greg Anthony's.

Good Greg Anthony appears alongside Ernie Johnson and Chris Webber on NBA TV's Fan Night (or, "Nerd Night plus C-Webb", according to Barkley).  He's bright.  He's more comfortable in his skin than you'd expect (I'd thought him something of a twerp in his playing days).  And he was involved in the most hammy moment the program's seen since Webber, Ahmad Rashad and Gary Payton held it down.  We like Good Greg Antony and hope his contract gets picked up for many seasons to come, so long as there's a clause written-in to exclude...

Bad Greg Anthony.  Wednesday Night Greg Anthony, who shamelessly provides the laugh track to Shaq's worst jokes, most notably during the "Shaqtin the Fool" segment.  Which should be subject to fine, in my opinion, like feeding nuisance animals in public parks.  And while I'm sure Anthony's encouragement isn't what's stopping Shaq from reining it in a little, I'd pay good money to find out.

The "Don't Lose This Guy's Number" Award: Brevin Knight

Knight only appeared on Gametime for a couple Saturday nights in February but killed it in his limited opportunity.  He dissected plays from a point guard's perspective while blending seamlessly with the stylings of Brent Barry and Rick Kamla.  Only so much can be said for a guy we saw for a combined two hours, but Knight is an intellect and a gentleman, that much is clear.  And we can only hope the door has been left open for his return -- even if it means bumping a less deserving former player (of which there's no shortage) from a studio rotation.

The "Fine, You're Good, I Admit It" Award: Brent Barry

Why is it necessary to praise Brent Barry through gritted teeth?  Well, he's a Barry, for starters.  He also oozes too cool for school, not the most endearing quality in someone who's paid to watch basketball and offer his opinion.  But, to his credit, he's always prepared, quick on the draw, and has a self-deprecating streak that goes a long way toward balancing his "above it all" swag.  Besides, you have to give a guy a little room to be cocky when he's busted this out on national television.

Honorable Mention: Jon Barry, naturally.

The MVP: Charles Barkley

You love Chuck and I love Chuck so I won't dwell on why our favorite Emmy-winner is the best thing going in NBA television.  Instead, let's talk about what's changed since he joined TNT in 2000: you can't mess with this guy like you used to.

He's gotten too good.  For everything Kenny, EG and Shaq throw at him, he now has a biting response.  Which makes sense considering that in his twelve-year analyst career he's heard every barb about his weight, rap sheet, country roots and lack of rings imaginable.  He's now an expert at using his natural wit to ping-pong those tried and true slights back in the direction of his adversaries.  And that makes for higher entertainment than when he was strictly on the receiving end.

Of course, they're all very good friends on the Inside set, and the best thing about Charles is his ability to take a joke.  Now that he's complemented his good nature with a few well-grounded opinions (along with some dead-wrong ones), he's become the undisputed crown jewel of NBA broadcasting.

In Memoriam: The Pre-ACL Bulls. A Guest Post by Kurt Scott.

Editor's Note:  The Diss is delighted to feature a guest post from Kurt Scott.  We wish it came under happier circumstances.  This is Kurt's first contribution to The Diss.  He is a lifelong fan of the Chicago Bulls.  You can follow him on Twitter here.

*****

In the waning moments of the Bulls' first playoff game against the Sixers, Derrick Rose hopped into the lane, landing first on his right foot, followed by his left -- those familiar first steps in the choreography of his trademark twisting floater -- before his left knee buckled and he collapsed to the floor.

It looked serious.  Reggie Miller, working color on the broadcast, warned us that it probably was.  Only I didn't believe it, not because the injury didn't look nasty; in what's become one of the most cliched sports observations, the non-contact knee injury is about as worrisome as it gets.  Still, a season of watching D-Rose suffer injury after injury had taught us two things:

1.  Derrick Rose's body can't be trusted.  Certainly not in this condensed season.  As much as we want our boy to be an every-game horse like Durant, Westbrook or LeBron, he just isn't built for it.  And it's not just this year; Rose's oft-cited six missed games over his previous three seasons belies his history of dings, including but not limited to the ankle injury that slowed him for the first month of his sophomore campaign, a back injury in his third year, and a second ankle injury he suffered in last year's first-round series against Indiana, after which he never fully regained his explosion against the Hawks and Heat.

2.  He eventually works his way back.  The road to recovery is fraught with setbacks, missteps and second-guessing, but because Derrick is a warrior, he eventually gets there, and having the chance to watch him at his most brilliant makes it all worthwhile.

Which is why, for me, and I imagine most Bulls' fans, watching Derrick writhe on the baseline was more of a "here we go again" moment than anything else.  Derrick Rose injuries are annoying, not serious.  They mean rehab timetables that are constantly revised by the Bulls' brain-trust of coaches, trainers and front office personnel; they mean watching Rose labor to regain his conditioning and his confidence in his supernatural skills; they meant the possibility that we could -- *gasp* -- fall to the second seed; and perhaps worst of all, they mean angsty internal conversations wherein you remind yourself that it's grossly unfair to be frustrated with Rose himself, as no one feels more betrayed by his body than he does.

Well, we were indulging ourselves.  We know that now.  Rose's series of "minor" injuries didn't make him more immune to more serious "freak" injuries, of course, it only gave us a false sense of security about his ability to bounce back, like clockwork.  And now that he's facing a minimum rehab of six months, and the possibility that he'll never be the same athlete again, we're pushed into a new reality, one where we're far more afraid of what'll happen two, three years from now that what'll happen tomorrow.

But let's deal with the short term, first.

The Bulls' title run is over.  Obviously.  And if we're being honest with ourselves, it's going to be hard to watch them play in this series (or, God willing, the next one and the one after that) without being sad as shit.  It's a Catch-22: If the Bulls look awful in Rose's absence, that clearly sucks.  And if they beat the Sixers and give Boston and the Heat all they can handle before bowing out, it'll be hard to appreciate the accomplishment in its own light.  We'll instead be distracted by what could have been.  And maybe this is just me being cynical, but I expect "what could have been" to turn into "what could have been avoided."  In other words, more heat on Thibs for having left D-Rose in a game that was probably already in hand.

Look, here's what folks are overlooking: though we all know that Rose's body has been a ticking time bomb, the last thing, and I mean the last thing, the Bulls wanted to do was make Rose feel they were anything short of 1,000,000% confident that he could play hard and stay healthy.  It's the playoffs.  The Bulls were only going as far as a fine-tuned Rose, in body and mind, would take them.  And pulling him from the game when they were up 12, with 90 seconds left, would have sent one message: "You will not spend any more time on the court than is absolutely necessary, lest you bust your delicate ass." That's a little incongruous with their other message, which was, "We need you to lead us to the summit of professional basketball," no?  I'd say it is.

But anyways.  Blame games and dime store psychology aside, the title run is over.  For this year and maybe the next.  Maybe even beyond that, depending on how well Rose rehabs and/or modifies his game to his new athletic limitations (I just threw up a little bit in my mouth).  It absolutely goes without saying (though I'll proceed to say it) that Rose has earned almost infinite patience from the fans and the front office as he works his way back to what he was, or discovers what he now must be.  A torn ACL isn't the career-killer that it used to be, so a bit of positive thinking is in order, for as long as this is possible.

But staying invested in the Post-ACL Bulls will mean swallowing a few hard pills, some of which might go down easier if we embrace them now, before they're thrown in our collective faces.

1.  The NBA hype-machine will turn the page on Derrick Rose.  To some degree, it already has.  The echo chamber (TV analysts, bloggers, fan forums, the twitterati) have used Rose's 27 missed games in the regular season to give Chris Paul back his title as the league's best point guard, and anoint Durant as "the guy we like with the best chance to beat the guy we hate" (it was D-Rose this time last year).  It's a short-term memory league, and Rose's cache will suffer for it.  To quote the late great Guru, for the next couple seasons there'll be "no justice, just us", bulls fans, when it comes to recognizing Derrick's talents.

2.  Chicago will turn the page on the Bulls.  Every Chicagoan knows the Bulls are the hottest ticket in town...when the Cubs, Bears and Blackhawks (with their smaller but considerably more visible fan base) aren't rolling.  And now that Rose is out, expect the MLS team -- the whatever they're called -- to challenge as well, and for casual Bulls fans to go back to their default mode: ignoring basketball.

3.  You will be tempted to turn the page, as well.  Rehab is a hard process, even for those of us on the outside looking in.  Especially when there are so many vicarious fan opportunities out there, waving at us, batting come hither eyes.  The Grizzlies.  Now there's a sexy bandwagon.  Tony Allen's twitter feed is full of fun crazy talk and Zach Randolph has "heel cred."  The Thunder are so good, and yet so flawed, that rooting for them at this point doesn't feel like a total front-runner pick.  You can't go wrong with either of those if you're aiming to shift some of your well-wishing to a team with better prospects.

And then there are the offerings of life itself.  Family, lovers, pets, gardens, vacations, professional fulfillment, the Fire and Ice books, brunch.  Now that there's no guarantee that Rose or the Bulls will be supremely awesome soon or ever again, this feels like a moment to reinvest in those beautiful, tactile, and lovable elements in your life, some of which are capable of actually loving you back.

You could do that.  But it'd be a mistake.

Here's why: because jumping ship now would make you a chump.

As noted above, casual appreciation of the Bulls is the name of the game in Chicago and throughout the Bulls diaspora, so it's not as if anyone would confront you for your chumpishness on the street, at the office or family gatherings (unless it's my family, in which case I will definitely tell you about yourself, cousin T).  In fact you'd probably have plenty of company: since Saturday afternoon, the ranks of Bulls  fans ready to look away from the wreckage, take up new hobbies like chess or paying bills on time, has probably swelled to epic proportions.  But that doesn't make it right.  You know it isn't right.  You know that while following professional sports teams -- that is, corporate entities whose employees wouldn't spit on you if you were on fire -- has to rate as one of the least constructive ways a person can spend their time, the only thing that transforms it into an empty calorie pursuit is deciding to care only when your team's chances of success are at their highest.  Bandwagoning, in other words.

After all, some of the most rabid fan-bases have been hardened by the worst disappointments.  The Blazers, the Knicks, the Jazz -- if you're reading this blog, you don't need a history lesson.  It's no coincidence that the hungriest fans aren't only the most underfed, but the ones who've been close enough to smell the meal, only to have it snatched away and fed to someone else or thrown by fate into the garbage disposal, time and time and time again.

If you consider these fan bases to be mature for their run-ins with crushing disappointment, Bulls fans, as a collective, are in their adolescence.  The Pistons-dominated late-'80's, which many of us weren't old enough to experience, were washed away by the Dynasty years.  The same can be said for the heartache over Jordan's broken foot, which caused him to miss nearly his entire second season; in his third year he came back even Jordan-er than before.  The post-dynasty Bulls (Eddy Curry, Tyson Chander, Eddie Robinson, Jalen Rose, Jamal Crawford and Mark Blount) were too awful to suffer over, and as scrappy as the Hinrich-Gordon teams were, few of us were under any illusion that they were missing a piece.

In other words, when we've had a taste of greatness, we've gorged ourselves on it.  And when we haven't, we'd known not to expect one.  Our outlook was simple, innocent: we've had our ups and downs, but things have been exactly what they appeared to be.

This is what makes this moment unique for Bulls fans.  It's the first time that we've had something truly excellent taken from us, maybe forever.  And it's where my biggest fear for the Post ACL Bulls era lies: we've never shown that we're capable of loving a team that is facing ruin.

Even if Rose comes back fully healthy, there will always be the specter of another crushing injury.  His style of play dictates that reality.  We know that now.  And who's to say what'll happen with Noah and Deng's also fragile healths, Boozer's descent into mediocrity, and Taj and Omer's upcoming contract negotiations in another year?  This will, in short, be a hard and downright scary team to love with all of its uncertainty.  To quote Melisandre, "the night is long and full of terrors."

(And to add her implied meaning, get ready for some disturbing shit to happen while we're chasing this throne, bitch.)