Kirk Hinrich is a veteran. Kirk Hinrich should know better. Kirk Hinrich made every Bulls fan who can’t stand his game look like a genius tonight.
The Bulls led the Mavericks 108-105 with 4.2 seconds left in regulation after Pau Gasol hit a pair of free throws. The Mavs were out of time outs, so their only choice was to hit a 3 and hope for overtime.
They inbounded the ball to Monta Ellis, who was all set to dribble up the right side of the court and launch a 3 from at least 25 feet out. But for some completely inexplicable reason, Kirk Hinrich fouled Ellis ON PURPOSE with 1.2 seconds left, giving Ellis three free throws and sending the game into overtime.
Photo by Chris Swada, Chicago Tribune
Kirk Hinrich 1, Bulls 0
It makes sense for Hinrich to foul Ellis as he crossed half court, forcing Ellis to make the first free throw and intentionally miss the second for the Mavs to have any prayer of forcing overtime. But Kirk waited until Monta was close enough to the basket to shoot an actual 3 in rhythm, and the official had no choice but to award him three free throws.
Kirk Hinrich should know better
Kirk Hinrich is a long-time NBA veteran, he absolutely has to know better than to wait until Ellis was in shooting range to commit that foul.
Kirk Hinrich had absolutely no excuse for what he did.
Kirk Hinrich officially cost the Bulls this game.
Thibs did learn his lesson, so I guess that’s good?
Kirk Hinrich did not see the floor in either overtime period, even though he had finished the game in regulation. Thibs benched him in favor of Dunleavy in OT 1 and OT 2, and while I am not one to overreact to one bad play, this one was absolutely inexcusable.
Completely, absolutely, 100% without a shadow of a doubt, inexcusable.
As far as I am concerned, Kirk Hinrich played himself out of the game-ending rotation by handing the Mavs this game. It was won, barring a miracle 3 by Ellis, and Hinrich gave the Mavs life.
Gasol was outstanding
Pau Gasol continues to show why he was such an outstanding free agent signing, playing 50 minutes tonight and giving the Bulls a season-high 29 points to go along with 14 rebounds. His 19 points in the second half and overtime, hitting big shot after big shot to keep the Bulls in the game.
Jimmy Butler struggled from both the field (9/21) and the free throw line (5/9), but he had a pretty good game overall with 23 points, 8 rebounds and 7 assists (with only 1 turnover) in 46 minutes.
Joakim Noah had another good game as he recovers from off-season knee surgery, with 8 points, 14 rebounds, 6 assists, 2 blocked shots and 2 steals.
Nikola Mirotic had another nice all-around game, contributing 15 points (4/8 FG, 7/8 FT), 4 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 blocked shots in his 26 minutes. For me, the only question is what kind of return the Bulls can get for Taj Gibson, because there is no excuse for Niko to only play 10 minutes a night once Taj is healthy again.
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Tags: chicago bulls, jimmy butler, kirk hinrich, nikola mirotic, pau gasol, taj gibson
There was some debate on the radio whether it was a continuation, but the highlights looked like enough of a continuation for me.
That much of a veteran should not have had a brain cramp of that sort, but apparently he did.
The inexplicable was explained by Thibs as that it was an intentional foul to try to force Dallas to reset the offense, but the mistake was doing it in 3 point range.
The other debate is whether Thibs left Gasol and Butler so exhausted that they may not be able to go against the hapless Hornets tonight. One commentator said "it looks like Heinrich cost the Bulls 2 games."
I don't think there's any doubt that it was the right call. Like you said, the foul has to be taken on the other side of half court, and if anyone on this team should know better that to wait, you would think it's Hinrich.
The sad thing is, Kurt has actually been playing pretty decent ball this season - which is shocking, since he usually starts out really slow shooting the ball the first month or two. He's taking 3.3 3-point attempts per game and shooting a team-high .446 (which is a career high for Kurt).
He hasn't been over 40% on 3's since 2008-09, and he's even been hitting some big shots late in games.
But all that three point shooting doesn't help when you make a play like the one on Ellis in a game there was no excuse for us to lose.
I would actually argue that Ellis didn't start any shooting motion until after Hangdog attacked him. I actually think that it should have been a 2 shot foul, especially in light of the change in the rules emphasis over the past couple of years. But it was still beyond inexcusable for Hangdog to make the call that close. He simply lost contact with Ellis then couldn't control himself when he finally caught up, thats the $68 million moron for you.
I'd also say that he makes bulls fans who can't stand the sight of him look like geniuses on most every night(check out the GS game), just not as blatantly as against Dallas.
Everyone gets stupid moments in their lives.
Hinrich is doing it too much!
Agreed, a player is supposed to get smarter as he ages, not dumber right ??
As for Mirotic, he got a whopping 8 minutes against GS, on another night when it should have been obvious that the Noah and Gasol pairing is killing us not just when they are on the court together but because it pairs Mirotic with Gibson, another pairing that is brutal together. The only solution is to pair Gasol with Gibson and Noah with Mirotic and play them all 24 minutes per game. It certainly couldn't hurt to try that for a couple of weeks and see what happens.