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John Paxson Might Be Gone Next Week

Feb 13, 2009 – 1:08 PM
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Tom Ziller

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The Bulls have a big week ahead, being featured players in just about every rumored scenario regarding a cadre of players (their own and otherwise). A few independent reports (via TSB) have made the whole run-up to the Thursday deadline more interesting for Chicago: both Peter (groan) Vescey of the New York Post and the Chicago Sun-Times report John Paxson will resign as Bulls GM after the deadline.

However, Mike McGraw of the Arlington Heights Daily Herald has a source denying the rumor. And Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf put out a statement basically calling Vescey a liar. So here we are.

I have little rooting interest here. As Dwyer notes, once we strip away assumptions and perception, Paxson's only bad mistake has been the Ben Wallace signing. Half the league would have made the same move. Some might consider the Tyrus Thomas-LaMarcus Aldridge swap bad news too, but the jury isn't back from lunch yet.

Further, Pax has a solid enough young core (half the league would trade for his roster). He almost had enough to trade for KOBE BRYANT last year, for goodness sake. He's a decent GM, and the team has bigger problems than personnel. (In fact, personnel is the strength of the team right now. The personnel just isn't improving much. Coaches are typically responsible for that.) Still, if it's time, it is time. Like Dwyer, I think Doug Collins is a walking disaster as coach and/or GM. But on the specific matter of Pax, I have no unassailable opinion either way.

But instead of considering Pax's future, let's count the failures of Vescey. Hey, Steve Kerr had two terse words for him this morning!
Filed under: Sports

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