Topics discussed: Thibs, what Bulls practice is like, how he is preparing to become a coach after retirement, and how Rose is better than what most people think, compared to last year, already.

Rec this so it stays up for a while. Let's try to get Deng in his first ever ASG. Dude really deserves it.

Freaking Riley. Well, still. CONGRATS TO MY GUY!!!!

With 20 of the NBA's 30 general managers responding to the survey, Riley has eight first-place votes compared to seven for Forman. (via RealGM)

Oh god. Commence BlogAMelo.

Westbrook got the WCF nod.

Great timing for the ASG voting purposes. KEEP VOTING.

Expected.

Jeez, ESPN is calling us the 5th best team in the league, all the national media and fans outside of Miami are complimenting our moves, and KC of course does what he does best, which is swoop in and piss in our cheerios. Every time we get hope or good news about anything, this clown comes through like it's his job to shoot it down. Go away, mouthpiece! AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH Does he not understand the Central Division is the Bulls' for the taking???

I found this funny yet cool. Caron Butler's boss is trying to get LeBron to come to the Mavs, yet Caron pointedly excludes Dallas from a list of possible destinations and also has no problem ignoring the stupid "Jodan's shadow" argument that so many people love to throw out about why LeBron wouldn't want to come here. In fact, he turns it on its proverbial head.

Nice to see the mood of some other players in the league regarding this.

As I posted in the Bosh thread, this could be huge news, or it could be spiraling toward bad news. At worst, this could be the ending:

amare/joe johnson/wade in miami
lebron/bosh in NY
boozer to NJN
Lee in TOR

or at best, this could be the ending:

noah/rose/bosh/lebron/kurt (still team captain).

[From the FanShots. Elsewhere on the coaching front, Mike McGraw reports that they will interview Tom Thibodeau, but may not be able to until the Finals are over.

Also, Doug Collins has been hired by Philly, so that's a potential bullet dodged -ed.]

And with the first interview, the Bulls talk to... ELSTON TURNER! YEAH BABY! Experience FTW.

(someone hold me).

Take that, KC/Sam:

A source with direct knowledge of the Chicago Bulls front office's plans says the team believes it has the right players in place -- namely, Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah and Luol Deng -- to surround LeBron James when it makes its case with the free agent to-be on July 1.

But the source said there has been no discussion of bringing Kentucky coach John Calipari in with James as part of a package deal.

Uh......WOW.

*thumbs up*

As soon as Mike and Mike wrap up, I'll try to get a link up to the podcast.

EDIT: He also reiterated this point to Hannah Storm this morning. I am now linking to the video.

So the best team in the league needs to get some "private time" with the guy who is in charge of all the refs??? Hmm. Must be nothing major, me thinks. Nah, not at all. They were probably just kicking back and enjoying the Lakers-Thunder game. Right?

Cross posted this to RGM...

Amidst all the bad news we've been hearing, a glimmer of hope. The headline is based on yesterday's NBA Today podcast where Ryen Rusillo mentioned with a lot of certainty that the Bulls were going to get rid of Vinny this summer, and pretty much give our prized FA acquisition the choice of which coach they want to have. I would have put "he predicts" except that 1, he talks to a lot of insiders and 2, he sounded like this was pretty much guaranteed. He also said the Clippers are in position to do the same thing.

He starts to talk about this at the 5:00 mark approximately:

Yeah I know he's not our guy anymore, but can you believe it's not even 6 months and there are already rumors about trading him. But on the flipside, if Dumars pulls this off (getting Amare) he should be vindicated.

[From the FanShots. Yahoo! is confirming this. Rose is the first Bulls All-Star since '98. -ed]