In the 89th minute of the Fire’s game Sept. 17 against Charlotte FC with the score tied at 2, Xherdan Shaqiri was removed because of a persistent quadriceps problem. A few minutes later, Charlotte’s Karol Swiderski scored the winner, eliminating the Fire from playoff contention for a fifth straight year.

Despite leaving that game when the Fire’s season was still alive, Shaqiri traveled to meet up with Switzerland during the international window. With the World Cup opening in November, Shaqiri started on Sept. 24 and Sept. 27 and played more than 130 minutes in UEFA Nations League games.

It begs the question: Should Shaqiri’s commitment to the Fire be questioned? Coach Ezra Hendrickson had an answer Wednesday.

“Shaq came here with a commitment to help get this organization back to where it belongs, and I think he’s shown that throughout the entire year,” Hendrickson said.

Shaqiri was a worthwhile gamble and has been productive for the Fire when healthy, contributing seven goals and 11 assists in 2,168 minutes. But that doesn’t tell the whole story as injuries have kept him from consistently fueling the Fire attack and living up to his salary. There have been moments when Shaqiri’s effort has been questioned, notably during the Aug. 21 loss to New York City FC when he didn’t mark Gabriel Pereira and walked before the NYCFC player picked up a pass and scored from outside the 18-yard box.

Shaqiri’s latest injury was not enough to keep him from playing for the Swiss and appearing in two glorified international friendlies a week after bowing out of the Charlotte game. And as one of Switzerland’s best and most accomplished players, Shaqiri’s place in their World Cup lineup is likely safe, regardless of whether he had suited up for those recent games.

Hendrickson, who defended him after the Charlotte game, backed Shaqiri and pointed out that he has played hurt at times this season, something that was especially clear to observers as the schedule wound down. Shaqiri also has made efforts to play with the Fire soon after international windows, including April 2 against FC Dallas when he left with an injury midway through the first half.

“Even when he was carrying injuries, he played,” Hendrickson said. “That wasn’t the case for every player on the squad this year. His commitment to this team is very high, but he knows his body, and he knows what he’s feeling.”

As for keeping Shaqiri in shape between the end of the MLS regular season and the World Cup, Hendrickson said the Fire are planning to train two or three days a week for about three weeks. If that’s adequate for Shaqiri, he’ll stay with the Fire and practice.

Now with the Fire’s season effectively over, there are arguments for Shaqiri to skip the last two games, including Saturday at FC Cincinnati. Even with a depleted roster, some of his young teammates would benefit from 180 minutes of experience. And with the trip to Qatar approaching, there’s little to gain and a lot to risk for Shaqiri before what’s probably his last World Cup.

Hendrickson said the team hasn’t decided on how much Shaqiri will play Saturday and that the club realizes the attacker could need some rest before the trip to Qatar.

“That’s something we’ll sit down and talk with him about as far as making sure that we send him off to the World Cup in the best physical shape as possible and as healthy as possible,” Hendrickson said.

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Somebody has to manage the White Sox next season, but will it be a member of the “family”? Will it be yet another former South Sider for chairman Jerry Reinsdorf to look at lovingly and say, “I always knew you were the one”?

Let’s be honest: Bringing in a skipper without Sox ties wouldn’t be the worst way to go. And there’s a decent chance it’ll go down like that this offseason. But in this week’s “Polling Place,” your home for Sun-Times sports polls on Twitter, we’re focusing on the family because, well, sometimes it’s fun to just lean back from the dinner table and watch everyone else argue.

So, pick a skipper for 2023: Miguel Cairo, Tony La Russa, Ozzie Guillen or A.J. Pierzynski?

“I choose the guillotine,” @bigballerbro commented.

We also asked about Sunday’s Bears-Giants game. Who’s going to win?

“Bear down!” @KurtisArndt wrote. “I haven’t lost faith in Justin Fields and won’t any time soon.”

Finally, we asked about Northwestern’s plans to build a state-of-the-art football stadium by 2026. Will you be there with purple bells on?

On to the polls:

Poll No. 1: Pick one of these guys (yes, you have to) to manage the White Sox in 2023:

Upshot: Looks like Ozzie’s the man. Nobody will have to tell him that, of course. “The only guy to win it all on the South Side in the last 100 years,” @JeffreyCanalia pointed out. What about Pierzynski, the only man of the four who hasn’t done the job before? “Absolutely A.J.,” @RonaldVoigt4 offered. “He knows baseball inside and out. And if effort is lacking, I would love to see these lollygaggers meeting A.J. on the dugout steps.”

Poll No. 2: The 2-1 Bears visit the 2-1 Giants on Sunday. Who wins?

Upshot: Did voters forget about Giants running back Saquon Barkley? Or maybe they’re too stricken with Khalil Herbert fever to care. Two blah teams with subpar offenses and quarterbacks who get chased around unmercifully go at it, and it’s kind of hilarious to realize that one of these teams is going to wake up 3-1 on Monday.

Poll No. 3: Will a state-of-the-art Northwestern football stadium make you more interested in the Wildcats?

Upshot: As @RLins12 put it, “The lesson from this poll is the only thing that makes fans show up at NU is winning a bunch.” @WildcatReport called the results “depressing, but not surprising — Chicago sports fans will come once to check it out and then probably won’t come back.” Clearly, the powers that be in Evanston have higher hopes than that.

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KEY MATCHUP

Two years after he torn his ACL in Week 2 against the Bears, Giants running back Saquon Barkley has regained his old form. The No. 2 overall pick of the 2018 draft has rushed for 317 yards and two touchdowns on 53 carries (6.0 avg.) — including a 68-yard run against the Titans and a 36-yard touchdown run against the Cowboys on Monday night.

Bears linebacker Roquan Smith is coming off a big-impact game, with 16 tackles, two tackles for loss and a fourth-quarter interception that led to the winning field goal against the Texans. He’s looking forward to the challenge.

“He’s a dynamic runner. He’s been that way since college,” Smith said. “He does a lot of different things, but hey, that’s what makes me me. So I look forward to those opportunities to go against a back like that.”

TRENDING

The Bears’ 45 pass attempts this season are the fewest through three games in the NFL since 1972 –when the Bears’ Bobby Douglass completed 15-of-43 passes for 214 yards (but rushed for 247) against the Falcons, Rams and Lions.

“We’ve got to do what’s best across the board — how we can take advantage of matchups sometimes,,” offensive coordinator Luke Getsy said. “And hopefully as we go along, it’ll be different each week. That’s how we view it — it has been different each week. Maybe from an outsider looking in it doesn’t appear that way, but it really has been.”

We’ll see about that. With the Bears second in the NFL in rushing (186.7 yards per game), opponents — like the Giants — figure to load up the box to defend the run, which in theory will open opportunities in the passing game. In theory.

PLAYER TO WATCH

Bears quarterback Justin Fields is under the microscope more than ever after innaccurate throws marked a dismal performance in Week 3. He completed 8-of-17 passes for 106 yards, with notable misses — overthrew on two interceptions and a bad miss on a simple swing pass to running back Trestan Ebner among them.

“Part of the process. That’s all it is,” he said when asked if three weeks of subpar performance have become a mental challenge as well. “It was frustrating for sure. [I’ve] got to learn from my mistakes.”

X-FACTOR

Injuries have started to impact the Bears’ lineup. Cornerback Jaylon Johnson (quad) will miss his second consecutive game — undrafted rookie Jaylon Jones replaced him in the nickel package.

The Giants are playing on a short week after losing 23-16 to the Cowboys on Monday Night Football — with both games at home. But they lost wide receiver Sterling Shepard (13 receptions, 154 yards, on touchdown) to a season-ending torn ACL against the Cowboys, leaving them with Richie James (14-146), David Sills (5-57) and Kenny Golladay (2-22) as the top three receivers for Daniel Jones.

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Everything feels fresh to Bears safety Eddie Jackson, and it’s impossible to overlook how the coaching change renewed his enthusiasm.

It was evident in April at minicamp after an offseason of waiting to see if he’d be traded or released. Jackson simply looked joyful. His face lit up with every question about how he’d fit into the new scheme under coach Matt Eberflus and defensive coordinator Alan Williams.

It was perfect timing. Everything had cleared up for Jackson, including some challenges in his personal life and various frustrations on the field, and the change sparked him.

“It just felt that much better, man,” Jackson said. “I could really start over and build from here on what I really want to do.

“And that was the message from the coaches when they came to me and explained how they wanted me to play. I was very happy with it.”

And he has been thrilled since.

After two seasons without an interception, Jackson already has two as he eyes Giants quarterback Daniel Jones on Sunday.

Jackson, 28, was the wild card of the defensive players Eberflus and general manager Ryan Poles inherited. If he produced like the All-Pro he was in 2018, he could be integral to the rebuild. If not, it would be time to offload the remaining three years and $51.9 million on his contract.

Both sides are glad they kept him. Eberflus raved this week about Jackson’s conditioning and effort, and Jackson sees a brighter future than ever with the Bears.

“I know how it works in the league, and guys don’t stay with one team, but that’s something I’d really love,” he said. “I love it here. I love the tradition and the history. And right now, we’re balling. So I want to keep this thing going and finish out my career here as a Bear.”

If he keeps playing like this, that should happen.

Eberflus and Williams envisioned Jackson as a roving threat deep in the secondary who would be a constant concern for quarterbacks.

Sound familiar? That’s exactly what he was in 2018, when the Bears also had Adrian Amos. Jackson had six interceptions and a fumble recovery and scored three touchdowns. But when Amos left in free agency, the team kept trying to replace him on the cheap, and that left Jackson with wide-ranging responsibilities.

Enter Jaquan Brisker.

The Bears invested the 48th overall pick in 2022 on Brisker and projected him as a do-it-all safety in the long run. For now, though, he specializes in playing strong safety and freeing up Jackson.

He’s also the best talent they’ve paired with Jackson since Amos.

“Watching last year’s games, it seemed like he did a lot of the work,” Brisker said. “He looked like he was really trying to be a savior almost.

“If I’m in the box, he’s up high where he can cover the field, read the quarterback and make plays on the ball.”

Jackson was willing to play the way the Bears asked him to the last few seasons but didn’t think it made the best use of his abilities the way this arrangement does.

“This is what I’ve mastered,” he said. “This is my strength. . . . That’s really the big change.”

Eberflus also overhauled the Bears philosophically, particularly with an emphasis on always practicing with game-level intensity. It was interesting to see how that would sit with veterans, but Jackson actually credited it as a reason he’s playing better.

“We practice fast, so it’s natural to do it in a game,” he said. “We’re so conditioned as a team. Everybody’s not doing that. . . .I’ve been here six years, and this is the first year we actually go out there and practice fast all the time, so that’s a huge help.”

It’s working for Jackson, and he’s proved to be compatible with Eberflus and Williams. Once a potential misfit, Jackson looks like a perfect match.

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When his older daughter started playing hockey in 2017, Ryan Kalcich realized his family ought to pick an NHL team to follow.

But living near Green Bay, Wisconsin, there was no obvious choice.

”The Wild games are blacked out here, so we couldn’t watch them,” he said. ”We bought an NHL package online, and it was like, ‘The Blackhawks used to be pretty good, and they have some pretty good players.’ ”

The Kalciches have remained Hawks fans since, even as the team’s performance has lagged. But the four-hour driving distance from their house to downtown Chicago, combined with the Hawks rarely playing Saturday home games, has made it difficult for him to take his daughters — his younger one since has taken up hockey, too — to see the Hawks live.

That will change this weekend. For the first time in 29 years, the NHL will return to Wisconsin when the Hawks and Wild face off in a preseason game Sunday in Milwaukee at Fiserv Forum, the home of the NBA’s Bucks.

Although the American Hockey League’s Admirals and the University of Wisconsin’s hockey programs long have cultivated sizable followings, hosting a (somewhat) official NHL game on home soil represents a new high-water mark for Wisconsin’s slowly growing hockey community.

”We were all pretty jacked when we heard,” Kalcich said. ”It shows NHL hockey to the Wisconsin area. And the fact it’s against the Wild makes it even better.”

Neutral-site preseason games, driven by the NHL’s interest in growing the popularity of hockey outside pre-existing hotbeds and influenced by typically poor attendance for preseason games in NHL arenas, have existed for decades.

Fourteen non-NHL cities — ranging from Bern, Switzerland, to Gander, Newfoundland, to Boise, Idaho — will host exhibitions this year, including some that do so almost annually.

Milwaukee used to be in that rotation. The Bradley Center, the Bucks’ former arena, hosted games annually from 1988 to 1993, including a Hawks-Kings regular-season matchup in December 1992. Milwaukee was considered a prime candidate for an NHL expansion team at the time, with former Hawks broadcaster Lloyd Pettit offering $72 million in a bid that never came to fruition.

Hawks business president Jaime Faulkner was watching a stream of the Blues-Hawks exhibition game last year — held in the Kansas City suburb of Independence, Missouri — when the thought that evolved into this game first crossed her mind.

”It gave me the idea of, ‘Should we be thinking of doing a neutral-site game?’ ” Faulkner said. ”Coming up with the location that would be great for our players and for our fans, I thought of Fiserv immediately.

”I called [Bucks president] Peter Feigin, who I know really well, and said: ‘Hey, I’ve got this crazy idea. What would you think if we came in and played a preseason game?’ I couldn’t even get the sentence completed, and he was like, ‘Hell, yeah, let’s do it.’ ”

Neither Faulkner nor Feigin realized at the time what a significant undertaking planning the game would be. It turned out new boards had to be purchased and installed because the boards the arena previously had used for college hockey tournaments didn’t meet NHL standards. Sorting out the Hawks’ and Bucks’ sometimes-overlapping, sometimes-conflicting corporate sponsorships was also a puzzle.

But selling tickets proved to be simple, because demand was sky-high from the start.

Advance sales to Hawks and Bucks season-ticket holders gobbled up nearly all the roughly 15,000 available seats. Once ticket sales went public, the game sold out in less than an hour. Remarkably, Wisconsin residents accounted for 81% of sales, compared with 7% from Illinois and 11% from other states, including Minnesota.

”It shouldn’t have been a surprise, because the data indicated this would be the case, but we were thrilled,” Faulkner said. ”We have been doing a lot of analysis of where our fan base is . . . [and] we have a lot of fans to the north of us, extending into Milwaukee.”

At McGillycuddy’s, which proclaims itself to be Milwaukee’s only official Blackhawks bar, manager T.J. Tomes has seen plenty of anecdotal evidence of that.

The bar typically draws a few dozen Hawks fans on an average game night, but its crowds have dwindled since the dynasty era. Leading up to the 6:30 p.m. puck drop Sunday, however, Tomes said he expects the atmosphere to compare to the Stanley Cup runs of old.

”Fans are going to come out of the woodwork,” he said.

The Hawks’ trip to Milwaukee also will be special for one of its primary participants: new forward Colin Blackwell.

Blackwell met his fianc?e, Lauren, while playing for the Admirals in 2019-20 and now calls Milwaukee home, living there during his summers off. Many of his future in-laws will be in attendance Sunday, watching him play in an NHL game for the first time in person.

”Sometimes when you play this game, people don’t realize I’m not by my friends and family really ever,” Blackwell said. ”[This will be] special because she has some grandparents and family that are a little bit new to hockey and really haven’t gotten a chance to watch me play over the last couple of years.”

He said he expects a lively mood in the building.

”[Wisconsin’s] hockey community is really blossoming, and it’s slowly catching up with the surrounding states,” he said. ”A lot of people are Wild fans and a lot of people are Blackhawks fans, so to have those two teams come in . . . is going to be awesome.”

The Hawks would like to make hosting a preseason home game somewhere outside Chicago into an annual tradition, Faulkner said, and planning for a 2023 event will begin soon. Rockford, Indianapolis and South Bend, Indiana, are three possible cities under consideration.

But first comes Sunday and Milwaukee’s long-awaited reintroduction to the NHL.

Notes:

Defenseman Connor Murphy has missed the last two days of training camp with lower-back soreness and likely won’t play in either preseason game this weekend. (The Hawks will host the Red Wings on Saturday at the United Center before their trip Sunday to Milwaukee.) Coach Luke Richardson said Murphy’s absence is mainly precautionary.The Hawks cut their camp roster to 50 on Friday, assigning a dozen players to the IceHogs’ camp.Read More

Cute title, this week, huh? With all due respect to the original and biblical ”Pride goeth before the fall” from the Book of Proverbs, my Book of Four Seasons (not the one with Frankie Valli) indicates that summer precedes the fall.

Baseball is made up of four seasons: the spring, which is when it begins; the summer, when most of the season is played; the fall, when the playoffs and World Series are played; and the offseason, when we wait for baseball to resume.

Today’s questions focus on the summer, those miserable days from June 21 to Sept. 22, when hopes went from high to being dashed in Chicago. But you can make up for it by doing well on the quiz today. Good luck.

1. Who had a better won/lost record this summer?

a. Cubs b. White Sox c. The same

2. Who hit more home runs this summer?

a. Cubs b. White Sox c. The same

3. Who had a better ERA this summer?

a. Cubs b. White Sox c. The same

4. Did Sox batters have more strikeouts or did their pitchers strike out more opponents this summer? Or was the number the same?

5. Eloy Jimenez led Chicago with 13 homers this summer. Patrick Wisdom was next with 11. Ian Happ was one of three Chicagoans with 10 (Gavin Sheets and Andrew Vaughn were the other two). Was the Eloy, Patrick and Ian total (that would be 34) more, less or the same as Aaron Judge?

6. Which Sox pitcher suffered the most losses this summer?

a. Johnny Cueto

b. Lance Lynn

c. Lucas Giolito

d. Michael Kopech

e. They all lost the same number

7. Who led Chicago in extra-base hits this

summer?

a. Ian Happ

b. Andrew Vaughn

c. Jose Abreu

d. Nico Hoerner

e. They all had the same number

8. Which team had the most come-from-behind victories (winning a game in which the opponent held the lead at any point) this summer?

a. Cubs b. White Sox c. The same

9. OK, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons’ third

No. 1 hit was ”Walk Like a Man.” Rays pitchers walked 184 batters this summer, the fewest in the majors. Sox pitchers walked 245 and Cubs pitchers walked 274. The Yankees drew 325 walks this summer to lead the majors. Which Chicago team walked more frequently?

a. Cubs b. White Sox c. The same

ANSWERS

1. The Cubs went 40-43, and the White Sox went 44-41. The Sox were 12th in the majors and the Cubs 16th.

2. The Cubs out-homered the Sox 84-82.

3. The Cubs’ ERA was 3.58, ninth in the majors; the Sox’ ERA was 3.70, 10th in the majors.

4. Sox batters struck out 677 times and their pitchers recorded 729 whiffs. In case you were wondering (I know you were), Cubs batters struck out 753 times and their pitchers whiffed 708 opponents.

5. Aaron Judge, the star of the summer, slammed 35 homers, one more than Chicago’s top three homer hitters.

6. They all lost six times. For that matter, Mark Leiter Jr. led the Cubs in losses with six, as well.

7. Ian Happ had 35 extra-base hits, Andrew Vaughn 28, Jose Abreu 27 and Nico Hoerner 24.

8. The Cubs had 17 comebacks; the Sox had 20.

9. The Cubs walked 231 times. It wouldn’t have killed the Sox to walk more than 209 times. They were 26th in the majors.

Oh, ”Sherry” and ”Big Girls Don’t Cry” were the first two No. 1 singles for the Four Seasons.

Hey, don’t worry about what season it is, the quizmaster is not going anywhere. I’ll see you next week.

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There’s still time for Justin Fields to straighten out his season and show he can be a franchise quarterback, but he’s already in quite a deep hole.

No NFL quarterback has thrown fewer passes this season, or accomplished so little with them. Fields has the least yardage and highest interception percentage by a wide margin heading into the Bears’ game against the Giants on Sunday. And it’s hard to decide which is more jarring, his 51.1% completion rate or his 50.0 passer rating through three games. Both, again, are league lows.

There’s still a lot of hope for Fields because during his turbulent two seasons, there have been moments that spark it. And when the fans and organization want so badly for it to be true, it doesn’t take much to keep those dreams going.

Remember his wild touchdown run against the 49ers last season? The frenzied rally in Pittsburgh on “Monday Night Football”? The way he kept the Bears within reach deep into the fourth quarter against the Packers in his fourth career start?

All three of those games ended in defeat, by the way, but the focus was on Fields showing promise. At some point, however, he has to deliver on that promise by playing consistently. Almost any quarterback can pull off some big plays — or even big games — here and there.

Fields’ struggles are alarming because they’ve come at a time when everyone expected he’d be coming into his own. They’re also concerning because this isn’t a sharp departure from his overall performance last season. Through 15 career games, he has completed 57.8% of his passes and thrown for nine touchdowns against 14 interceptions for a 69.9 passer rating.

Over the last three decades, the list of quarterbacks who had a sub-70.0 rating through 15 games is scary — only sparsely decorated with players turning that around to achieve long-term success. It includes many more dreadful draft picks (David Carr, Rick Mirer, Akili Smith, Joey Harrington) than it does resurgent mainstays (Donovan McNabb, Alex Smith). The Bears’ 1999 first-round pick, Cade McNown, is on that list. Through his first 15 games, he was at 67.7.

And although passer rating is not the all-encompassing, defining statistic it sounds like, it does provide a reasonable sketch of a quarterback’s performance — minus his rushing prowess, which is a significant factor for Fields, who has 515 yards and three touchdowns as a runner.

Among the 16 quarterbacks who were first- or second-team on any of the foremost All-Pro lists over the last decade, the average passer rating for their first 15 games was 88.0.

Of the 11 quarterbacks — yes, 11 — who made the Pro Bowl last season, the average passer rating for their first 15 games was 90.8.

Passer ratings in that range aren’t amazing, but they pointed toward bright futures for most of the quarterbacks.

The lowest of that group was Josh Allen at 71.7, and he has been an MVP contender the last three seasons, so that provides at least a little optimism for Fields. Drew Brees, Peyton Manning and Kirk Cousins were in the 70s through 15 games, as well.

One of the Pro Bowl quarterbacks last season was Mac Jones, whom the Patriots drafted four spots after the Bears took Fields at No. 11. Jones landed in the most favorable situation of any rookie that year and has made the most of it, currently leading the 2021 draft class with an 89.9 passer rating, 67.3% completion rate, 4,587 yards and 24 touchdown passes. He also has thrown a class-worst 18 interceptions, including three pick-sixes.

Fields, meanwhile, beats only the Jets’ Zach Wilson in passer rating (69.7) and completion percentage (55.6%), and he has the highest interception percentage at 4.4%.

There are a variety of mitigating factors that must be considered in Fields’ case. When Giants owner John Mara said of quarterback Daniel Jones in January, “We’ve done everything possible to screw this kid up,” it was easy to imagine the same line coming from Bears chairman George McCaskey about Fields. There was so much wrong with his rookie season under former coach Matt Nagy that it’s hard to identify what the Bears actually accomplished with him. When Ryan Poles took over as general manager, he said the adverse circumstances clouded his evaluation of Fields.

Asked what good came out of his 2021 experience, Fields told the Sun-Times, “You may not know now why that happened last year, so I can’t fully answer that question for you, but you might find that out in the next two or three years. It’s just all about the journey.”

Fields spent the months before his rookie season stuck on second string behind journeyman Andy Dalton, and Nagy never seemed to know what to do with him. In his debut, he played five snaps sprinkled in against the Rams as part of a plan that was as confusing as it was ineffective. In Fields’ first start against the Browns, Nagy’s game plan was so disastrous that the Bears had their worst offensive output in more than 40 years and Nagy gave up play-calling shortly after.

There also were major flaws in the personnel assembled by former general manager Ryan Pace, leaving Fields to play behind an unreliable offensive line and throw to an inadequate crew of targets. The Bears are still seeking concrete proof that Poles has fixed those issues.

Nonetheless, Fields was the one who threw those passes. He’s not absolved from poor decisions and inaccurate throws because of what went on around him. As he grows, he’ll need to rise above imperfect circumstances.

But he needs to do it quickly. There’s only so long the Bears can wait.

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At some point, everyone in the NBA is weighed, measured and found wanting.

That’s the reality of the league.

Bulls coach Billy Donovan knows exactly how it works.

This will be the third year of the four-year deal Donovan signed in 2020. He coached through a pandemic and a roster turnover in his first season, got the franchise back to the playoffs last season and has a whole new set of expectations tossed upon his shoulders this season, which tips off in a few weeks.

Those expectations were laid down this week by executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas.

“We’ve talked to Billy, and obviously last year we were not surprised we made the playoffs,” Karnisovas said. “A lot of people were surprised. Nor should we be surprised to make the playoffs this year, but we want to see improvement.

“We have to do better than last year . . . you can get by a round. Those are the expectations.”

Fair or unfair, there are layers to Karnisovas’ statement.

First, does that mean it will be second round or bust for Donovan and his coaching future? Second, if the Bulls should fall short of those expectations, is Karnisovas the type of executive who falls on the sword and pins the blame on roster-building or does he go into survival mode and put the onus on Donovan?

Finally, and maybe more important, is the front office raising those expectationsunderstanding the reality of the Eastern Conference and just saying the right things or has it fooled itself into thinking that this team is somehow better than it is perceived by most?

This season will tell a lot about Karnisovas & Co., and Donovan could be the scapegoat depending on which direction the Bulls go.

Welcome to the pressure of NBA coaching, a pool Donovan has been swimming in since 2015.

“I think I’m always in that pool regardless, whether it was my first year or last year: How do you continue to make the crew better?” Donovan said when asked if he was feeling more pressure than usual this season.

And while he’s on board with the expectation of getting past Round 1, he’s also dealing in reality.

“If you look at [last] season in its totality, we made a jump from the first year to the second year, but if you really start to put a magnifying glass up to it, after the All-Star break against some of the better teams, we were really, really dominated,” Donovan said. “How do we get better in those areas against those elite teams?”

That’s what Donovan and his staff have to figure out.

And they’ll have to solve the problem with starting point guard Lonzo Ball (left knee surgery) sidelined at least six more weeks and almost the same cast of characters in a league that seemed to figure out how to slow down DeMar DeRozan and Zach LaVine.

Good luck.

Another side note: Donovan has never been fired from a coaching gig — college or NBA.

“I think we had the third-best record last year in close games, but when you go against the best teams, and there weren’t a lot of games, to be honest with you, that we were close against those teams, but the games that we were, we were 1-8,” Donovan said. “[Relying on DeRozan and LaVine], that’s only going to get us so far. We have to do other things to take another step, and that’s where I think our focus has to be.”

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