Some Bulls players could use the downtime, but not all of themJoe Cowleyon December 14, 2021 at 5:55 pm

Guards Lonzo Ball and Zach LaVine were playing heavy minutes and were looking for a rest, so that’s why Bulls coach Billy Donovan felt the pause could “pay dividends” for a few on his roster. But there’s the other side of this, and players who didn’t need this week-long shutdown.

If Nikola Vucevic had an answer he would have offered it up.

That’s the state of the Bulls these days, however. A lot of questions and very few answers.

“I guess it’s part of the world we live in, this whole situation with Covid,” Vucevic said over the weekend. “A lot of it doesn’t make much sense right now. Obviously the scientists from around the world don’t have the answer, so I don’t. Some things are just weird.”

Little did Vucevic know at the time that things were about to get even weirder for the Bulls.

When he spoke in Miami there were seven of his teammates in the NBA’s coronavirus health and safety protocol. He himself was a month removed from that same protocol. By the time the Bulls landed back in Chicago from the two-game road trip and were about to start the week with a Monday practice, the number of his teammates that were in the protocol was up to 10.

By Monday afternoon, the NBA said enough was enough, postponing the Tuesday game with Detroit, as well as the Thursday game in Toronto. On Tuesday, they then moved the Sunday game with the Lakers from an afternoon tip-off at the United Center to a 7 pm tipoff.

That was standard procedure last season for many day games, with the league wanting to test the Bulls fully before playing Los Angeles, rather than having to get them up early in the morning for testing to make the 2:30 pm tip-off work.

Meanwhile, there’s still a basketball element to all of this for the Bulls. Specifically, which players has this pause really hurt?

For a guy like Vucevic, who has been searching for consistency and a rhythm on the offensive end, it was likely a gut-punch. Playing a drowning Pistons team that had lost 12 straight, might have been the perfect remedy for the center on pace to shoot a career-low 40.4% from the field.

Instead, Vucevic has more time off, and when play does resume he might have to deal with Anthony Davis if the Lakers use a smaller starting lineup that they rolled out last week.

Other Bulls hurt by the layoff:

Coby White – The guard was set to return on Tuesday, cleared of the protocol by all accounts. He could have definitely used the run.

Because of offseason shoulder surgery, White missed all summer activity, fall camp and has only played in nine of the 27 regular-season game. He was starting to get his minutes ramped up, and then went into the protocol.

So not only does White have to make sure his conditioning is back yet again, but also keep trying to hold off Ayo Dosunmu from taking his minutes because the fact is the rookie has simply played better than White as that combo guard off the bench.

The other downside for White was even if the Bulls are looking to shop him and get him elsewhere, more missed games means more missed film and scouting opportunities for interested teams.

DeMar DeRozan – The veteran has played like an MVP candidate all season, but was on a head-shaking roll before he went into the protocol. In his last five games before he was shut down, DeRozan averaged 28.4 points per game and did so by shooting 56% from the field.

Yes, he’s a veteran and knows how to take care of his body during pauses, but missing 14 days between dominating in Brooklyn and then playing the Lakers will really test how quickly he can get back in that zone.

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