There is weeping wailing and gnashing of teeth in Chicago today because the Chicago Bulls couldn't pull the trigger on a deal with Mike D'Antoni.  Of course, according to Jay Mariotti, it's about money, which it isn't because D'Antoni never got around to asking the Bulls how much they would pay.  This was just Jay's opportunity to take shots at his hated nemesis Jerry Reinsdorf.  Truth is, Mr. Mouth, Scott Skiles was rewarded handsomely for coaching the Bulls, so money is not an object unless you are looking for target practice which is often the case.  And kids, when I defend The Chairman, you know he's not be treated fairly.

But wait, as usual, there's more. In accepting the challenge of rebuilding the Knicks, D'Antoni may have just killed his career.

Every coach thinks he's a genius and that his way, applied in a different environment will work.  But what they fail to realize is that there are all kinds of factors that they don't count on that bring them down.  The salary cap for instance.  In baseball, you can back the truck up, gut your team, rebuild with youth, have a few good drafts, bring in a few key free agents and you go from being the 2005 Detroit Tigers to the 2006 Detroit Tigers.  In the NBA, this is not possible.

So, D'Antoni iinherits a team with a losing culture that is not very good whch begs the question will the clock run out on him before he can turn Cinderella into a princess?  Anyone remember a guy named Doug Collins who primed the pump for the Bulls, couldn't get them past the Pistons, got fired and was replaced by some zenmaster named Phil who could?  How about Rick Carlisle in Detroit, getting bumped for Flip Saunders?

In all fairness to Pax and The Chairman, it was D'Antoni who lost out on the opportunity and may have jeopardized his career as opposed to the Bulls being cheap or slow or whatever paranoid scandals Mariotti is cooking up this time.

In time, the Bulls will name a new coach and we will judge them at that point.  But not when a coach decides that he can go into the biggest and harshest sports market in the country and right the Titanic.  Besides, if D'Antoni was really that good, he'd still be in Phoenix.