What's a contract but a silly piece of paper?

As upset as I was when Mike D'Antoni first signed on as the Knicks' coach, I, like most Bulls fans, am all the more pissed ever since the Bulls' ping pong balls proved to be this year's version of the '07 Blazers' ping pong balls.

D'Antoni made his panting lust for Derrick Rose well-known prior to the lottery, and it would have been a near certainty that the Bulls would be drafting him next month if D'Antoni were coach. Now--despite Rose's hometown ties and the PR bonanza said ties would reap--I'm not so certain that John Paxson will draft him. As we all know, some GMs--though I'm admittedly not sure where the Pax-man stands on this issue--explicitly avoid bringing in guys who will be playing in their hometown. Plus, Lord Paxington has taken a lot of heat in the past few seasons for not acquiring a good low-post scorer, hence some pressure to take Beasley.

My own worries aside, it's of course D'Antoni who should be--and no doubt is--upset right now, and if it were possible, he might be considering a retroactive "just kidding!" on his contract. Instead of coaching Rose and big men like Joakim Noah and Tyrus Thomas who can run the floor, he's stuck with Jamal Crawford, Eddie Curry, and Snack-Attack Zach, one of the most stationary and team offense-killing big men in the game (the D'Anti-Christ?).

People who believe that the last five years in Phoenix proved D'Antoni's system to be flawed may certainly have a point. Whether it's the case that the type of players needed to run the system properly aren't equipped to win a playoff series against a super-elite team or that the type of players needed to beat super-elite teams can't fit the system or neither, the results never fully panned out for him in the past. But as a spectator in the Bulls' media market, I lament never having the chance to see him try with Rose at the point, even if it failed over and again. Even when Phoenix was losing the last few years, it always looked like it was working, and most importantly, it was purty.

Championships are fun, as all us Chicagolandians got to find out last decade, but they also got sorta old after a while. Maybe Rose (if the Bulls draft him) can score "us" some more. But for me, crazy up-and-down, free-flowing, high-scoring basketball has never gotten old, and unfortunately, it might be a long time until D'Antoni can make it work with the Knicks, if he ever can.