Considering I’m a Chicago Bulls supporter, I frequent your website quite often. Also, following them on Twitter allows me to receive recent news from the Chicago Bulls. Sam Smith is very knowledgeable about all things NBA and actually writes solely for the Chicago Bulls website. Here is a brief review of Sam Smith according to the website, “The Chicago Bulls announced on October 24, 2008 that prominent Chicago veteran sportswriter Sam Smith will write his entire future and continue his popular NBA column exclusively on the team.Smith covered the Bulls and the NBA for the Chicago Tribune for 25 years.He is the author of the bestselling The Jordan Rules, which was in the top ten on the New York Times bestseller list for three months. In his career, Smith has been a basketball columnist for MSNBC Sports, ESPN.com, ESPN The Magazine, SportingNews.com and HoopsHype.com.”
I’ve been reading Sam Smith’s articles for the last two years, ever since I got that spark of interest in basketball back. As a child I always dreamed of playing basketball in the NBA, as I’m sure many children did when they were younger. Other hobbies kept me away from basketball for a while, but once I got interested again, it was all over from there. Coincidentally, it happened just as the Chicago Bulls received the number one pick in the 2008 draft. When I saw Derrick Rose play for the first time, I immediately regained my connection to the Chicago Bulls.
Sam Smith not only writes about the Chicago Bulls, but news from around the league. I find his articles to be very well written and I share them with friends if I think they might find them interesting as well. Sam has the ability to speak his mind and I find myself agreeing with him almost all the time. Maybe it’s because I’m biased towards the Bulls and all the things that Bulls fans might think, like Lebron James is just a big-headed, selfish baby who brags too much. I agree that he is tremendously talented, but he never saw Michael Jordan dancing on the sidelines during a landslide victory. Lebron James’ character is out of control and I think Sam Smith would agree.
One of the first articles Sam wrote was about Derrick Rose. Looking back on this article, I realize how right Sam was on Derrick Rose and how wrong he was on Michael Beasley. Sam talks about Rose at the beginning of his article and how he has the potential to match up with Chris Paul and Deron Williams. Derrick is bigger than Paul and faster than Deron Williams, Sam was right about that. He even called Derrick a “number one” player (ironically, that’s his game number)… he won rookie of the year with ease and now leads his Bulls team in points per game this season. In this year’s playoffs he ranked fifth in points per game, points scored, assists per game and assists. He may only be for the first round, but Sam was right that he’s No. 1. He’s also probably the No. 1 player to play next season on a lot of those high-end free agents.
Sam Smith also mentioned in his article that Michael Beasley would be an “instant scorer” for the Miami Heat. He was partly right, but Beasley hasn’t been considered an offensive threat. He only averaged 13 and 14 points per game, respectively, in his first two seasons.
Over the past few years, one of the most talked about topics for Sam Smith (as well as anyone else in the NBA) has been the free agent class of 2010. I’m sure I’ll be reading many more articles from Sam in the next weeks. the off-season is coming up pretty fast. In this particular article, Sam Smith talks about the different ways teams can become championship-caliber teams. One way, he says, is the old-fashioned way of acquiring draft picks and placing bets on how well college talent will develop a team over time. But he points out that the only champion team where this has worked in the last decade is the San Antonio Spurs.
I might add that those same Spurs have won 4 championships since 1999 (’99, ’03, ’05, ’07). Sam’s other option for developing a team is through free agency. The most notable are the Los Angeles Lakers with the acquisition of Shaquille O’Neal which led them to three consecutive championships. The Pistons did it with the help of Rasheed Wallace, Ben Wallace, Richard Hamilton and Chauncey Billups. The Miami Heat did it with Shaq in 2006 and Boston did it in 2008 with Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett. So he is not a bad choice. Chicago is one of the biggest markets in the NBA and definitely has the potential to attract guys who would like a crowd like that to play. Lebron James would surely love it and Dwyane Wade is originally from Chicago.
Sam Smith has covered free agency in a couple of other articles. This one in particular goes over where he thought, at the time, free agents could land. Sam provides his insider knowledge of things he’s heard around the league about where big free agents can land and what teams rank on his roster. The number one free agent is Lebron James (current MVP, scoring titles, big games, last NBA Finals appearance). Sam ranks the Cavaliers as the number one (and two) destination where he thinks Lebron will go.
His third pick is the Los Angles Lakers. He thinks that with Kobe getting older and Lebron in his prime, they could pair up with some big talent in the middle to win some championships. Sam has been noted to say that Chicago is another place that Lebron is looking at. The second free agent on the list is Dwyane Wade. With Miami in contention for a free agent this summer, he believes Wade will stay in tropical paradise and hopes his club musters some talent to surround him. If that fails, Sam sees Dwyane coming to Chicago or Milwaukee because his children currently live in Chicago and he would like to be closer to them.
