With the 1st Pick…

Either Derrick Rose or Michael Beasley. This decision will be agoniozed over for the next month as much as any 1/ 2 picks have been in any sport; think Peyton Manning or Ryan Leaf. Well hopefully neither one of these guys blows up like Leaf. The buzz is though that these two are the clear favorites to go in the top 2, although OJ Mayo is shooting up draft boards all over the country. I still think it will be Rose and Beasley or Beasley and Rose. The best predicter of the Draft www.nbadraft.net has yet to update their mock draft since the Lottery order was announced, so they still have Rose going in the top spot. I will do a point/counter point on each guy.

Making the case for Derrick Rose. He has overwhelmingly been the top choice amongst NBA execs for almost a year now, and a Chicago native. He made the Memphis Tigers a legit title contender and lifted them to another level. He has a great shooting touch and already has NBA range. He can create and get to the basket as well as anyone in the draft. He has a chance to raise a teams level of play exponetially.

Making the case against Derrick Rose. Well Chicago has a pretty solid NBA back court. Now I know Kirk Hinrich isn’t as good as Rose, but he is a productive NBA point. The Bulls get all of their scoring from the backcourt with Hinrich, Ben Gordon and Luol Deng. Being a Chicago native may also be a drawback here, especially with the temptation of young athletes today, giving Rose a boatload of money and fame and unleashing on his hometown could prove to be costly.

Making the case for Michael Beasley. Ahhh, have you seen him play? He is Kevin Durant but with some physical size in his repetoire. Beasley has a good shooting touch, probably from 18 feet right now in the league (though he showed the ability to hit the college 3). He does a great job of taking the ball at defender and can score in traffic and shoot a very high percentage, and the Bulls need a ton of frontcourt scoring. A relentless rebounder, Beasley also has a better defensive game than most give him credit for.

Making the case against Michaeal Beasley. Well the Bulls have drafted a power forward with their last 2 top ten picks, Tyrus Thomas and Joakim Noah. There are some who think Beasley to be a little bit in between positions and may take a year or two to develop his game. Chicago is looking to move back into the mainstream media and taking the local boy over Beasley would just seem to be a better fit.

Looking at all I don’t think you can really go wrong. If you draft Rose that would make Hinrich expendible, and he is tradeable. On the other hand taking Beasley fills an immediate need for froncourt production in the scoring column night in and night out.