During Chicago home games, Taj Gibson usually sits relatively undisturbed at his locker. Despite the fact that he plays for one of the best teams in the league in one of the country’s largest sports markets, media has never really shown him much attention.
But when you travel to Los Angeles for NBA All-Star Weekend, it doesn’t matter how quiet and reserved you are; if you’re answering questions reporters will descend upon you. And when you play for a team as good as the Bulls with a superstar as amazing as Derrick Rose, there’s no shortage of questions to ask, starting with the effect that first year head coach Tom Thibodeau has had on this team’s success.
"He just knows what players want to do. He gets us better every day in practice. He doesn’t take any shortcuts, and he has that championship mindset," Gibson said about his coach. "You can feel it every time we practice just with how hard everybody comes. There’s really no days off, and [Thibodeau] wants us to play like that every time we play. We understand that we have to get up to a higher level if we want to get the championship level like the Boston Celtics and the L.A. Lakers are."
Winning the last game before the break against the league-best San Antonio Spurs was a strong statement that Chicago is approaching that elite level, but Gibson knows they still have a ways to go.
"Our goal is just to take it one game at a time," he said. "[Coach Thibodeau] just wanted us to finish strong. He told us not to worry about the break, that some guys tend to go on the break already with the state of mind most guys are in. He just wanted us to focus."
And focus they did. It’s something Gibson has never really had a problem doing having been forced into a huge minutes for the majority of the season, first as a replacement for Carlos Boozer and then for Joakim Noah.
Boozer has been especially helpful in Gibson’s development in his second season, as Gibson himself openly admits.
"Since the beginning of the year when I had to fill in for him, he was right there behind me, helping out with my game," Gibson said about Boozer. "Even on days off we work, we shoot, and almost every drill we do, we do together. He’s just been a great attribute to this team, and he’s been helping me with my growth."
{AUTHOR_BOX}As for Rose, Gibson admits that he and his teammates have grown relatively immune to his athletic antics on what seems to be a nightly basis.
"You expect to see him do certain crazy things because he does it in practice all the time, but in games, those people don’t get to see him practice and work on his game," Gibson said, adding, "He’s really humble, and one of the leaders of our team."
So where do Gibson and his Bulls go after the break? They’re eyes are focused solely on the prize.
"Coach Thibodeau has us in the right state of mind, and he wants us to get better and better, make a late playoff run, and hopefully win a championship one of these years coming up."
If that happens, we can rest assured that Gibson won’t be left to his own devices at his locker during home games anywhere. In the aftermath of winning a championship in Chicago, every important Bull would get slammed with media all the time.
And that would be the kind of attention that Taj Gibson deserves.