Matas Buzelis Plays Through Illness: 21 Points and a New Rebounding Role for the Chicago Bulls

In the fourth quarter of the second game of the season, Matas Buzelis sat on the bench with a towel around his neck, eyes fixed on the floor. Two nights later he walked into the third game with the illness still in his body, shot 7-of-13 and scored 21 points. Chicago still lost at home to Washington.

And here is where I am about to annoy everyone: those 21 points are the least important thing in this entire story.

The more important thing sits elsewhere. A 22-year-old forward listed at 6-foot-10 has just been handed a job most of the league actively avoids — crashing the offensive glass on every teammate's shot. Not occasionally. Every time. He describes it in the exact language of someone paying a bill: “You've got to run back.” That run-back is the invoice the Chicago staff is quietly signing, and nobody in the meeting room says it out loud to the man who pays it.

People remember the declaration. I want them to stay for the findings.

Context: 1-2, a home loss, and a player being rebuilt

Chicago opened the season 1-2. The most telling result was the home loss to Washington — the kind of should-win that, if repeated, quietly defines a season's ceiling as play-in rather than playoff. Next up is a Monday trip to Boston, right while the team is still searching for a shape.

A three-game sample is always distorted by schedule and health. Chicago landed on both: a strong opponent waiting, and a future cornerstone under the weather. Buzelis is 22, a Chicago native with Lithuanian heritage, listed at 6-foot-10. He is early in a rookie-scale deal — the kind of cost-controlled asset every rebuilding team builds around, because it is cheap and it lasts.

Over the first two games he averaged 12.0 points. In game two he sat out the fourth quarter. In game three, while ill, he shot 7-of-13 for 21 points. Read only the last line and you see a breakout. Read all three and you see a zigzag.

Three quotes paint the picture better than any box score. “I haven't been feeling like myself.” “I'm still trying to adjust to how the team plays.” “The hardest part is being in shape and keeping consistently going.” Put together, they do not describe a player exploding. They describe a player being reassembled.

From the staff side the signal is different. He says all the coaches believe in him and calls the situation part of the process. For a team that just changed systems, that sentence is worth more than an October win.

Why crashing the glass is a contrarian bet

The league's two-decade trend has been spacing. Five players outside the arc, big forwards shooting threes, and an unwritten rule after every shot: turn and run back. Offensive rebounding came to be seen as a luxury from a lost era, because every body on the glass is a body not getting back. Public league data shows offensive rebounding rates sliding from around 30 percent in the early 2000s to below 25 percent — a deliberate retreat, not an accident.

Chicago is going the other way. The new staff wants Buzelis, a 6-foot-10 forward, attacking the glass on purpose. He calls it a role that takes a lot of energy, and adds that after crashing, “you've got to run back.” That trailing clause is the expensive part.

The arithmetic is simple and unpleasant. Every crash buys a second-chance opportunity and stakes a 4-on-5 break at the other end. For