Billy Donovan: True reason Bulls hit a home run with new head coach hire

The Chicago Bulls have been a mess over the last few years, but the Billy Donovan hiring provides real hope for real change.

The Chicago Bulls have been a mess over the last few years, and fans of the franchise have agreed that their front office known as GarPax was largely to blame. The #FireGarPax was a cry for help from Bulls fans just wanting a competent basketball team again. Now, Chicago has relieved Gar Forman of his GM duties, John Paxson is moving to an advisory role, and the franchise has a new head coach in Billy Donovan.

On the daily Locked On Bulls Podcast, hosts Matt Peck and Jordan Maly explain why the Donovan hiring proves that the Bulls' new front office is finally fulfilling their promise to bring about real change in the franchise.

Matt Peck: I’m shocked and pleasantly so because we can talk about Billy Donovan's resume and his fit with this roster and all of that. But to me, the biggest, biggest takeaway, and in some cases the only important takeaway from this right now, is that (Arturas Karnisovas) and his bosses, the ownership group of this team, are continuing to prove that it wasn’t just lip service when they talked about creating change, that all of the panic we had about bringing Jim Boylan back and thinking, even if they fired Boylen, they're probably going to go with some cheapy first time head coach, and all of the other doubts about real change happening when they brought in AK.

It's actually real. This is the latest example of the person who the Reinsdorf's hired to effect changes the way AK phrased it himself. And Ryan Michael Reinsdorf had a comment, who was similarly hired to bring change to this organization. He is doing it and they are letting him do it because Donovan, as you said, not expected. Along with probably just Mike D'Antoni, the top tier available coaches in the NBA with experience. Donovan is the fourth winningest coach (by win percentage) in the NBA right now behind I believe only Popovich, Steve Kerr, and Nick Nurse. He has the 16th best winning percentage among NBA coaches in history with at least 100 games coached.

We know about his two titles back in his college coaching days because they happened with one of the most beloved Bulls of all time, Joakim Noah, and that's all gravy on top.

But to me, it is all about this. The Reinsdorfs said change, AK's said change, and this is change. This is the first hire the Bulls have made to be their next head coach with head coaching experience already on the resume since Scott Skiles in 2003.