One way to keep up with the Chicago Bulls – beside Yahoo! Sports, that is – is with social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, which might be fun to follow along with as players prepare for a short two-week training camp, free agency and the upcoming 2011-12 NBA season.

With more than four million fans, the Chicago Bulls’ Facebook page ought to be your first stop. The page features news briefs about the team and league as well as information about upcoming games. I follow a lot of web sites in keeping up with the Bulls, and this one is a good source of miscellaneous tidbits.

Chicago Bulls’ players with Facebook pages include Derrick Rose, Carlos Boozer, Joakim Noah, Ronnie Brewer and Kyle Korver. The players use their Facebook pages for everything from contests with prizes to inspirational messages.

Twitter has also proven to be a popular forum for players. Bulls’ players with Twitter accounts include Boozer, Brewer, Korver, Luol Deng, Taj Gibson and C.J. Watson.

The team’s Twitter account, while similar to its Facebook page in content, is also worth following.

Other Twitter users Bulls’ fans might like to follow include the esteemed Sam Smith, who handles bulls.blog.com for the team’s official web site, Chicago Tribune Bulls beat reporter K.C. Johnson and ESPN Bulls beat reporter Nick Friedell (I especially like reading the conversations between Johnson and the players). Another Twitter user to follow is Kelly Scaletta, who cranks out some exceptional copy on the Bulls.

Just for fun, Bulls ambassador Scottie Pippen also has a Twitter account, and the Chicago Luvabulls can be found on Facebook as well as Twitter.

YCN featured sports contributor Steve Merritt is – for better or worse – a lifelong Chicago Bulls, Bears and Cubs fan.

Note: This article was written by a Yahoo! contributor. Sign up here to start publishing your own sports content.

CHICAGO — In the end, Scottie Pippen said, the Chicago Bulls simply did not have the players necessary to beat the Miami Heat and compete for the NBA title. And specifically, the Bulls Hall of Famer said, the highest-priced Bulls players could not be counted on.

“When you’re playing at this stage of the playoffs, the best of the best are still there and you have to have guys stepping up,” Pippen told ESPNChicago.com. “And I just felt like it finally caught up with the Bulls, who didn’t have consistent play from guys who needed to play big down the stretch. When those pieces are not falling into place, you’re going to fall out of it.

“Miami was the better team, they have better finishers and more finishers.”

Specifically, the Bulls could not rely on Carlos Boozer and Joakim Noah when they need them most in the Eastern Conference finals, Pippen said.

“You can’t have two of your top high-paid players sitting on the bench in the fourth quarter,” Pippen said. “And that isn’t just last night’s game. We have seen this the whole season. So for us to think the Bulls are going to go farther when your high-priced players are not going to carry you and finish games for you … you’re not talking about a championship team.

“You can’t hide at this stage of the season. At this point, you have to be able to play through everything because if you’re trying to hide a guy or a guy is not performing for you, it’s going to show offensively in the playoffs and it’s going to be magnified … We all know Carlos did not play at the level the team needed him to and that that hurt them more than anything because they couldn’t rely on him.

“The flagrant foul, the pushing calls, the inability to finish strong around the basket. Now you’re a liability. We can’t hide you and now we have to take you out of the game.”

The Heat closed out the Bulls with an 83-80 victory in Game 5 Thursday night and advanced to play the Dallas Mavericks in the NBA Finals.

Pippen, who was critical of the Bulls’ lack of physical play on defense early in the playoffs, lauded the Bulls’ defense against Miami.

“But the Miami defense is strong, too … and when it came down to it, Miami had three guys who could make shots and the Bulls had maybe two and a half,” he said. “Maybe Lu [Luol Deng], his offense had been there. But it’s a half when Boozer is coming up with 10 points and you need 20, or Joakim is coming up with one point and you needed 10. You never had that third guy.”

The Bulls’ relative lack of playoff experience was commonly cited as a factor throughout the postseason. But to compare this Bulls team in that regard to the teams of the late ’80s that had to get past Detroit to win the title, is “not quite the same thing,” Pippen said.

“When we went through it, we pretty much had our team together,” he said. “We ended up losing Oak [Charles Oakley] for [Bill] Cartwright but other than that, we added just a few pieces through the draft and free agency … It was all about getting more physically ready for the long haul of the season. But the way I see these Bulls, I don’t quite see plugging in one piece and saying great.”

Still, the Bulls’ season definitely should not be considered a disappointment, Pippen said.

“They truly overachieved,” he said. “We didn’t expect the Bulls to play in the Eastern Conference finals, not even close. They did make it, and they deserved it. They did the right things in the regular season. But we all knew going into postseason, it was going to be a tall order.”

Melissa Isaacson is a columnist for ESPNChicago.com.

This is what LeBron James envisioned last summer. Why he broke
the hearts of everyone within a 100-mile radius of Cleveland,
trashed his reputation and gave the nation a new punchline.

The Miami Heat aren’t in the NBA finals _ yet. But it seems
almost inevitable now, what with a 3-1 lead and the Chicago Bulls
looking dazed after James’ all-around dominating performance
Tuesday night.

James can apologize for the rest of his career or make more
defiant commercials, and he’ll still be the player everyone outside
Miami loves to hate. The only way he’ll change public opinion is by
winning the NBA title, and he is playing like a man determined to
do that, even if it means dragging the rest of the Heat along with
him.

“It’s whatever it takes for myself and for our team,” James
said.

He was talking about defense, but it applies to the rest of his
game, too. He played more minutes (49:23) and scored more points
(35) than anyone else on the floor in Miami’s 101-93 overtime win
in Game 4. He led the Heat with six assists, grabbed six rebounds
and had a pair each of steals and blocked shots.

That James is a special talent has never been in question. He’s
mesmerizing on the court, able to do things that defy imagination,
and was a two-time NBA MVP before his 26th birthday. Finally, NBA
fans thought, here was a player worthy of those Michael Jordan
comparisons.

There’s always been something, though, that’s kept James from
making the league his own as Jordan did. In years past, he might
have had a meltdown after being called for a late offensive foul,
as he was with 8 seconds left in regulation Tuesday night. He might
have faltered at taking sole responsibility when his team’s
next-best offensive option was having an off night, as Dwyane Wade
did against the Bulls.

But there is a toughness to James now, a superstar’s attitude he
never seemed comfortable embracing in Cleveland. No one can accuse
him of quitting, as he was after last year’s second-round debacle
against Boston. Or wish he’d been a little more selfish, as he
could have been in Cleveland’s other playoff disappointments when
he insisted on passing to open teammates instead of keeping the
ball in his own hands.

His 10 points in the third quarter Tuesday almost
single-handedly kept the Bulls from pulling away, his one-handed
slam over Luol Deng in the final seconds cutting Chicago’s lead to
65-63. He scored 13 of his 35 points in the fourth quarter and
overtime, seeming to be everywhere on the court.

He scored on a spin move and, on the next possession, fed Mike
Miller for a 3-pointer. He took a charge to cause a Bulls turnover,
which set up a jumper by Miller that gave the Heat a 70-69 lead.
And though Wade finally found his groove in overtime, it was James
who finished the Bulls off.

With about 90 seconds left and Miami clinging to a 91-89 lead,
he scored on a driving layup, brushing Joakim Noah out of the way
as if the Chicago Bulls center was a mere gnat.

Equally impressive was his smothering defense on MVP Derrick
Rose.

Rose has been dismal in the fourth quarter this series, in large
part because of James. Anytime he gets the ball, James is sticking
a hand in his face or forcing him to change direction. Rose had a
chance to win the game in regulation, but his jumper never even
reached the basket after the pressure James put on him.

“It’s extremely hard when a 6-8 guy can easily defend you,” said
Rose, who is listed at 6-3.

James has owned their matchup so completely it’ll be months
before Rose is be able to shake the feeling somebody’s following
him.

“He shoulders a big responsibility for us during the course of
the game on both ends of the court,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra
said.

Being willing to put a team on your back and carry it when it
matters most is what separates the game’s greatest icons from those
who are merely great. James, Wade and Chris Bosh have billed
themselves “The Big Three,” and James and Wade clearly want to be
seen as this generation’s Jordan and Pippen.

What they’ve forgotten, though, is Scottie Pippen was the
supporting actor and Jordan the star. Jordan lived to take the big
shots, to put on the kind of performance that sent opposing coaches
back to the greaseboard and broke the will of his opponents.

Oh, he could get his teammates involved and let them share in
the glory. When the game was on the line, though, Jordan was going
to have his hands on the ball.

James finally seems to understand it has to be that way for him,
too.

___

Nancy Armour is a National Writer for The Associated Press.
Write to her at narmour(at)ap.org or follow her at

http://twitter.com/nrarmour