For the past 3 seasons, the Chicago Bulls have been floating in mediocrity. Since singing DeMar DeRozan, Lonzo Ball and Alex Caruso in free agency in 2021, the Bulls have gone 46-36 in 2021-22 and a first round exit, 40-42 in 2022-23 and a play-in exit and 39-43 in 2023-24 and a play-in exit over the last 3 seasons, and now DeRozan and Caruso are gone. Is the rebuild on in Chicago?
First the Bulls traded Caruso to the Oklahoma City Thunder in exchange for Josh Giddey in what was a head scratching trade. There are a lot of people who liked the trade for the Bulls but I am not sold on it. When Giddey has the ball in his hands, he has been really good but when he does not have the ball in his hands, he has been bad, especially in the playoffs. However, the playoffs will not be a problem for the Bulls so Giddey should look good next season. This does not mean that Giddey is a sure thing going into the future. Even if he plays well, he cannot have the ball in his hands all the time on a championship team, he needs to learn how to play without the ball and with his lack of shooting, it gets dicey. Also, Giddey is entering the final year of his rookie contract so he needs a new deal. What is Giddey worth? Could he get over $20 million a season? What are the Bulls going to be willing to pay? Josh Giddey is a good player who has a chance to be a really good NBA player, there are just a lot of questions surrounding him.
Chicago totally botched the DeMar DeRozan situation. I was calling for the Bulls to trade DeRozan in December of 2022, over a year and a half ago. They had their chances to get real value out of DeRozan and they didn’t. They also had a chance to get real value out of DeRozan out of this sign-and-trade, instead they hard-capped themselves by signing Jalen Smith to a 3yr/$27 million deal so they could not take back Harrison Barnes’ $18 million salary. As a result, they missed out on the 2031 pick swap Sacramento sent to San Antonio instead of Chicago. They did get Chris Duarte and 2 future 2nd round picks back in the deal but not getting that pick swap is a big miss for the Bulls. What does Chicago have? Well, Zach LaVine and Nikola Vucevic are still with the team and Lonzo Ball has still yet to play since January 14th, 2022, 2.5 years ago. Those are the 3 highest paid players on the team. The Bulls have been desperately trying to trade LaVine since the trade deadline last year and no one wants that contract and I think they need to play this season out. LaVine only played in 25 games last season and has 3yrs/$138 million left on his 5-year max extension he signed in 2022. Vucevic has 2yrs/$41.5 million left on his contract and Chicago has been trying to trade him but no one wants him either. The Bulls would like to trade both of those players but they seemingly can’t so they’ll likely have to head into next season with the roster they have.
What is this team? Coby White had a breakout season last year once the Bulls put the ball in his hands and oh… Giddey needs the ball. That should not sway the way Bulls fans feel about White. Last season he averaged 19.1 points, 5.1 assists and 4.5 rebounds in 79 games played. He was really productive and played every single night, he is one of the main building blocks for the Bulls going forward. The Bulls also drafted Chicago native Matas Buzelis with the 11th pick in the draft. Buzelis is a 6 foot 10 wing who is a really good ball handler at that size and can score the ball at all 3 levels, he has a chance to be a good NBA player. The Bulls have a lot of guards, White, Giddey, LaVine, Ayo Dosunmo, Javon Carter, Duarte and Dalen Terry are all players who could see rotation minutes next season thus they could make a move at that spot. They also just gave Patrick Williams a new 5yr/$90 million contract this summer so he will be a key part of the team going forward as well. The starting 5 will be Giddey/White/LaVine/Williams/Vucevic, that team is not good but is it bad enough? The Bulls need to stay inside of the top 10 of this year's draft or else they owe their pick to San Antonio, with what the 2025 draft is projected to be, that cannot happen. The Bulls need to lose games next season and while I think they will end up keeping their pick, that is not promised.
The offseason is not over but it might be for the Bulls. Maybe they find a LaVine or Vucevic trade, or maybe they trade one of the guards but I don’t see any of that happening. This team has started to get itself out of the middle of the NBA and they are headed to the button quickly. Maybe they have another trade to get them closer to the bottom but that could be a longshot.
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