I've had mixed feelings on re-signing Gordon to a big deal, but the Monta Ellis deal and the fact that they are very comparable players in terms of value (even though I initially doubted this) has convinced me that Ben needs to get paid.  The question is, how much?  Well, if we go based on the Monta Ellis model, about 6 years $66 million (maybe a little less).  So how much do we need to pay him starting this year based on those figures?  For 6 years $66 million, we'd need to start him out at $8.7 million this year- increasing $.9135 million every year (or 10.5% of $8.7mil).  Luol Deng is reportedly seeking a deal worth $75 million over 6 years.  In order to pay Deng his money we'd need to start him out at $9.9 million this year - increasing about $1.04 mil per year to reach about $15.1 mil on the final year of his deal.  So for this year's luxury tax number the Bulls would be adding 8.7+9.9 = $18.6 million.

Right now the luxury tax threshold is $71.15 million.  According to Sham , the Bulls have about $49.12 million on the payroll for next year and that's before adding the $4.83 million for Derrick Rose's contract.  So all totalled the Bulls have about $53.95 on the payroll (assuming Shannon Brown isn't back this year, which he shouldn't be).  So that leaves the Bulls at about $17.2 million for the Bulls to work underneath for the luxury tax.  As I showed above, to pay the two best players on the Bulls what they're worth we need to spend $18.6 million.  This would put them about $1.4 million over the luxury tax, which would be a problem for this ownership group, as they've expressed several times.  The Bulls would have the whole year, though, to get themselves under the tax.  Here's the way that I propose they do it.

Trade Hinrich and Hughes (expiring in 2010) to the Nuggets for Allen Iverson.  This does a couple of things, it consolidates two backcourt players into one, better player, it shaves about $1.987 million of the Bulls total salary for the year.  Also, it gives the Bulls a huge amount of flexibility in the summer of 2009 to pursue a big name free agent.  Drew Gooden's contract will also be coming off the books, so that's about $28 million in cap space in a summer when most of the teams in the NBA are going to be saving for 2010.  The names aren't as flashy as the 2010 crowd, but there is certainly value to be had.  It also gives the Bulls the option to get players on teams that need to cut salary by allowing them to trade  for more than they send out.  The reason the Nuggets would do this trade is it allows them to be a player in that 2010 FA class (via Hughes's big expiring deal) and gives them a nice defensive minded PG who can play with Melo in Hinrich and gives them something of value for Iverson before he leaves.  The downside for the Bulls is that Iverson is old, dominates the ball and scores inefficiently. Oh, and he's tiny which is bad for BG, Rose.  However, this is about the best the Bulls can do for these two guys in my view (they might be able to swindle a first round pick out of it too, maybe).  The most important thing though is it allows the Bulls to resign Deng and Gordon while keeping them happy, consolidates some talent and allows the Bulls to push (potentially) into the playoffs, while still developing the young guys and gives them loads of flexibility in the future which should be their focus anyway.  This team is not competing with elite teams next year.  Not even close, so we should be focused on 2009 and beyond.

Update: Matt deftly pointed out in initial comments that this would hurt Rose's development (which I mentioned above), AI would be unhappy here, and having AI around would be difficult for Ben to swallow being that they perform a similar role.  This led me to try and find other ways to dump Hughes and Hinrich in one deal for an expiring, and I was unsuccessful.  I really can't find a team who would want or need Hinrich at this point (despite rumors that plenty of teams are interested) and Hughes is not much of a trading chip until closer to 2010 (which is really the reason WE should just keep him and only let him play like 10-15 minutes a game).  So my alternative solution to paying the guys their money and avoiding the luxury tax is this: hope these guys are reasonable and offer them good solid deals (even better than what we offered last year, despite their regression).  The Bulls acknowledged last year's deals were lower than market value but offered security.  Well, now the Bulls need the security of having their guys back and can't afford to lowball them.  Offer BG 6 years $62 million (8.185 this year) and Deng 6 years almost $70 million (just a hair under to make the numbers work under the luxury tax).  BG and Deng both get a little more than they were offered per year last year, plus an extra year of security.  No one walks away humiliated at being screwed into a lowball offer and the Bulls remain below the luxury tax. Everyone should be happy.