AK hates the home losses because he knows that's the only time anyone connected to Bulls ownership might see a stray 20 seconds of Bull basketball while they glance up from the drinks and buffet and their phone and whatever magazines might be laying around the box to see what a shit product they're selling.
Now that every team plays essentially the same way, bad NBA teams are less interesting than they have ever been in the history of the league. I don't care about seeing a lot of these teams play, Bulls included. I can watch high school kids jack and miss 3s, not box out and not play help defense, and I don't have to sit through commercials.
In KC's defense, he knows how poor this comes off and tries to caveat this as the ownerships thinking.
On the other hand, the "one for one" language is laughably awful. They hit on one roster 5 years ago, and nothing happened since then? Such a thin pretense to pretend AK is competent.
I don’t even think they really hit on that roster. Sure they were the #1 seed in the east for less than two months. A lot of those wins came against bad teams. They were never a serious contender even with Lonzo. Then when Lonzo got hurt, they literally sat on their hands, did nothing and hoped that it would work out.
I don't know why we need to try to rewrite history here. Bulls were a really good team before Ball went down. He was our leader on offense and defense. Derozan was great and Vuc was solid. It was great to be a Bulls fan, it's too bad Ball blew out his knee.
it was a mirage my man. i get it tho, it felt great at the time. but if you look at the macro, that team did beat up on subpar squads and had a lot of last minute wins. They were a solid squad tho, but they were never gonna finish at #1 even if Lonzo was healthy all year. they coulda been a 5 seed
I was just looking at a bunch of mock drafts to get an idea of who the Bulls might take. Mock drafts are really all over the place after the first three picks with the Bulls taking six different players in them. I’m ready for anything on Wednesday.
KC is the cringiest type of displaced journalist, a mediocrity who got too comfortable over 29 years at the Trib, building his career not on writing ability or insight, but on bootlicking his sources. His TV presence is execrable, a shambling, doofy assistant funeral director filling a role typically staffed by camera-ready eye candy, making Will Perdue look like Charles Barkley. Carrying water for this horrid Dorfian regime, like B-Ball Baghdad Bob, is an ethical and moral failure, and since he was too dumb to save for retirement when he was working, he should take up honest toil, like night-stocking the Jewel or staffing the dish pit at The Wiener's Circle.
He has a Substack focused on finances. I kind of wondered if he was just transitioning to that full time, but I guess we'll find out. I'm sure a few years of covering the Bulls would make anyone look for a change in career paths.
Essengue, Coward, CMB, Newell... we're lucky that those are the guys in the tier in which AK will be picking. Going to get it right by default, just like last year.
I hate to say this, but that team might sneak into the playoffs as the six seed with how wide open the East will be next season. Not saying I want that, but I'm sure AK would.
I think it's OK to say. Bulls are gonna have a winning record next year, and it will be confusing to everyone. Doesn't mean AK has made good decisions, or that the Bulls are a championship competitor.
I'm not sure I'm ready to say they'll have a winning record, but I do expect them to beat whatever projections are made prior to the season starting. It'll be the same thing as last year.
I'm more on your end. I was wrong last year but they had flukey stretches in the beginning from Zach and Vuc, and then at the end in bullshit March time
not sure why people think the East is going to be so wide open. Even without Tatum, Boston is a 45 win team. Cleveland will still be as good as they were this year.Orlando got better. Knicks should be as good as they were this year. Indy will fall off but they could still win 42 games without Hali. Hawks should be around .500. Miami could fall off....Milwaukee still has Giannis so they should still be around 44 wins. Philly could get back to .500 or better if Embiid somehow can play at least 70% of the games and Podcast P is solid instead of being trash. Detroit will be good again.
Bulls are still going to be in the 9th to 11th realm....they probably win 39 games next year and compete for play-in just like they have been doing the last 4 years.
Celtics have Luke Kornet and Al Horford (age 40) as centers next year. There will be a lot of churn throughout the east as teams figure there way out of all the untenable situations, but the Celtics aren't going to spend money or assets on a non-championship team next year.
Mike, I wrote about a Kuminga sign and trade on here a couple days ago. I believe base year compensation rules will come into play, so GS will only get credit for half of his outgoing salary. But on the Bulls side, it would be a normal trade.
So if Kuminga signs for $28 million, then the Bulls would have to send out at least $22.3m. Since GS could only accept $17.6, we'd have to bring in the Nets to take the difference. So Ball and Terry to GS, and Carter and a 1st to the Nets I think would work.
That being said, I don't think GS would take that trade.
I would like to see us get Kuminga, but I think it needs to be a larger deal, hopefully starting with Vuc.
“The Bulls have reached the point where they’ve run through most of their developmental staff in an effort to pair Williams with the right personal coach, only to see no upward movement.
Considering Karnisovas made a desperate attempt to motivate Williams with the security of a five-year, $90 million contract extension last summer, the only way he knows he can trade him is in a package or part of a multiteam deal.
He has invested a lot of work and phone time to try to make that happen.“
At this point it makes basically no sense to trade Williams. You're going to have to eat at least two more years of his salary before it's tradable. Might as well just hold onto him and he either helps you be bad or he magically gets better.
This feels like a story that was leaked to show how hard AK is working so when he doesn’t do anything, he can say he tried but there wasn’t a deal to be made.
yeah, Cowley - who likes to think of himself as someone who sees through the Bullshit - was adamant after the deadline parroting the 'laying groundwork' stuff the Org. was selling
i think a lot has to do with him being a moron and easily influenced by his personal biases in his reporting. For example, he simply likes Vuc, so he doesn't want to say that the guy has no value. And he thinks PWill is 'mentally soft', so he'll 'report' stuff like this how AK is desperately trying to trade him
PWill sure seems to me to need a change of scenery. Maybe Nets would take a chance on him. We could trade our #12 for their #22. The $18 million off our books could give us cap room to make an offer to Naz Reid.
Are you saying we trade #12 and Pat to the Nets for #22? I know Pat's a bad contract, but I'm not sure I want to trade down 10 places just to get rid of him.
lol how in the hell do you motivate someone by handing them a plush contract? if anything that takes away the carrot in front of the horse. at what point is it not about motivation and just about lack of skill
I also don't think Pat's problem is motivation. He's simply a tweener who's busted especially after injury took away some of his more overrated traits. It happens all the time, AK ascribing motivation means he still made a good pick, when he didn't (and Cowley is just a meathead)
He's playing at the level of Simone Fontecchio ($8M) or David Roddy ($1M two-way deal). That's a ton of negative value and no one believes he'll improve (especially him). So the Bulls would need to attach the first-round pick to, like, Coby or Ayo to neutralize it. That would tough for someone smart like Brad Stevens to pull off, much less AKME.
impressed a journalist cared enough to ask: CHSN confirmed they took down the podcast, but didn't say why, except to say it *definitively wasn't the Chicago Bulls, who owns the network* that ordered them to take it down
I don't think fans needed further reason to recognize CHSN is a house organ and all information coming out of there is to be taken in within that context.
updated to link a transcript from the deleted podcast. We got 'em! https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/by-the-horns-a-chicago-bulls-s-224912/episodes/bulls-reportedly-extend-front-256611023/transcript
AK hates the home losses because he knows that's the only time anyone connected to Bulls ownership might see a stray 20 seconds of Bull basketball while they glance up from the drinks and buffet and their phone and whatever magazines might be laying around the box to see what a shit product they're selling.
Now that every team plays essentially the same way, bad NBA teams are less interesting than they have ever been in the history of the league. I don't care about seeing a lot of these teams play, Bulls included. I can watch high school kids jack and miss 3s, not box out and not play help defense, and I don't have to sit through commercials.
This doesn't even include TV viewership, which I expect to be as dismal, if not more.
In KC's defense, he knows how poor this comes off and tries to caveat this as the ownerships thinking.
On the other hand, the "one for one" language is laughably awful. They hit on one roster 5 years ago, and nothing happened since then? Such a thin pretense to pretend AK is competent.
KC starts that way but then piles on with his own personal agreement, especially in lack of pushback on Smith's warped history retelling
I don’t even think they really hit on that roster. Sure they were the #1 seed in the east for less than two months. A lot of those wins came against bad teams. They were never a serious contender even with Lonzo. Then when Lonzo got hurt, they literally sat on their hands, did nothing and hoped that it would work out.
I don't know why we need to try to rewrite history here. Bulls were a really good team before Ball went down. He was our leader on offense and defense. Derozan was great and Vuc was solid. It was great to be a Bulls fan, it's too bad Ball blew out his knee.
it was a mirage my man. i get it tho, it felt great at the time. but if you look at the macro, that team did beat up on subpar squads and had a lot of last minute wins. They were a solid squad tho, but they were never gonna finish at #1 even if Lonzo was healthy all year. they coulda been a 5 seed
And even their "hit" in 2021 wasn't all that great. There are so many stats that show that team wasn't nearly as good as its record indicated.
And that's not even mentioning how much they gave up for that roster.
I just said just about the same thing. IIRC, the Bulls had a lot of last second wins that inflated their record.
Whoops, my bad!
No worries, great minds think alike!
That's the really crazy thing. They paid Louis Vuitton prices for some moderately ok Sketchers.
I was just looking at a bunch of mock drafts to get an idea of who the Bulls might take. Mock drafts are really all over the place after the first three picks with the Bulls taking six different players in them. I’m ready for anything on Wednesday.
KC is the cringiest type of displaced journalist, a mediocrity who got too comfortable over 29 years at the Trib, building his career not on writing ability or insight, but on bootlicking his sources. His TV presence is execrable, a shambling, doofy assistant funeral director filling a role typically staffed by camera-ready eye candy, making Will Perdue look like Charles Barkley. Carrying water for this horrid Dorfian regime, like B-Ball Baghdad Bob, is an ethical and moral failure, and since he was too dumb to save for retirement when he was working, he should take up honest toil, like night-stocking the Jewel or staffing the dish pit at The Wiener's Circle.
What happened to Darnell Mayberry at The Athletic?
unclear yet, maybe his contract runs through the draft or offseason
He has a Substack focused on finances. I kind of wondered if he was just transitioning to that full time, but I guess we'll find out. I'm sure a few years of covering the Bulls would make anyone look for a change in career paths.
Some Draft day trade ideas:
1. Bulls send Lonzo plus Carter or Terry to Golden State for Kuminga in a sign and trade.
2. Bulls send Vuc and Phillips + a second rounder for Porzingis (drops Boston's team salary by over $7M)
3. Bulls send Pat+Ayo for RJ Barrett
G- Coby
G- Barrett, Huerter
F- Giddey, Matas
F- Kuminga, Essengue
C- Porzingis, Collins, Smith
Pick BPA... tentatively Essengue, Coward, CMB, Newell. If they can trade down and do it, do that.
Just wanted to escape reality for a while.
Essengue, Coward, CMB, Newell... we're lucky that those are the guys in the tier in which AK will be picking. Going to get it right by default, just like last year.
I hate to say this, but that team might sneak into the playoffs as the six seed with how wide open the East will be next season. Not saying I want that, but I'm sure AK would.
I think it's OK to say. Bulls are gonna have a winning record next year, and it will be confusing to everyone. Doesn't mean AK has made good decisions, or that the Bulls are a championship competitor.
I'm not sure I'm ready to say they'll have a winning record, but I do expect them to beat whatever projections are made prior to the season starting. It'll be the same thing as last year.
I think they have several moves to make before they're above .500
Here's what they actually have right now:
G- Coby, Lonzo, Carter
G- Huerter, Ayo, Terry
F- Giddey, Phillips
F- Matas, Pat
C- Vuc, Collins, Smith
That seems like ~30 win team to me unless Matas is playing like AK-47 next year. Maybe even then.
I'm more on your end. I was wrong last year but they had flukey stretches in the beginning from Zach and Vuc, and then at the end in bullshit March time
but also 34 wins could get you the 7th seed
I dunno man...it's early obviously but:
definitely better than the Bulls (7):
Cavs, Knicks, Pistons, Heat, Hawks, Magic, Celtics
In limbo and could be in the ass tier where Bulls live:
Bucks, Pacers, Sixers, Raptors
maybe as good as the Bulls on talent, but they have smart front offices and won't try for the 10 seed
Wizards, Nets, Hornets
not sure why people think the East is going to be so wide open. Even without Tatum, Boston is a 45 win team. Cleveland will still be as good as they were this year.Orlando got better. Knicks should be as good as they were this year. Indy will fall off but they could still win 42 games without Hali. Hawks should be around .500. Miami could fall off....Milwaukee still has Giannis so they should still be around 44 wins. Philly could get back to .500 or better if Embiid somehow can play at least 70% of the games and Podcast P is solid instead of being trash. Detroit will be good again.
Bulls are still going to be in the 9th to 11th realm....they probably win 39 games next year and compete for play-in just like they have been doing the last 4 years.
Celtics have Luke Kornet and Al Horford (age 40) as centers next year. There will be a lot of churn throughout the east as teams figure there way out of all the untenable situations, but the Celtics aren't going to spend money or assets on a non-championship team next year.
Wait sorry Al Horford is a free agent and apparently there is a market for him. Celtics are gonna try to get into the lottery Dallas style.
I think Vuc for Porzingis makes a lot of sense for both teams and for me personally, as I just don't want to watch Vuc anymore
Yep, I would have liked to see that too.
Porzingas went to Atlanta as part of a three way trade with the Nets. I have a feeling that the Bulls aren’t going to make any big trades.
that feeling is the nagging 'reality' Mike referenced
also this cements The Hawks as far better than the Bulls. Though they rarely seem to actually realize that talent advantage. This year though!
whelp...
Mike, I wrote about a Kuminga sign and trade on here a couple days ago. I believe base year compensation rules will come into play, so GS will only get credit for half of his outgoing salary. But on the Bulls side, it would be a normal trade.
So if Kuminga signs for $28 million, then the Bulls would have to send out at least $22.3m. Since GS could only accept $17.6, we'd have to bring in the Nets to take the difference. So Ball and Terry to GS, and Carter and a 1st to the Nets I think would work.
That being said, I don't think GS would take that trade.
I would like to see us get Kuminga, but I think it needs to be a larger deal, hopefully starting with Vuc.
I would avoid that problem but not signing Kuminga to a $28M contract.
FFS:
“The Bulls have reached the point where they’ve run through most of their developmental staff in an effort to pair Williams with the right personal coach, only to see no upward movement.
Considering Karnisovas made a desperate attempt to motivate Williams with the security of a five-year, $90 million contract extension last summer, the only way he knows he can trade him is in a package or part of a multiteam deal.
He has invested a lot of work and phone time to try to make that happen.“
https://chicago.suntimes.com/bulls/2025/06/24/could-bulls-have-aces-up-the-sleeve-nba-draft-approaches
At this point it makes basically no sense to trade Williams. You're going to have to eat at least two more years of his salary before it's tradable. Might as well just hold onto him and he either helps you be bad or he magically gets better.
This feels like a story that was leaked to show how hard AK is working so when he doesn’t do anything, he can say he tried but there wasn’t a deal to be made.
yeah, Cowley - who likes to think of himself as someone who sees through the Bullshit - was adamant after the deadline parroting the 'laying groundwork' stuff the Org. was selling
i think a lot has to do with him being a moron and easily influenced by his personal biases in his reporting. For example, he simply likes Vuc, so he doesn't want to say that the guy has no value. And he thinks PWill is 'mentally soft', so he'll 'report' stuff like this how AK is desperately trying to trade him
PWill sure seems to me to need a change of scenery. Maybe Nets would take a chance on him. We could trade our #12 for their #22. The $18 million off our books could give us cap room to make an offer to Naz Reid.
Are you saying we trade #12 and Pat to the Nets for #22? I know Pat's a bad contract, but I'm not sure I want to trade down 10 places just to get rid of him.
i dont know if the difference between 12 and 22 is that major in this draft.
I dunno, at every point in Pat's career everyone saying "his value can't be lower" has been wrong
lol how in the hell do you motivate someone by handing them a plush contract? if anything that takes away the carrot in front of the horse. at what point is it not about motivation and just about lack of skill
I also don't think Pat's problem is motivation. He's simply a tweener who's busted especially after injury took away some of his more overrated traits. It happens all the time, AK ascribing motivation means he still made a good pick, when he didn't (and Cowley is just a meathead)
He's playing at the level of Simone Fontecchio ($8M) or David Roddy ($1M two-way deal). That's a ton of negative value and no one believes he'll improve (especially him). So the Bulls would need to attach the first-round pick to, like, Coby or Ayo to neutralize it. That would tough for someone smart like Brad Stevens to pull off, much less AKME.
"...so this will be forgotten amongst past and future idiocy, forming a cocoon of irrelevance where they can hide away from the rest of the NBA."
This has to go in the "Angry Fan Blog" Hall of Fame for the poetry alone :)
Funny.
I'm hearing Boston is looking to trade Derrick White to cut costs. Maybe they would trade us a FRP for Ayo as a White replacement?
impressed a journalist cared enough to ask: CHSN confirmed they took down the podcast, but didn't say why, except to say it *definitively wasn't the Chicago Bulls, who owns the network* that ordered them to take it down
I don't think fans needed further reason to recognize CHSN is a house organ and all information coming out of there is to be taken in within that context.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/sports-media/2025/06/26/chicago-sports-network-bulls-podcast-by-the-horns-kc-johnson-noa-essengue-arturas-karnisovas