I wonder at what point the Bulls brand stops being worth any more than the mere size of the media market. Honestly, in my person experience talking to basketball fans who are under the age of like 35, they don't really give a shit about MJ. Now that still leaves a lot of people alive who do, but still. I wonder at what point Uncle Jerry brings this thing full circle and we're basically so post-MJ that we become pre-MJ again.
You know, this is a little far afield but whatever. Again, just personal experience read into it what you will, but I feel like for people under like 25, not only do they not give a shit about MJ, they also don't even think he'd be that good in today's game lol. Like, ok, I don't agree with that. But I am very fond of the take. Over the last 20-odd years there's just been so much shitting on contemporary players by old retired guys. It's frankly refreshing to hear someone say "Yeah, MJ would be Mikhail Bridges. Maybe not quite that good since he couldn't shoot 3s." I'm sorry. I think that rules lol.
The disrespect! The notion that MJ, Bird, Magic or twenty or thirty other 80s players aren't as good as today's AAU highlights one trick ponies is absurd.
MJ would dominate this era. What 6'6 athletic guard who can shoot and handle isn't successful? MJ is like twice the player Ant is and look at what Ant is doing. I think the rule changes midseason actually demonstrates the opposite - Jordan could play today.
I'm with DC - arguments aren't good just b/c their young or new. A stupid argument is just a stupid argument. And social media amplifies the stupid. Bulls talk on X is the worst.
When the nba was doing it's mass logo rebranding, there was an article that talked about the bulls logo and colors. Largely thanks to Jordan, the colors of red and black remain favorites among sneaker heads, the bulls logo remains iconic. So much so that these three things are just part of fashion, nevermind the history of the game and team (or player) that made them that way to begin with. Even the people under 35, they may not give a shit about Jordan, but their favorite rapper might... Their favorite non nba hooper may still rock the old Jordan jerseys, their favorite actor may still wear a bulls hat. The direct connection to bulls Fandom may have been waning for the past decade, but the indirect connection is still there. Black and red just look good and that has remained enough for people to continue to buy the brand,without caring at all for it.
I think we often take for granted how good we have it with Stacey, Adam, KG, and Will. I'm not saying this is the Inside the NBA crew but I have League Pass and our guys are better than probably 80% of the announcing and post-game teams league-wide.
I can take or leave Goff (side note: wow his pod is awful), but Kendall and Will are great. KG mixes actual basketball insight with crazy takes, which I find entertaining. I missed him when they made him sit out a year for fighting another employee. If I have to hear another story about Will's time on the 10 win (or whatever) Spurs, I'll scream but he mostly gets the analysis right.
I know there are folks on here who have been die hard far longer than I have. But it makes me feel so dated that I remember when kg was the young optimistic ex-player brought on to provide some modern cool to the broadcast, and now is the old man shouting at the sky about heart huscle and muscle (rip norm). Like damn man... My oldest is gnna be 8, and the amount of fucks his generation gives about this team is next to nothing. I thought we'd have at least a competent mainstay team by now for him to watch.... Fucking bulls
I'll second Matt's view that we are lucky that we don't have to feel obligated to look at the bright side of this team. I listen to podcasts of guys (not gonna name names where they're just, you know, trying to act like there's something fun about the Bulls from an internet basketball nerd perspective.
I say internet basketball nerd, because the organization does have a point that the average ticket buying fan isn't made very happy about the prospect of three or eight years of missing the playoffs and winning 20ish games.
And the average internet basketball nerd isn't very excited about a 40ish win team with no discernible upside, financial restrictions, and a massive pick deficit hanging over them. Eventually, both types of fans will be unhappy, because although a good GM leading a good organization might be able to thread this needle and entertain everyone, we do not have those things. So at some point it will come crashing down.
In the meantime, what can you do? Well, I'll enjoy (occasionally) watching a 40ish win team that has guys I mostly like (DeMar, Coby, Ayo) rather than watching a 20ish win team that's a placeholder for a team that in 5 years will be composed of guys currently just getting their pubes in middle school.
If we can maintain a 40ish win team while getting younger, cheaper, and collecting some assets, that'd be good too.
There's an NYT article about AK upping the offer to DDR from 2 yr/$80+M by adding a third year player option. Love DDR, but that would be one of the dumbest moves AK has made this far.
My take is that they're bidding against embarrassment.
Demar's leverage is he doesn't actually need the money. He can walk, take a cheaper contract with an organization that can win, and make the Bulls look like what they are, which is nothing as far as actual basketball is concerned.
My general sense of things is that if you have a pay a guy a meaningful amount more to play for you than he’d be willing to play for somewhere else, you should let him go. His heart aint gonna be in it and everyone will be looking for the exit. But there may not be one.
Counterpoint: DeMar is a nearly perfect face of the franchise, or THIS franchise — praises the coach, works for free with teammates in the off-season and most importantly has repeatedly voiced a personal philosophy to never demand trades or complain about his contract or situation. We don't know what Karnisovas actually wants but we know what Jerry loves and it's short contracts, loyalty and no bad vibes.
I think this is backwards (though you're likely correct in thinking the Bulls feel this way)
Bulls have leverage because they can pay him more than another contender (likely just having Taxpayer MLE). DeMar may not 'need the money' but this is also his last big contract and he played well enough to where he doesn't have to be ring-chasing on one-year deals yet.
Bulls should treat this like they do with restricted free agents: go get another offer. And not a 'cap legal' offer but any contract. If the Clippers talk to DeMar and want to pay him $30M, well they can't unless working out a sign-and-trade. And not that they worry about public perception (nor should they), but I don't think it'd be an 'embarrassment' to get something in a S/T, a lot of nerds will be happy and the season ticket holders aren't going to notice the team sucks w/o DeMar until after they renew
truly insane that AKME seems to think they have to pay MORE than what another team can't even legally offer. There's no cap space team that would pay DeMar over $20M, and no non-cap space team that would pay him over $30M (if they even could)
past behavior being the best predictor of future behavior, and knowing AKME overpaid for Lavine and Vooch when they didn't really need to, we can for sure expect them to overpay for DDR. It's OK though, they're making savings elsewhere (the new G-league coach is the head coach's son).
I think I've told you my idea. If you really feel the need to resign him at a premium, give him a 4 year contract and heavily front load it. Like $43/20/12/12. I feel like that would be tradable after the first year, even if he slows down. His locker room presence, plus his clutch performances are worth that much.
I read up on this a couple months ago. DeMar's agent is trying not to put his client in the situation where Chicago can dictate the rest of his career and fuck up his earning potential. This is FAR more complicated for DeMar than it is for other free agents because of his age and the Over 38 Rule which they are going to have to face very soon.
The Bulls can offer him 4 years because of Bird Rights negating the limit of the Over 38 Rule. Other teams wanting to sign him as an FA can only offer 3. I think quite a lot of them would like to offer 1 or 2 years, which is no bueno: the Over 38 is going to loom larger every summer, and his market will be just 1 year deals after that. Which wouldn't be the end of the world, but his agent is being smart to argue for the S-tier top-of-the-line option for his client, which is 3 years.
KC putting it out that he wants 3 years a month ago was an indication of this. It's a very real question whether DeMar would take 2 years/$80 from Chicago over 3 years/$90 million from someone else. Not because of the guaranteed 3rd year but the reality that he'd be hitting the market in 2026 with Chicago giving him a gold watch as a 37 year old who might be very effective (I personally hold out more hope that he'll be an effective 37 year old than Kevin Durant) and then signing a 1 year/$10 million contract AT BEST because nobody can give him more than a 1 or 2 year deal. Which again, might even be the best thing for him, career-wise! But I don't begrudge his agent from trying to find a money situation where he's most comfortable and not hemmed in by arcane cap rules and Chicago being dicks and not doing a sign-and-trade.
So there's kind of a lot of shit at play here, I think his agent is arguing for the best possible scenario and then working backward from the scenarios that are actually offered.
Maybe it's changed under the new CBA, but I don't think that kind of contract structure is legal to sign a player to unless you're under the cap (which we aren't). Every year's raise or decrease has to be within 8% of the starting salary if you're using the Bird exception to sign your own player.
I was poking through the CBA and found that section: Article VII Section 5 (a)(2).
There is an exception for Incentive Compensation. If I'm reading it correctly, Unlikely Bonuses are limited to 140% of Likely Bonuses and the two are limited to 107.5% of the salary for DDR.
I'm not spotting anything saying Bonuses can't be changed drastically between seasons. So they could potentially use bonuses to alter the effective payout and salary cap interactions.
The first things I'm seeing (primarily from Q54, 74 & 75):
1. A signing bonus could be used to increase the effective first year salary, effectively allowing lower base salary for subsequent years. It is split across the years for cap space. Assuming a $100M/4yr contract and no Likely/Unlikely bonuses, you could go with something like $15M Signing bonus/$26M/22M/20M/18.5M. Not great, but maybe a starting point.
2. Likely vs Unlikely Bonuses are re-evaluated each year. You could set bonuses that are likely to move from Likely to Unlikely as DDR ages (maybe PPG? 24 would qualify as Likely this year), to reduce both payout and cap hit (though not cap hold?, if I'm using the right terminology).
3. I see Unlikely Bonuses are limited to 15%, but I don't see how that is effected during the re-evaluation process. Any idea where I can find that?
4. Can teams voluntarily pay a Likely (or Unlikely) Bonus, if the player did not qualify? I feel like I remember a team doing that at one point.
5. From that, it appears Incentive Bonuses are limited to 20% of salary (I see what I misread in the CBA... thanks again). Assuming that is correct, you could end up with that earlier $100M proposed contract being something close to $15M signing bonus / $20M (+$4M Likely Bonus) / $17.7M (+$3.5M Bonus) / $16.25M (+$3.25M Bonus) / $15M (+$3M Bonus), with the Bonuses set at 21PPG (his career average)...or PPG plus 2x AST at 21 (is that allowed? it would discourage ball hogging as his game degrades with age). Not great, but on the surface it's not completely outside the realm of tradable. However, the cap issues add additional complexity.
6. Could also alter that to have Team Option for the last year, but then years 3&4 would need to have the same salary.
It's a hell of a thing that they've done to Sports Illustrated. I wish Google News would de-list it because it's just bullshit like this and "What Nikola Jovic Tweeted On Tuesday." I'm not exaggerating: https://i.imgur.com/XIRFDkO.png
1. After striking out with three other teams (Portland, Charlotte, Detroit) over the past few years and clearly showing his displeasure working for the Bulls, Marc Eversley has now been rewarded with a three year extension.
2. Billy Donovan is now the head coach of the Windy City Bulls. No, not that Billy Donovan. It's his son this time. #Nepotism!
3. This one is a more of a rumor, but apparently Devin Carter has been given a draft promise with the rumor part being that the promise was made by the Bulls.
---------------------------------------------
Thoughts on these:
1. Why?
2. Why???
3. WHY????? I actually like Devin Carter and wouldn't necessarily mind drafting him if none of the bigger names fall, but this draft is totally up in the air. The likelihood of a bigger name with high upside being available at #11 is pretty high.
I wonder at what point the Bulls brand stops being worth any more than the mere size of the media market. Honestly, in my person experience talking to basketball fans who are under the age of like 35, they don't really give a shit about MJ. Now that still leaves a lot of people alive who do, but still. I wonder at what point Uncle Jerry brings this thing full circle and we're basically so post-MJ that we become pre-MJ again.
it just still drives me gd crazy how the bulls could've been the yankees of the nba and they completely squandered any and every part of that
Luckily for Jerry, it'll be long after he dies.
You know, this is a little far afield but whatever. Again, just personal experience read into it what you will, but I feel like for people under like 25, not only do they not give a shit about MJ, they also don't even think he'd be that good in today's game lol. Like, ok, I don't agree with that. But I am very fond of the take. Over the last 20-odd years there's just been so much shitting on contemporary players by old retired guys. It's frankly refreshing to hear someone say "Yeah, MJ would be Mikhail Bridges. Maybe not quite that good since he couldn't shoot 3s." I'm sorry. I think that rules lol.
Yes, this is a very funny take but MJ would murder these goofies.
Totally. It's a fundamental lack of understanding of MJ and what a complete psycho he was lol.
The disrespect! The notion that MJ, Bird, Magic or twenty or thirty other 80s players aren't as good as today's AAU highlights one trick ponies is absurd.
What's so great about it?
I like to hear stuff that's new and interesting. New and stupid takes are just as boring to me as old and stupid takes.
loss and gain are the same, hm
MJ would dominate this era. What 6'6 athletic guard who can shoot and handle isn't successful? MJ is like twice the player Ant is and look at what Ant is doing. I think the rule changes midseason actually demonstrates the opposite - Jordan could play today.
I'm with DC - arguments aren't good just b/c their young or new. A stupid argument is just a stupid argument. And social media amplifies the stupid. Bulls talk on X is the worst.
When the nba was doing it's mass logo rebranding, there was an article that talked about the bulls logo and colors. Largely thanks to Jordan, the colors of red and black remain favorites among sneaker heads, the bulls logo remains iconic. So much so that these three things are just part of fashion, nevermind the history of the game and team (or player) that made them that way to begin with. Even the people under 35, they may not give a shit about Jordan, but their favorite rapper might... Their favorite non nba hooper may still rock the old Jordan jerseys, their favorite actor may still wear a bulls hat. The direct connection to bulls Fandom may have been waning for the past decade, but the indirect connection is still there. Black and red just look good and that has remained enough for people to continue to buy the brand,without caring at all for it.
When I do pro bono defense and a young man appears wearing red & black, it's usually not an expression of support for a basketball team. 🙁
I think we often take for granted how good we have it with Stacey, Adam, KG, and Will. I'm not saying this is the Inside the NBA crew but I have League Pass and our guys are better than probably 80% of the announcing and post-game teams league-wide.
I can take or leave Goff (side note: wow his pod is awful), but Kendall and Will are great. KG mixes actual basketball insight with crazy takes, which I find entertaining. I missed him when they made him sit out a year for fighting another employee. If I have to hear another story about Will's time on the 10 win (or whatever) Spurs, I'll scream but he mostly gets the analysis right.
I know there are folks on here who have been die hard far longer than I have. But it makes me feel so dated that I remember when kg was the young optimistic ex-player brought on to provide some modern cool to the broadcast, and now is the old man shouting at the sky about heart huscle and muscle (rip norm). Like damn man... My oldest is gnna be 8, and the amount of fucks his generation gives about this team is next to nothing. I thought we'd have at least a competent mainstay team by now for him to watch.... Fucking bulls
jason goff has always been so bad
I'll second Matt's view that we are lucky that we don't have to feel obligated to look at the bright side of this team. I listen to podcasts of guys (not gonna name names where they're just, you know, trying to act like there's something fun about the Bulls from an internet basketball nerd perspective.
I say internet basketball nerd, because the organization does have a point that the average ticket buying fan isn't made very happy about the prospect of three or eight years of missing the playoffs and winning 20ish games.
And the average internet basketball nerd isn't very excited about a 40ish win team with no discernible upside, financial restrictions, and a massive pick deficit hanging over them. Eventually, both types of fans will be unhappy, because although a good GM leading a good organization might be able to thread this needle and entertain everyone, we do not have those things. So at some point it will come crashing down.
In the meantime, what can you do? Well, I'll enjoy (occasionally) watching a 40ish win team that has guys I mostly like (DeMar, Coby, Ayo) rather than watching a 20ish win team that's a placeholder for a team that in 5 years will be composed of guys currently just getting their pubes in middle school.
If we can maintain a 40ish win team while getting younger, cheaper, and collecting some assets, that'd be good too.
There's an NYT article about AK upping the offer to DDR from 2 yr/$80+M by adding a third year player option. Love DDR, but that would be one of the dumbest moves AK has made this far.
I might be the biggest DeMar fan around, but jeez, who are we bidding against here?
Its not really about DeMar at all… its about AK being bad at his job. At the end of the day, overpaying is overpaying and you cant do it.
My take is that they're bidding against embarrassment.
Demar's leverage is he doesn't actually need the money. He can walk, take a cheaper contract with an organization that can win, and make the Bulls look like what they are, which is nothing as far as actual basketball is concerned.
My general sense of things is that if you have a pay a guy a meaningful amount more to play for you than he’d be willing to play for somewhere else, you should let him go. His heart aint gonna be in it and everyone will be looking for the exit. But there may not be one.
Counterpoint: DeMar is a nearly perfect face of the franchise, or THIS franchise — praises the coach, works for free with teammates in the off-season and most importantly has repeatedly voiced a personal philosophy to never demand trades or complain about his contract or situation. We don't know what Karnisovas actually wants but we know what Jerry loves and it's short contracts, loyalty and no bad vibes.
I think this is backwards (though you're likely correct in thinking the Bulls feel this way)
Bulls have leverage because they can pay him more than another contender (likely just having Taxpayer MLE). DeMar may not 'need the money' but this is also his last big contract and he played well enough to where he doesn't have to be ring-chasing on one-year deals yet.
Bulls should treat this like they do with restricted free agents: go get another offer. And not a 'cap legal' offer but any contract. If the Clippers talk to DeMar and want to pay him $30M, well they can't unless working out a sign-and-trade. And not that they worry about public perception (nor should they), but I don't think it'd be an 'embarrassment' to get something in a S/T, a lot of nerds will be happy and the season ticket holders aren't going to notice the team sucks w/o DeMar until after they renew
truly insane that AKME seems to think they have to pay MORE than what another team can't even legally offer. There's no cap space team that would pay DeMar over $20M, and no non-cap space team that would pay him over $30M (if they even could)
past behavior being the best predictor of future behavior, and knowing AKME overpaid for Lavine and Vooch when they didn't really need to, we can for sure expect them to overpay for DDR. It's OK though, they're making savings elsewhere (the new G-league coach is the head coach's son).
I think I've told you my idea. If you really feel the need to resign him at a premium, give him a 4 year contract and heavily front load it. Like $43/20/12/12. I feel like that would be tradable after the first year, even if he slows down. His locker room presence, plus his clutch performances are worth that much.
I read up on this a couple months ago. DeMar's agent is trying not to put his client in the situation where Chicago can dictate the rest of his career and fuck up his earning potential. This is FAR more complicated for DeMar than it is for other free agents because of his age and the Over 38 Rule which they are going to have to face very soon.
The Bulls can offer him 4 years because of Bird Rights negating the limit of the Over 38 Rule. Other teams wanting to sign him as an FA can only offer 3. I think quite a lot of them would like to offer 1 or 2 years, which is no bueno: the Over 38 is going to loom larger every summer, and his market will be just 1 year deals after that. Which wouldn't be the end of the world, but his agent is being smart to argue for the S-tier top-of-the-line option for his client, which is 3 years.
KC putting it out that he wants 3 years a month ago was an indication of this. It's a very real question whether DeMar would take 2 years/$80 from Chicago over 3 years/$90 million from someone else. Not because of the guaranteed 3rd year but the reality that he'd be hitting the market in 2026 with Chicago giving him a gold watch as a 37 year old who might be very effective (I personally hold out more hope that he'll be an effective 37 year old than Kevin Durant) and then signing a 1 year/$10 million contract AT BEST because nobody can give him more than a 1 or 2 year deal. Which again, might even be the best thing for him, career-wise! But I don't begrudge his agent from trying to find a money situation where he's most comfortable and not hemmed in by arcane cap rules and Chicago being dicks and not doing a sign-and-trade.
So there's kind of a lot of shit at play here, I think his agent is arguing for the best possible scenario and then working backward from the scenarios that are actually offered.
This is both informative and compelling, great post.
Trying to work this through in my mind, I'm just not sure where to go.
Maybe it's changed under the new CBA, but I don't think that kind of contract structure is legal to sign a player to unless you're under the cap (which we aren't). Every year's raise or decrease has to be within 8% of the starting salary if you're using the Bird exception to sign your own player.
that's still correct, can't have huge increase or decrease in the contract
outside of, like you said, if a team is under the cap. Like Myles Turner got some insane raise in the first year of an extension, I recall
That is something I was unaware of. I did read something about the final year rules, which is why I made years 3 & 4 the same
Is there a good writeup on NBA contracts?
I was poking through the CBA and found that section: Article VII Section 5 (a)(2).
There is an exception for Incentive Compensation. If I'm reading it correctly, Unlikely Bonuses are limited to 140% of Likely Bonuses and the two are limited to 107.5% of the salary for DDR.
I'm not spotting anything saying Bonuses can't be changed drastically between seasons. So they could potentially use bonuses to alter the effective payout and salary cap interactions.
Nah, that's for bonuses. Which are limited to a percentage of total salary.
What you want to be looking at is the CBA FAQ. It'll answer all the questions you might come up with and probably some others
http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm
Thanks! Lots of good info to look through.
Kinda rambling thoughts as I peruse that FAQ.
The first things I'm seeing (primarily from Q54, 74 & 75):
1. A signing bonus could be used to increase the effective first year salary, effectively allowing lower base salary for subsequent years. It is split across the years for cap space. Assuming a $100M/4yr contract and no Likely/Unlikely bonuses, you could go with something like $15M Signing bonus/$26M/22M/20M/18.5M. Not great, but maybe a starting point.
2. Likely vs Unlikely Bonuses are re-evaluated each year. You could set bonuses that are likely to move from Likely to Unlikely as DDR ages (maybe PPG? 24 would qualify as Likely this year), to reduce both payout and cap hit (though not cap hold?, if I'm using the right terminology).
3. I see Unlikely Bonuses are limited to 15%, but I don't see how that is effected during the re-evaluation process. Any idea where I can find that?
4. Can teams voluntarily pay a Likely (or Unlikely) Bonus, if the player did not qualify? I feel like I remember a team doing that at one point.
5. From that, it appears Incentive Bonuses are limited to 20% of salary (I see what I misread in the CBA... thanks again). Assuming that is correct, you could end up with that earlier $100M proposed contract being something close to $15M signing bonus / $20M (+$4M Likely Bonus) / $17.7M (+$3.5M Bonus) / $16.25M (+$3.25M Bonus) / $15M (+$3M Bonus), with the Bonuses set at 21PPG (his career average)...or PPG plus 2x AST at 21 (is that allowed? it would discourage ball hogging as his game degrades with age). Not great, but on the surface it's not completely outside the realm of tradable. However, the cap issues add additional complexity.
6. Could also alter that to have Team Option for the last year, but then years 3&4 would need to have the same salary.
i still don't know what this guy does
https://www.si.com/nba/bulls/news/chicago-bulls-make-controversial-decision-after-failed-season-01hzn5yrkn65
It's a hell of a thing that they've done to Sports Illustrated. I wish Google News would de-list it because it's just bullshit like this and "What Nikola Jovic Tweeted On Tuesday." I'm not exaggerating: https://i.imgur.com/XIRFDkO.png
Latest Bulls news/rumors:
1. After striking out with three other teams (Portland, Charlotte, Detroit) over the past few years and clearly showing his displeasure working for the Bulls, Marc Eversley has now been rewarded with a three year extension.
2. Billy Donovan is now the head coach of the Windy City Bulls. No, not that Billy Donovan. It's his son this time. #Nepotism!
3. This one is a more of a rumor, but apparently Devin Carter has been given a draft promise with the rumor part being that the promise was made by the Bulls.
---------------------------------------------
Thoughts on these:
1. Why?
2. Why???
3. WHY????? I actually like Devin Carter and wouldn't necessarily mind drafting him if none of the bigger names fall, but this draft is totally up in the air. The likelihood of a bigger name with high upside being available at #11 is pretty high.
Who is #1 about?
Whoops, sorry about that! It was about Marc Eversley. I've edited my comment, although Matt has now covered it too in his new post.
hey that's my job https://www.blogabull.com/p/bulls-summer-rumors-are-minor-but