Feel like the bottom line right now is the Bulls are 15-17 with a -4 net rating, which is basically that of a team that should have 11 or 12 wins. When they've been fully or mostly healthy, they've been able to squeak out a number of wins thanks in large part to depth, other teams choking on it (looking at you Sixers), Vucevic game-winners. Believe they have the most wins in the NBA in games that come down to the final minute/few possessions. They've need a ton of clutch magic like that just to be...15-17, with a whole host of blowout losses and terrible losses to bad teams when there were a few injuries. The team is decent when fully/mostly healthy, but the margin for error is so small and they've needed some crazy shit to happen to barely be .below 500. a whole lot of trades should be made given where the roster is.
Of course. If we trade for 3 bad contracts we could get 3 1st round picks that may or may not be good someday. Or instead we could sign 3 useful free agents who could improve our team now.
It's about taking a big swing with a pick or packaging picks in a trade. Say instead we sign the equivalent of Jalen Smith, Tre Jones and Isaac Okoro to 'good' contracts, what does that do anyone?
The most infuriating thing is that the damage has already been done from a tanking perspective. Even if they lose a majority of their games over the next few weeks, they’re not “catching” the bottom five worst teams in the league.
Best-case scenario, they finish with worse records than the Hawks and Bucks, miss the play-in, and AK is FINALLY put on the hot seat (he still won’t be fired this year). But that’s a pretty sad best-case scenario at this point.
Selling at the deadline is never going to happen either.
I keep saying this because it’s true: the play-in tournament is a Bulls fan’s worst nightmare. This front office will stay in the 40-win zone as long as the Reinsdorfs let them.
Since the lottery odds got flattened, an average of 1.7 of the top 4 picks have gone to teams outside of the bottom 5.
I've concluded I'd rather almost never have a fire sale. The best strategy is to maintain an OK team and strategically tank by injuries or trades and be in the 5-11 zone, not the 0-4 zone. The 0-4 zone is pretty hard to get out of.
@KCJHoop: Patrick Williams and Dalen Terry checking in as 8th and 9th players for Billy Donovan
Billy is trying to play both sides here, if he was maximizing wins potential he'd simply not play 9 guys in the first quarter. And Jevon Carter over Dalen Terry.
Yeah, he is trying to earn his contract, which is good. And his shot has been going down. He's just so small it's hard to find spots for him where he can be a net positive.
Terry is a plus defender, which we have very few of. It's a shame he can't learn to make even open shots. He shouldn't be in anybody rotation but he can be useful as an energy guy when we need a disrupter to provide defensive pressure.
Filling gaps and running at shooters is part of defense today, so looking busy is good I guess. Let's just say he's not at Thybulle's level on D but he's just as bad a shooter, so there's not much of a future for him.
I want them to get star players. I think this wouldn't do that but would set them up better for the next move. There is no chance they can sign someone that good in free agency just based on who is available, the deemphasis of free agency, and the Bulls historic inability to get Free Agents
It is kinda scary to go into the off season with cap space. As you say we might strike out. The safer thing would be to tank, lowering everyone's expectations, and then draft some 18 year olds. Then we could all spend the next 3 years complaining that we should have drafted some #15 pick who turned out to be better than anyone expected instead of the guys we actually took.
The thing is there are a bunch of young free agents available who are future stars, who could do well to come to Chicago. Giddey is a great facilitator and we need a #1 scoring option. AK should be able to sell that.
Better than kicking the can down the road another few years, I'd say.
You know the list of free agents I'm sure. You also know how this site works, if someone floats a few names, all that happens is somebody picks out one guy from the list and says he sucks.
I'm not advocating for any specific players. We need a primary scorer, a rim-protecting big, and another wing defender. Those guys are out there.
but you don't have to trade for totally dead weight. They can even maybe rehab a vet's value, like theoretically what Tre Jones and Isaac Okoro have been able to do here but it is merely theoretical because the Bulls won't sell high (and I'm not sure the rest of the league isn't up to 'Bulls inflation')
Will has brought up the Nets trading for MPJ as an example. They got a pick from Denver to take that contract. He's playing so well they may be able to get another pick trading him away.
Which way do you mean? Trading for him or helping to get him to GS? If we could get Kuminga and move Williams with Portland's draft pick to Brooklyn I'd be all for that. We could play JK for the rest of the year to see what he can do, and either pick up his option or not. GS gets the player they want and Nets get an extra draft pick.
It will say AK doesn't know how to build and BD doesn't know how to coach around the 'talent' the team does have. Everything is just chaos and guesses all the time, all around. Amazing they spun back out of that seven game losing streak at all.
Billy’s doing as good of a job as he can with this roster. No coach is getting a good record out of a roster with zero top 60 players.
I think the harsh reality that AK won’t accept is that the gap between good role players (Tre Jones) and fringe all-star players (Giddey) isn’t that significant.
Unless Matas makes a leap, there isn’t anyone on this team that is going to make the kind of tangible difference you’d see from a franchise player.
I don't think AK would disagree with you on any of that. There is a small difference in talent between most NBA players. Coaches tell their players that all the time. Donovan says that in just about every post game interview. The reason we are winning is we have more and better role players than our opponents. The reason we are not winning enough is our best players are not as good as other teams' best players. We need to upgrade our roster.
Billy would agree with me, but AK most definitely would not.
Remember his back and forth with Cowley when Joe said there aren’t any all-stars on this roster and AK replied “Well, if Josh and Coby played like they did in March all season, they’d probably be all-stars”?
I don't think you should hold that against him. He was just talking up his players. And he didn't lie. They were playing like all stars. He even said probably haha.
For the record I do agree that Giddey is a fringe all star and Coby a bit below that.
If you're an AK apologist, it would say that their plan to build a team of 9-10 solid players has basically succeeded. Unfortunately, it would have only succeeded in showing that Giddey and Coby are replaceable and that this roster strategy is still only good for 35-40 wins.
We've had it all wrong all this time. AK is not stupid or incompetent, he's just too tall (at 30,000 feet) to see what's really happening down below:
In a separate story from Cowley, Donovan discusses the ‘‘30,000-foot view’’ that executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas has of the team’s injury situation as opposed to his mandate to try to win every game. Donovan also indicated that the Bulls don’t appear to be close to making any deals with the deadline five weeks away. ‘‘In the conversations I’ve had with Arturas, we have not talked about the trade deadline at this point in time at all,’’ Donovan told reporters. ‘‘I would say that I don’t know how other teams evaluate it. The guys you are bringing up, are they in contract years? Is there a dive they do in their history? Some of these guys, you’re right, have been set back with some injuries. I don’t know necessarily how much it does or doesn’t hurt.”
That wasn't much of an article was it. I thought Cowley had talked to AK but nope. Just Cowley telling us that Donovan let him know that AK is a big picture guy.
Bulls need to do something at the deadline and it should involve sending Coby to the Timberwolves for Beringer.
Peyton Watson would be a good get in free agency as I don’t see how Denver can match a big contract for him. Start Giddy, Buz, Noa, Beringer, and Watson (all +6’8”) and bottom out for the next 5 years. We would still have our firsts a good bench of Smith, Collins, Ayo, Okoro, and Jones.
Noa and Beringer are both risks, but we need to take a risk to get out of 10th place hell, don’t we? Minn has no reason to play an 18 yr old with their current win now big rotation of Randle Reid Gobert.
He’s not on there but Olivier Sarr would be worth a pickup. He’s playing well and looks like he’s recovered from his torn Achilles that dropped him off the map.
Also Charles Bassey.
I’d be happy to pick both of those guys up and drop any of our two-way guys or Phillips or Terry. Might hang on to the under contract guys until the deadline just in case but after that they can leave ASAP.
I might give Knox a look instead of one of them since seems like he can shoot now.
Watson seems like a solid defender and his offense is getting better every year. He gets to the line fairly well and his free throw percentage is improving. His 3-point shot is getting better too, he's 38% so far this year, and 50% from the corner. I agree it will be tough for the Nuggets to find the money to re-sign him.
Nuggets have Jokic out a while, and now Jonas Valanciunas also out at least a month.
would Nuggets feel need to plug this hole ASAP? Vuc is also legit better than Valanciunas for the playoffs
Nuggets are so close to 1st apron that Zeke Nnaji's contract pretty much needs to be included. It goes out 2 more years but the Bulls could reduce the cap hit if they waived and stretched. Taking on that money is more valueable than Vuc. While I don't think Denver would use a first...maybe a swap? And throw in a rookie scale guy aka young player with experience.
Vuc (could include Phillips, but Denver likely would rather do a vet buyout)
for
Valanciunas + Nnaji + Holmes + 2031 pick swap
Bulls waive Phillips and Terry
(it'd all be easier if the player going out was Zach Collins, but he's also hurt)
could expand it to bring in the above-mentioned Peyton Watson
the Nuggets need him - they are competitive! - but if Bulls sent back Ayo that would work financially. And if 'building', both need new contracts but Watson is nearly 3 years younger. (also could sign Ayo back if he took a hometown discount)
I think this team proves how much of a losing player Lavine is. The year Lonzo started healthy was the only year a Lavine led team had a better record than this year this far into the season.
Record on Jan 2 for each of his seasons:
2017-18: 13-24
2018-19: 10-28
2019-20: 13-22
2020-21: 2-4 (covid season)
2021-22: 24-10
2022-23: 16-21
2023-24: 15-20
2024-25: 15-19
w/o Lavine:
2025-26: 17-17
The biggest difference between last year and this year? Getting rid of Lavine and adding Okoro.
Granted, the difference between 15-19 & 17-17 isn't huge, but still... a team this mediocre is doing something a Lavine led team never did.
I'll think on how to do that, but it will be a bit harder, since he's still on the team.
I did a quick search (not 100% sure it's accurate), but found that the team is 179-184 (.493) with Vuc and 13-12 (.520) w/o (regular season only). That seems within rounding error of equal, due to the low number of games he's missed.
My feeling on Vuc is that he's less of a losing player, but primarily because he influences games less.
Well Zach and Vuc can both say they are all stars, they've both been on two AS teams. Do you mean the Brown is better because he is a perennial all star?
Luv 2 check in on a Bulls score (bc I'm not interested enough to watch) and see them up double digits because Vuc is perfect from the field and also up bc it's a home game against the Hornets
Okoro is on a completely different level than the others you listed. He's also not primarily a scorer. Huerter was the only player with >15 minutes who had a better +/- compared to Okoro.
Should we build a team around him? Of course not. But he's a good player. Not great, but good.
He’s a nice defender, but I wouldn’t say he’s a good overall player. +/- is an unreliable stat.
My point was just that a lot of these role players really aren’t as valuable as AK wants to believe they are. Sure, Okoro is better than Williams, Terry, and Phillips. That doesn’t mean he’s good compared to actual meaningful role players around the league.
You’ll feel the same way about him in two years when he’s inexplicably still here on a new contract.
The Bulls are 16-11 (.593) with Okoro playing and 1-7 (.125) with him out. He has more of an influence on winning than just about anyone else on this team.
With any roleplayer, fit is going to be incredibly important with how much he contributes to a team. On a good/great team, his influence will obviously be less. The same with a team that is filled with great defenders.
He's a good player. He'd find minutes on almost any team. Would he get starter minutes on a good team? Depends on the team's makeup. Would he get starter minutes on a great team? I doubt it.
"You’ll feel the same way about him in two years when he’s inexplicably still here on a new contract."
All players have a price where they are a good signing and a price where they are overpaid. AK has a terrible history of judging that kind of thing, so I can totally see him overpaying.
It's all about value and fit, once someone hits replacement level or better. And Okoro has hit that level.
Okoro at $11M/yr seems like a fine value. He's not at a value where every team would be salivating to make a trade for him (like Caruso was), but he's a solid consideration for teams needing a high level backup or average/good teams needing a defensive guard as a fifth starter.
I totally disagree. The Cavs couldn't give him away until they found a sucker in AK, and I don't think his esteem around the league has improved after 30 games in Chicago
Now we'll never know because AK doesn't 'sell', but I think the league treats Okoro as nobody worth using an asset on.
Feel like the bottom line right now is the Bulls are 15-17 with a -4 net rating, which is basically that of a team that should have 11 or 12 wins. When they've been fully or mostly healthy, they've been able to squeak out a number of wins thanks in large part to depth, other teams choking on it (looking at you Sixers), Vucevic game-winners. Believe they have the most wins in the NBA in games that come down to the final minute/few possessions. They've need a ton of clutch magic like that just to be...15-17, with a whole host of blowout losses and terrible losses to bad teams when there were a few injuries. The team is decent when fully/mostly healthy, but the margin for error is so small and they've needed some crazy shit to happen to barely be .below 500. a whole lot of trades should be made given where the roster is.
does anyone want Karnisovas making any more trades?
well yeah all of this should be prefaced with "AK should be fired first" but sadly that won't happen
I'm afraid the NBA will implement a solution to disincentivize tanking before AK is gone, making the job of the next front office that much harder
Or just making it that much easier for AK to keep his job.
We have $70 million of cap space to use. Do you think with trades we can improve more than signing $70 million of free agents?
Yes. Do you think there are $70M of signings AK could make that are positive value?
Of course. If we trade for 3 bad contracts we could get 3 1st round picks that may or may not be good someday. Or instead we could sign 3 useful free agents who could improve our team now.
It's about taking a big swing with a pick or packaging picks in a trade. Say instead we sign the equivalent of Jalen Smith, Tre Jones and Isaac Okoro to 'good' contracts, what does that do anyone?
Those three are all $10 million guys though. Obviously there are players available at a much higher level.
Who?
Bulls actually announced updates
https://www.nba.com/bulls/news/chicago-bulls-medical-updates
Going to be weeks, not days, for all three
The most infuriating thing is that the damage has already been done from a tanking perspective. Even if they lose a majority of their games over the next few weeks, they’re not “catching” the bottom five worst teams in the league.
Best-case scenario, they finish with worse records than the Hawks and Bucks, miss the play-in, and AK is FINALLY put on the hot seat (he still won’t be fired this year). But that’s a pretty sad best-case scenario at this point.
tank was never going to happen and due to some league-wide ineptitude (or craftiness) cannot happen this year
BUT they can still be deadline sellers and that will help their 'building' assets, even if large lottery odds aren't in the cards
Selling at the deadline is never going to happen either.
I keep saying this because it’s true: the play-in tournament is a Bulls fan’s worst nightmare. This front office will stay in the 40-win zone as long as the Reinsdorfs let them.
I agree, though it's not a function of the play-in. They would be In The Hunt for the play in even if they traded away 3-4 role players
I think White will be gone. There are too many teams interested in him. Someone will make us a stupid offer.
Since the lottery odds got flattened, an average of 1.7 of the top 4 picks have gone to teams outside of the bottom 5.
I've concluded I'd rather almost never have a fire sale. The best strategy is to maintain an OK team and strategically tank by injuries or trades and be in the 5-11 zone, not the 0-4 zone. The 0-4 zone is pretty hard to get out of.
are you suggesting there's an underlying logic in AKME actions ? That would be gross 😅 (but otherwise I understand and agree to your point)
Tonight's starters
Jones / Okoro / Buzelis / Smith / Vuc
Unclear if that's a matchup thing or Billy looking to COOK
and unfortunately:
@KCJHoop: Patrick Williams and Dalen Terry checking in as 8th and 9th players for Billy Donovan
Billy is trying to play both sides here, if he was maximizing wins potential he'd simply not play 9 guys in the first quarter. And Jevon Carter over Dalen Terry.
Pat is out there even though Zion isn't
Carter is not helping us at all. Terry would be a better player if he stopped shooting 3s.
the locker room seems to like him. And he can shoot and dribble, skills that Dalen Terry doesn't have. Terry has other skills but they're less useful.
Yeah, he is trying to earn his contract, which is good. And his shot has been going down. He's just so small it's hard to find spots for him where he can be a net positive.
Terry is a plus defender, which we have very few of. It's a shame he can't learn to make even open shots. He shouldn't be in anybody rotation but he can be useful as an energy guy when we need a disrupter to provide defensive pressure.
is he really a plus defender or does he just run around a lot and look busy?
Filling gaps and running at shooters is part of defense today, so looking busy is good I guess. Let's just say he's not at Thybulle's level on D but he's just as bad a shooter, so there's not much of a future for him.
I think the mistakes (fouling) negates his activity, at least as anything to be relied upon
Bulls are now 15-10 with Okoro in the lineup. He sucks up the tough defensive assignments. We're 1-7 without him.
Can't argue that math
Oh sorry I stopped after "he sucks"
Heh heh
Jones 7-7 from field, 12 assists with 1 TO
Did anyone guard him?
the Pelicans playing Jeremiah Fears who is a tiny and very green rookie. And Derrick Queen, who can't defend the paint.
So no.
I like Will Gottlieb but I'm not ready to pay him $48. What does he think the Bulls should do that you agree with?
Essentially use the flexibility to help other teams gain flexibility. Trade for bad contracts and take picks.
That's what you want us to do? Oof.
I want them to get star players. I think this wouldn't do that but would set them up better for the next move. There is no chance they can sign someone that good in free agency just based on who is available, the deemphasis of free agency, and the Bulls historic inability to get Free Agents
It is kinda scary to go into the off season with cap space. As you say we might strike out. The safer thing would be to tank, lowering everyone's expectations, and then draft some 18 year olds. Then we could all spend the next 3 years complaining that we should have drafted some #15 pick who turned out to be better than anyone expected instead of the guys we actually took.
The thing is there are a bunch of young free agents available who are future stars, who could do well to come to Chicago. Giddey is a great facilitator and we need a #1 scoring option. AK should be able to sell that.
Better than kicking the can down the road another few years, I'd say.
Do any of these available future star free agents have names?
You know the list of free agents I'm sure. You also know how this site works, if someone floats a few names, all that happens is somebody picks out one guy from the list and says he sucks.
I'm not advocating for any specific players. We need a primary scorer, a rim-protecting big, and another wing defender. Those guys are out there.
Also I want AK fired, that is the best thing they can do outside of winning the lottery
Winning the lottery with AKME deciding could be a positive ? Don't you expect them to trade away the top pick for young players with experience ? 😁
I suspect there's some kind of rule in the Bulls organization against that.
Like, when was the last time they did it?
If the Reinsdorfs demand that wins/attendance follow payroll (and it would be very much in character) then taking bad contracts is no go for a GM.
they did it for Tim Thomas TWICE
but you don't have to trade for totally dead weight. They can even maybe rehab a vet's value, like theoretically what Tre Jones and Isaac Okoro have been able to do here but it is merely theoretical because the Bulls won't sell high (and I'm not sure the rest of the league isn't up to 'Bulls inflation')
Will has brought up the Nets trading for MPJ as an example. They got a pick from Denver to take that contract. He's playing so well they may be able to get another pick trading him away.
Fischer says Bulls are interested in MPJ. Warriors too but Nets don't want Kuminga. So we could get MPJ for ourselves or facilitate a trade to GS.
which is totally backwards use of MPJ given the Bulls standing, but that's their M.O.
Which way do you mean? Trading for him or helping to get him to GS? If we could get Kuminga and move Williams with Portland's draft pick to Brooklyn I'd be all for that. We could play JK for the rest of the year to see what he can do, and either pick up his option or not. GS gets the player they want and Nets get an extra draft pick.
I wouldn't call it a rule, more like an executive compensation plan. I'd bet AK gets a bonus based on the bottom line.
Free Agent Signing: Bring back Doug McDermott?
Dog.
If the Bulls don’t really look any worse over the next few weeks, what does that say about the actual impact of Giddey and Coby?
whatever it says, AK won't say it
It will say AK doesn't know how to build and BD doesn't know how to coach around the 'talent' the team does have. Everything is just chaos and guesses all the time, all around. Amazing they spun back out of that seven game losing streak at all.
Billy’s doing as good of a job as he can with this roster. No coach is getting a good record out of a roster with zero top 60 players.
I think the harsh reality that AK won’t accept is that the gap between good role players (Tre Jones) and fringe all-star players (Giddey) isn’t that significant.
Unless Matas makes a leap, there isn’t anyone on this team that is going to make the kind of tangible difference you’d see from a franchise player.
I don't think AK would disagree with you on any of that. There is a small difference in talent between most NBA players. Coaches tell their players that all the time. Donovan says that in just about every post game interview. The reason we are winning is we have more and better role players than our opponents. The reason we are not winning enough is our best players are not as good as other teams' best players. We need to upgrade our roster.
Billy would agree with me, but AK most definitely would not.
Remember his back and forth with Cowley when Joe said there aren’t any all-stars on this roster and AK replied “Well, if Josh and Coby played like they did in March all season, they’d probably be all-stars”?
That man is living in a fantasy world.
I don't think you should hold that against him. He was just talking up his players. And he didn't lie. They were playing like all stars. He even said probably haha.
For the record I do agree that Giddey is a fringe all star and Coby a bit below that.
There’s a very big difference between an all-star and a fringe all-star.
Jaylen Brown is an all-star. Zach LaVine and Nikola Vucevic are fringe all-stars.
If AK can’t understand that difference, it absolutely should be held against him.
If you're an AK apologist, it would say that their plan to build a team of 9-10 solid players has basically succeeded. Unfortunately, it would have only succeeded in showing that Giddey and Coby are replaceable and that this roster strategy is still only good for 35-40 wins.
is Josh Giddey holding Buzelis back?!?!?
Gee, it’s almost as if the Thunder trading away Giddey and instantly becoming a potential dynasty was a bad sign.
Buz played well last night. That was a great poster dunk over Suggs. 7 assists too.
yeah Buzelis showing improvement would be the only possible meaning out of this stretch (or entire?) season
We've had it all wrong all this time. AK is not stupid or incompetent, he's just too tall (at 30,000 feet) to see what's really happening down below:
In a separate story from Cowley, Donovan discusses the ‘‘30,000-foot view’’ that executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas has of the team’s injury situation as opposed to his mandate to try to win every game. Donovan also indicated that the Bulls don’t appear to be close to making any deals with the deadline five weeks away. ‘‘In the conversations I’ve had with Arturas, we have not talked about the trade deadline at this point in time at all,’’ Donovan told reporters. ‘‘I would say that I don’t know how other teams evaluate it. The guys you are bringing up, are they in contract years? Is there a dive they do in their history? Some of these guys, you’re right, have been set back with some injuries. I don’t know necessarily how much it does or doesn’t hurt.”
That wasn't much of an article was it. I thought Cowley had talked to AK but nope. Just Cowley telling us that Donovan let him know that AK is a big picture guy.
Bulls need to do something at the deadline and it should involve sending Coby to the Timberwolves for Beringer.
Peyton Watson would be a good get in free agency as I don’t see how Denver can match a big contract for him. Start Giddy, Buz, Noa, Beringer, and Watson (all +6’8”) and bottom out for the next 5 years. We would still have our firsts a good bench of Smith, Collins, Ayo, Okoro, and Jones.
Beringer's claim to fame is that at this point he's played the 2nd fewest minutes of any FRP from the 2025 draft (second only to Noa).
I take that to mean that, like Noa, he will effectively be a wasted roster spot.
Noa and Beringer are both risks, but we need to take a risk to get out of 10th place hell, don’t we? Minn has no reason to play an 18 yr old with their current win now big rotation of Randle Reid Gobert.
Anybody off this list seem like a better use of a roster spot? https://www.spotrac.com/news/_/id/3198/nba-10-day-and-two-way-candidates-to-watch
He’s not on there but Olivier Sarr would be worth a pickup. He’s playing well and looks like he’s recovered from his torn Achilles that dropped him off the map.
Also Charles Bassey.
I’d be happy to pick both of those guys up and drop any of our two-way guys or Phillips or Terry. Might hang on to the under contract guys until the deadline just in case but after that they can leave ASAP.
I might give Knox a look instead of one of them since seems like he can shoot now.
Watson seems like a solid defender and his offense is getting better every year. He gets to the line fairly well and his free throw percentage is improving. His 3-point shot is getting better too, he's 38% so far this year, and 50% from the corner. I agree it will be tough for the Nuggets to find the money to re-sign him.
Nuggets have Jokic out a while, and now Jonas Valanciunas also out at least a month.
would Nuggets feel need to plug this hole ASAP? Vuc is also legit better than Valanciunas for the playoffs
Nuggets are so close to 1st apron that Zeke Nnaji's contract pretty much needs to be included. It goes out 2 more years but the Bulls could reduce the cap hit if they waived and stretched. Taking on that money is more valueable than Vuc. While I don't think Denver would use a first...maybe a swap? And throw in a rookie scale guy aka young player with experience.
Vuc (could include Phillips, but Denver likely would rather do a vet buyout)
for
Valanciunas + Nnaji + Holmes + 2031 pick swap
Bulls waive Phillips and Terry
(it'd all be easier if the player going out was Zach Collins, but he's also hurt)
could expand it to bring in the above-mentioned Peyton Watson
the Nuggets need him - they are competitive! - but if Bulls sent back Ayo that would work financially. And if 'building', both need new contracts but Watson is nearly 3 years younger. (also could sign Ayo back if he took a hometown discount)
"Bulls could reduce the cap hit if they waived and stretched."
Does AK even understand that concept?
and FYI it'd take cap hit to $3M/yr for the next 5 years.
I could see AK doing a deal like this, especially if he likes Watson. I think Holmes has upside too.
he'd do it without the pick swap
Lol maybe
Is there anybody in the league named Moriarty to be included here?
i dont think Vuc is that much better than JV for the Nuggets to feel the need to give up any assets at all.
I don't think he is either but he's healthy. JV's calf strain is at least 4 weeks
I think this team proves how much of a losing player Lavine is. The year Lonzo started healthy was the only year a Lavine led team had a better record than this year this far into the season.
Record on Jan 2 for each of his seasons:
2017-18: 13-24
2018-19: 10-28
2019-20: 13-22
2020-21: 2-4 (covid season)
2021-22: 24-10
2022-23: 16-21
2023-24: 15-20
2024-25: 15-19
w/o Lavine:
2025-26: 17-17
The biggest difference between last year and this year? Getting rid of Lavine and adding Okoro.
Granted, the difference between 15-19 & 17-17 isn't huge, but still... a team this mediocre is doing something a Lavine led team never did.
Could you investigate something similar wirh Vuc ? Just asking ^^
I'll think on how to do that, but it will be a bit harder, since he's still on the team.
I did a quick search (not 100% sure it's accurate), but found that the team is 179-184 (.493) with Vuc and 13-12 (.520) w/o (regular season only). That seems within rounding error of equal, due to the low number of games he's missed.
My feeling on Vuc is that he's less of a losing player, but primarily because he influences games less.
Well Zach and Vuc can both say they are all stars, they've both been on two AS teams. Do you mean the Brown is better because he is a perennial all star?
Luv 2 check in on a Bulls score (bc I'm not interested enough to watch) and see them up double digits because Vuc is perfect from the field and also up bc it's a home game against the Hornets
Nevermind they lost
Okoro, Williams, Terry, and Phillips tonight: 70 combined minutes. 10 combined points.
But hey, this team has a lot of good depth!
All 25 or younger so who can really say what their ceiling is
Exciting young core
Okoro is on a completely different level than the others you listed. He's also not primarily a scorer. Huerter was the only player with >15 minutes who had a better +/- compared to Okoro.
Should we build a team around him? Of course not. But he's a good player. Not great, but good.
He’s a nice defender, but I wouldn’t say he’s a good overall player. +/- is an unreliable stat.
My point was just that a lot of these role players really aren’t as valuable as AK wants to believe they are. Sure, Okoro is better than Williams, Terry, and Phillips. That doesn’t mean he’s good compared to actual meaningful role players around the league.
You’ll feel the same way about him in two years when he’s inexplicably still here on a new contract.
The Bulls are 16-11 (.593) with Okoro playing and 1-7 (.125) with him out. He has more of an influence on winning than just about anyone else on this team.
With any roleplayer, fit is going to be incredibly important with how much he contributes to a team. On a good/great team, his influence will obviously be less. The same with a team that is filled with great defenders.
He's a good player. He'd find minutes on almost any team. Would he get starter minutes on a good team? Depends on the team's makeup. Would he get starter minutes on a great team? I doubt it.
"You’ll feel the same way about him in two years when he’s inexplicably still here on a new contract."
All players have a price where they are a good signing and a price where they are overpaid. AK has a terrible history of judging that kind of thing, so I can totally see him overpaying.
Not that raw +\- is that useful but it's a low bar to beat 'team record when he plays'. Okoro is -4.7 per36
He's still perhaps technically on a different level than Terry or Phillips or Williams, who are sub replacement level
Ultimately what matters for the franchise (or should) is trade value, and they all have zero
It's all about value and fit, once someone hits replacement level or better. And Okoro has hit that level.
Okoro at $11M/yr seems like a fine value. He's not at a value where every team would be salivating to make a trade for him (like Caruso was), but he's a solid consideration for teams needing a high level backup or average/good teams needing a defensive guard as a fifth starter.
I totally disagree. The Cavs couldn't give him away until they found a sucker in AK, and I don't think his esteem around the league has improved after 30 games in Chicago
Now we'll never know because AK doesn't 'sell', but I think the league treats Okoro as nobody worth using an asset on.
I think he'd get a comparable player on a comparable contract.
I don't think any team would give up an expiring contract for him the way we did. Not without requiring some compensation back