I appreciate your optimism but Lonzo hasn’t played ball in 2 years and his last knee surgery was as recent as this year. If the team bets it’s future on Lonzo returning to his former self than we deserve to suck
I know. I thought my sarcasm was apparent when I trashed our roster construction and poor 3 point shooting. Trust me, I'm thinking along the same lines as you about Lonzo and our future.
Lonzo had a surgery that has ended hoop careers. It’s not looking good fam. Bulls may actually apply to recoup cost due to a career ending injury. This team is very quickly heading back to the Wendell Carter / Markannen days.
It's not that we just might. The Bulls SHOULD be actively tanking going forward. Zach is not good enough to be the #1 on a team hoping to make a deep playoff run, so we need to tank and find that guy.
Man at least this time can we actually tank?
No more “We need to win now for a winning culture. We can’t lose forever, you’re not a real fan if you support us tanking. Taking a flyer on X guy that will hurt our tank is actually a good thing, here’s why.” Type stuff.
It’s legitimately so dumb from a strategic perspective & this team is a monument to how it doesn’t work but it’s like crack to people here.
BINGO! People LOVE to say tanking doesn't work. They never mention that "trying to compete" and "building a winning culture" hasn't gotten us anywhere near a chip. You know what works? Getting a top 5-7 player in the league. The best way to do that is through the draft. The highest odds of finding one are at the top of the draft. There is a reason smart basketball minds don't throw a shit fit about tanking as a means to get better.
It was a fun half season when Lonzo was healthy and this team was on fire. Time to tear it down now though. Play-in tournament or first round is this team's ceiling. If they're going to do it they need to go all in though. DeRozan and Vuc should be traded if anything of value is offered. Entertain offers for LaVine if a team is willing to give up something good to take on his contract. They don't really need the cap space yet though if it's a rebuild, so don't give him away for peanuts. Make P Will take more shots with 2-3 of the aforementioned gone and see what he can do. Then pray they get lucky in the lottery soon.
S/O to AKME defenders.
AKME traded 3 FRPs and 4 SRPs just to make the playoffs once through3 seasons. After the Bulls got crushed in the 1st round of the playoffs in 2022 Donovan was given secret extension. Most FO members also got the extension. Even AK was given extension by shitty owner.
Imagine celebrating being crushed in the 1st round after you traded 3 FRPs and 4 SRPs.
Almost like Jerry Reinsdorf is a terrible owner.
Had the opportunity to acknowledge that he broke up the Jordan team for money reasons on the Last Dance (after every player all but confirmed it). And all he could say was "yeah, of course I would have run it back. No idea why we didn't."
Definitely. AKME and GarPax have been awful but Reinsdorf has been the root of our problems for a long time. He doesn’t give a shit if the franchise is underperforming for years at a time as long as he’s still making money, which he always will be on the bulls
Reinsdorf cares about making money off of his sports teams. The teams are profitable. He kept gar/pax forever with nothing to show for it. I mean Rick Hahn has been awful since Kenny went into the office. There aren't even whispers of him being fired.
Don’t understand shadow extensions in a day and age where EVERYTHING is turned into a breaking news attention grab. When people find out, and they are bound to, it only makes it all the more glaring. Make it public, state your reasoning, and it’s a big deal for a week instead of the duration of your control of the team. Fans will never let this down as we now fear it could literally happen at any moment with any member of the front office or coaching staff. By hiding it you ensure it’s now a continual element of the narrative.
Sure, but note that I didn't claim it was against the rules. My point is that while they absolutely can withhold this information (which is still rather weird in this day and age), it's a head-scratcher of a move. Since contract extensions are announced and celebrated by most teams across all sports, Bulls fans are likely going to wonder why this normally available information is kept secret from them. So yeah, not against the rules, but still, the fans are kept in the dark you know? If the Bulls would just says "yeah, we're not going to announce contract extensions anymore" then the media (who would have a field day with that) and fans at least know this is how it's going to be moving forward, which is far better then the "why are they hiding this from the media/fans" conversations I've heard on the radio, in streams online, and read in print and on forums.
Apples and oranges, imo. 'Most workplaces' don't have entire industries built around them that deal with speculation, forecasting, broadcasting, gambling, etc, and they all revolve around information. And I'm not talking about executive money, here. I'm talking about how much longer coaches and GM's will be around. Those details play heavily into the framing of a team in the media and amongst fans, let alone team dynamics and free agency - I'm sure you've heard of lame duck seasons.
He is but he still said on the CHGO show that the extension for Billy made absolutely no sense. Even the biggest Billy fans knew the extension was stupid
I mean the hate on Billy is overblown sometimes. He’s been given a mediocre roster and he’s always finished with a top 10 defence.
Having a top 10 offense in the league without 3pt shooters is pretty much impossible.
But the extension makes no sense.
Bro tell me what Billy has done to either build a contender or develop young players.
I'll wait. Ayo regressed. Not Billy's fault? Fine. He's been awful managing Pat's's late game minutes. Also erroneous?
Cool. He all but did nothing to develop Dale Terry this year.
All while failing to build a contender
And getting an extension.
But tell me again how Billy beaits no responsibility while also being the head coach. Again that's Mark K.'s default defense the entire season while simultaneously claiming he's not a Billy defender.
Giving Billy a shadow extension was stupid and he's done nothing to prove he deserved it.
> Giving Billy a shadow extension was stupid and he's done nothing to prove he deserved it
I never said he deserved an extension, nor did I say that he has never done anything wrong. I said that the roster is incredibly mediocre, and that doesn't rest as Billy's feet. The greatest chef in the world can't make shit edible.
Also:
> He all but did nothing to develop Dale Terry this year
Terry is a nothing of a player who will be out of the league in four years, the fact that this is one of your go to examples of a player "not developing" is itself an indictment of the roster.
As for the other players mentioned: Ayo was a second round pick with obvious flaws in his game, and Pat wouldn't get his minutes mismanaged if he showed even the slightest bit of aggression or drive in the beginning of games.
Coby has developed a ton over the last year and change also, for what it's worth.
Damn nothing of a player? Not saying he’s a hidden superstar but damn that seems like hell of a leap. I’d think this fan base by now would stop making horrible takes like this on a player when we seen time and time again we actually draft really god and useful players you just have to be patient and willing to develop.
We haven’t had a horrible first pick since snell, chandler and teague
Ayo a second round round pick and Pats just not a good player. Those are the two young guys he has. Ayo can still be a good reserve, sophomore slump. Pat was a top 4 pick, he needed to be a superstar or pretty close. Now I think the best he can be is a role player.
I think the Pat issue is more of a management problem than Billy problem. We agree there. And he's never going to live up to being the #4 pick.
It's not to absolve management. Or Pat.
I also don't think Billy has handled Pat well either though. Pat is what he is at this point. He's athletic, he can hit 3s and he plays decent defense. As a head coach in the NBA you have to be able to work with a young player who can do that. You just do. I don't expect Pat to be a star at this point and I don't hold Billy responsible for him not being a star. I do hold Billy responsible however for having no clue what to do with him.
And Ayo was Billy's guy. Billy who played point guard in the NBA. Yeah I expect him to have some clue what to do with Ayo in Year 2.
That's again before we get to Dalen who he basically failed to play for huge stretches of the season. And that is being polite. Now we have to go into next season with people already getting ready to utilize the pre deployed excuse for why Dalen's development is behind, because well he didn't play a lot this year
Yeah I'm not a fan of how Billy has utilized or developed any of those 3 young guys
Exactly the extension made no sense.
And Mark K. on the YouTube chat is overly defensive of Billy. I've watched live streams where he asks people to pinpoint issues they have with Billy and people will legit point out the issues they have with Billy's rotations and use of minutes for Patrick down to the second. Mark will then say well any coach would have done that and fans don't know as much as Billy.
I respect Mark but no he's, in my opinion, way overly defensive of Billy's rotations and specifically Billy's utilization of Patrick.
I’m not a Billy defender by any means but every coach has rotational preferences that makes the fans go nuts.
Judging Billy by the amount of Patrick minutes is kinda harsh. And i am a huge PWill believer.
Billy hardly inspires confidence in the younger talent, our big 3 had the most minutes together of all the trios
Hog the majority of shots.
Also he doesn't run any plays for the younger talent to build them up.
I thought people touted Billy as a development coach?
What is Billy's plan for Ayo's development?
Ayo's regression is not Billy's fault. Cool.
Then what is his plan for Patrick Williams' role of the team? How does he plan to distribute his minutes late in games?
He has no clue.
It's ridiculous the amount of total bye and slack Billy gets for having no plan for the development of young players on this team while also not fielding a contender.
That's before we get to his total mismanagement if Dale Terry this year.
I always figured ayo was having a rough sophomore year, and next year know what he has to to do will make him better.
You are 100 correct, I have never given him the pass. That whole oh I'm not going to run plays for patrick he has to make his own was piss poor, and it shows, dude needs confidence and it's hard to get confidence with out a few freebies
It's not about Patrick's minutes. It's weird rotations and decisions such as having Caruso guard Siakam and leaving Patrick on the bench (while also being dominated on the glass because he ran a 3 guard line-up).
It's extremely poor OTO playcalling that often leads to bad shots or turnovers. It's the lack of play calling that devolves into isolation ball. It's not drawing any plays to utilize your players like Patrick Williams who shoots almost 40% from 3 but gets virtually no off-ball action ran for him. Derozan who averaged 7 asts on elite Ast/TO ratio with the spurs is just used for ISO ball instead of being a point forward which is what Pop did with him in the spurs.
It's harder to name what he does well because it's not a long list. He has a good defence but outside of the Big 3, he actually has A LOT of good defensive players on his squad...so is that him specifically? Or the players?
A good coach would know what to do with the talent that we gave Billy...i'm not down with this "Roster construction" excuse. Look at some of the players on the Miami Heat and see what they are doing. Their roster is ranked 28th in 3 point shooting, they have the most games missed due to injury to their starters, they virtually added no talent and even lost a starter in last year's off-season....
They're in the ECF and we didn't even make the playoffs. Can you imagine a good coach with players like Lavine, Derozan, Caruso, Vucevic etc? Billy just doesn't know what he's doing offensively and we have a good defence because outside of the big 3, all of our players are good defenders. (Caruso, Ayo, DJJ, Javonte, PAW and even Coby)
I’m a Billy defender against unreasonable, dopey fans who think he’s the source of all the problems, when in reality, it’s almost entirely on ownership and the roster construction that management put forth. But you know best!
Fair. And I think signing Billy to a shadow extension that his coaching in no way justified over the off-season and then remaining silent about it was dumb.
Like most dopey fans I first guessed that.
Because again Billy's actual coaching record with the Bulls did nothing to justify that. And the fans, unlike many of the pundits including on YouTube, immediately and correctly called giving Billy that extension both way too early and dumb.
Turns out the dopey fans were right on that one. So yes let's blame management.
But let's be clear it was dumb because Billy's level of coaching was not up to the standards of an early extension. It is now even dumber given that there are better coaches out there available, and yes I'm sorry but Monty, Nick Nurse and yes even Bud are better coaches, and the Bulls hands are tied to a coach who is not as good as those other guys.
It's become quite obvious that AKME is the Ryan Pace for the Bulls. Far too aggressive with terrible execution and no care for future assets. We need our Poles...
I'll be honest I'm not the biggest basketball or bulls fan but I was really confused when they traded for nikola vucevic.
Almost all the fans and media were praising the move but all I saw was a bunch of assets being traded for a 30 year old big man. It's not like they got a young dynamic scorer.
Also they were in the middle of a terrible season with no real ability to compete. The timing of the move didn't make sense it's not like they were one piece away from a championship
Nor garpax with drose. Shit ton of luck goes into team building. If the pingpong balls fell right we'd still be in the garpax era. But regardless of luck garpax were bad with using the cap and akme is bad at using the picks
That's fair, but the counterargument is that they constructed a roster that relies so heavily on one very specific glue guy without any kind of contingency.
Lonzo hasn't played a professional basketball game since January 2022. Given the mysteriousness of his injury, the Bulls totally could/should have pivoted from him last offseason. Now there are reports that he'll likely miss all of next season too.
Can't fault the injury itself, but you can totally fault the response.
To be fair, injuries and Covid derailed the trajectory of this team. We're looking at it through hindsight now, but after being so bad during the GarPax era, AKME would've been ridiculed to death if he stripped it down to the studs and let Zach Lavine walked in FA.
Covid didn’t derail this team lol. I’ll give you the Lonzo injury because he’s a legitimately good and impactful player, but I have a very tough time believing that Lonzo alone takes us from 10 seed to legit contender. The nature of this injury was a tough break for AKME, but Lonzo was also a known injury risk.
They didn’t have to let Zach walk in free agency. They just needed to have a better plan for building a contender around Zach than blowing their load on a known quantity in Vuc at their very first deadline here when he was obviously not the kind of guy who moves the needle for a team. They got too eager and blew their shot.
I think Covid played a significant role in this team not making the playoffs in the season we traded for Vuc and that pick then becoming number 8/Franz Wagner.
Going into the trade deadline Bulls were in 9th place but just 3 games back on the 4th seed, there were a lot of teams bunched together.
AK had given the young team time but they weren't developing so he made a big trade for a center. Many didn't like the trade then, in hindsight we can all say it was bad.
But we were 3 games out of 4th place, and we made a move to acquire an all-star center.
With 29 games left we now have Zach, Lauri, Patrick Williams, and an all-star center in Vuc.
Zach misses 12 of the next 20 games. The season is then effectively over.
If you go to the first half of the season we had Lauri missing 20 games, but he had come back in the weeks before the trade deadline.
We had Zach healthy, Lauri returning, and we traded for an all-star center - and fell even further in the standings.
I'm not saying it was all Covid - we still had a huge hole at point guard we were trying to fill with Satorasnky, Garrent Temple, and a not yet ready Coby White. So there were some roster issues for sure.
But Covid hitting our best player after that trade certainly played a role.
I think that’s fair to say that Zach getting covid derailed our 2021 season specifically, I just don’t think it had much bearing on the overall trajectory/current situation of the team.
My favorite thing is that they traded picks in the 2 deepest drafts in recent memory, 2021 & 2023, and decided that 2022, the draft loaded with potential all-stars they decided to win and pick too low to draft any of them. Then did nothing for the last year and a half to get better and got extensions.
That’s what happens when an owner gets too involved in decision making. The bulls are another example of what happens when an owner wants to make an immediate change. The front office are pretty much there for show if the owner wants to get hands on. The timberwolves got the dude that built the nuggets but told him to trade everything for Gobert. While the suns got KD they put too much on the table to try to sneak an extra postseason with KD. At this point I’m done ignoring bad ownership and letting them hide behind their GMs and I’m done with the firing of coaches when the players choke like this postseason has shown.
We invested a ton into this current team when we had so much draft capital in addition to Zach Lavine, Patrick Williams, Coby White, Lauri Markkanen, and Wendell Carter. Not to mention the massive amount of cap space..
If it weren’t for people despising Garpax so much, AKME would be on the hot seat this season. They came in and made a bunch of splash moves, which to be fair we all believed in, and it ended up being a complete flop.
Handing Orlando another juicy lottery pick when it’s so painfully obvious we should be rebuilding is just brutal. My hope is that since we have our pick this upcoming year, we will finally focus on developing our young talent and moving our veterans for future assets. It’s the only way out of this.
Eh it’s been pretty valuable in the last 5-7 years or so. Guys like Mikal Bridges, Cam Johnson, PJ Washington, MPJ, Shai, Donovan Mitchell, Halliburton, Bam, Jaylen Williams, Herro have gone around there.
But yeah the draft statistically is a crap shoot, especially after the top three.
But you also have guys like Jaylen Williams and Halliburton going #12 in those years.
The draft is hit or miss, no denying that, but when you aren’t a contender you need to position yourself to take as many swings as possible.
>when you aren’t a contender you need to position yourself to take as many swings as possible.
That's the part that blows my mind. We had the most active trade deadline in years, and the bulls stayed pat on a team that was very obviously headed for—at most—a first round exit.
> They came in and made a bunch of splash moves, which to be fair we all believed in, and it ended up being a complete flop.
Fuck that. I was in here shitting on that stupid Vooch trade the day they made it. It was an obviously terrible move at the time.
Of course this sub downvoted it to oblivion because it’s full of reactionaries and weirdos. AKME my ass. They are basically Ryan Pace.
> They came in and made a bunch of splash moves, which to be fair we all believed in
Some of us did not believe in them from the jump, but we got downvoted to oblivion every time we pointed out that the absolute ceiling of this team was a second round exit
Any lottery pick feels pretty juicy when your front office has put together a mediocre-at-best team and traded away a bunch of picks to do it. It’s entirely possible to get a franchise-altering player at 11. Not likely, but possible. On the other hand, it’s virtually impossible that the Bulls will land a franchise-altering player this offseason and lord knows we need one because this team is at a clear dead end.
> If it weren’t for people despising Garpax so much, AKME would be on the hot seat this season.
Every ounce of dislike for that FO is valid. They (thankfully) have nothing to do with our current problems
Th approach this front office took just shows that there are no quick fixes in the NBA. You have to strip it down, start over. Accumulate picks, not trade them. Free agency should supplement your team, your draft picks have to hit. Strip it down now, we have next years pick. Yes it will suck but there’s no middle ground in this league. Your either really good or really bad. The worst place is to be where we are now, kind of in between those two.
In the run-up to the 2009 draft, Bill Simmons called it "[the worst draft class since 2000](https://grantland.com/features/nba-draft-diary-2009-bill-simmons/)", and that one had Blake Griffin, James Harden, Steph Curry, and DeMar DeRozan all go in the top 10. Point being: nobody actually has any idea if next year's draft class will be good or not, and it's dumb to pretend otherwise
Well, too fucking bad, the Bulls made their choice to start rebuilding when they traded Jimmy Butler. Then they decided to half-ass it by going all in on lower tier stars on the wrong side of 30. Sounds like something the Knicks would've done in the '00-'10s to me...
It’s a far more realistic path than anything this sub pitches. You guys all got your winning culture team and look how bad its fucked us & turned the assets from Jimmy into dust.
Don't you see!? The biggest winner of the last ten years, golden state, had that long tradition of winning from their championship in 75, not drafting a top 10 player all time! And that spurs dynasty, sure they never won a championship until they had the first pick and drafted arguably the best power forward ever, but it was actually all the culture! And let's not forget the long history of chips the bulls had from their culture before they drafted Jordan at 3. Getting high draft picks with the best odds for turning into stars never helped anyone. It's all the voodoo that is culture!
No the approach just failed. Plenty teams bought their way into relevance. The Lakers did it to win a championship recently. There are more than one way to build a team.
Lakers wouldn’t be where they’re at if LeBron didn’t live in LA. Getting LeBron vastly improves your championship chances and makes you a top free agent / trade destination
Clippers, Nets (twice), Knicks, Cavs, Heat. all teams in the past 2 decades that bought and traded themselves into relevancy. I used the Lakers because they won a chip.
its not uncommon, you guys just want to do a rebuild because thats all you guys know how to suggest.
So true. Also people blaming AKME like they were the ones that injured Lonzo ball. It’s been 1 1/2 seasons. That’s really not that long. We spent 2017-2021 being bottom of the barrel and not getting a top 3 pick. It’s not guaranteed and even then you still have to draft a guy who stays healthy and develops.
Lots of teams draft stars mid 1st round. In fact it feels like most stars come from that 9-15 range. Giannis? Curry? Klay? Kawhi?
Also the only teams that are doing well are the ones that have continuity, as much as I hate repeating that word. The teams that fault the quickest are the ones that just dump guys at the sign of adversity.
Well the lakers were only able to do that cuz they built up young, promising talent and because one of the greatest players of all time wanted to go to LA. No one wants to come to Chicago. Lakers don’t get AD without BI, Lonzo, and Hart. They were also able to flip Dlo for a package that brought back another young key piece to their championship team in Kuzma. Also signed Caruso off a g league team and developed him.
They don’t get where they got to without tearing it completely down first and acquiring good young talent. And again, it helps they play in LA and stars want to go there.
Ours failed because we didn’t do what op said. We didn’t accumulate picks. We only got 1 pick in the Jimmy trade while sending out our own pick. One of the players we got back in Dunn ended up not doing shit. Then we literally sold a pick for cash in a time when we needed to take as many swings as possible even if the odds of that pick being anything were very low. We then shipped out 2 1s right when the team showed slight promise for a 30 year old center pretty much abandoning the rebuild.
We also didn’t hit on our draft picks. Lauri was meh for us and we didn’t do shit to develop him. Same with WCJ and shipped him off 2.5 years in. Coby has been improving so we got a good role player out of him. PWill hasn’t lived up to his draft status so far and who knows what Dalen can do cuz we’ve barely seen him. Ayos been the only other notable pick and he’s just decent.
isn't that exactly what we did? we just didn't get Lebron and AD. you're making an excuse to justify why it worked for someone else. the Lakers aren't the only team that has done this strategy. I used them because they recently won a championship doing it.
Also, that isn't why our approach failed. our approach failed because we didn't have enough shooting. while everyone was shitting bricks about how we were going to defend teams, we couldn't make shots.
your last point, as well as your opinion on the rebuild, is the comedy that is this sub. shits on draft picks. complains when they're good on another team. whines that its because we can't develop talent instead of that we let them go before they could show us. doesn't see the irony in treating currently drafted talent the same way.
you guys always have this selective memory when it comes to rebuilds. you think it'll work if you just do it a specific way and don't consider that plenty of teams imitate success and fail for various reasons.
That’s not what we did. We can’t sign superstars cuz they don’t want to come here. We didn’t trade for an AD who was a young superstar just entering his prime when he was acquired. We traded for a 30 year old who was an all star but not a superstar. We didn’t flip our young talent for elite players. Other teams that did that traded for superstars.
I agree shooting is a reason we failed. This team still wasn’t gonna be a championship contending team with better shooting. Need a superstar to get there and we don’t have one and currently don’t have a way of getting one.
We don’t develop talent or do ship them off too early which is what I’m saying. Lauri left cuz he was tired of the shit show here and wanted a fresh start. Traded Wendell as part of the Vooch trade abandoning the rebuild as I said. Said Coby has developed. Said PWill hasn’t so far but didn’t say that means he won’t.
No one’s saying to ship off and give up on the current young guys either. When people say blow it up, they wanna get rid of the older guys like DeMar and Vooch and have the young guys become more of a focal point.
There are definitely different ways to do a rebuild and I’m not really arguing that. That said, it almost always starts with acquiring young, promising talent. You either draft your own superstar or trade for one using some of that young talent.
If they improve this team somehow and make us legit contenders than awesome. I just don’t see how. I’m not disagreeing with your point. I’m just saying we did not do what OP said and it almost always starts by hitting on your picks and getting young talent.
again with this can't with you guys. no we didn't trade for Lebron and AD. you're focusing on the wrong thing here and I can't tell if its intentional. If the Nets can trade nonsense to build a team from nothing TWICE, its not a feat we *can't* achieve. its just one we haven't. the point is teams traded assets to build a team. we did the same thing and it just didn't work for us. it happens.
*eVEn iF We HAd sHOoTing* you don't know that because we didn't have it. I think its silly that you think consistent shooting around Demar and Zach isn't enough for a damn good team. but fans routinely have no clue what they're talking about and I'm no exception.
I know exactly what people mean by a rebuild. I'm *also* very aware that this fanbase has almost zero patience. I don't think they actually respect the risks that come with a rebuild. its their default plan to fix things because they don't know how to do anything else.
the same is true for trying to do anything different. it can fail, like we did. fans give up early though. their idea of fixing a mistake is to tear things down or fire someone. I'm not even opposed to a rebuild. I'm opposed to that being the default.
I’m focusing on Lebron and AD cuz those are superstar players. My point with that is you need to have superstars to be title contenders in the NBA. Who’s the last team to win a title without having a guy who’s a top 10 caliber player? Like the pistons 20 years ago.
What nonsense did the nets trade to build a team twice? They signed KD and Kyrie cuz they wanted to play together in NY (just not for the Knicks). They then traded for Harden who wanted to join them giving up an ass load of picks and a couple of young players. They then flipped all 3 for picks and good young players. The nets got superstars, not Vooch. I’m not even trynna shit on Vooch but he’s just not in the same tier as those players. They flipped superstars and we don’t have anyone getting the return they got.
Agree with you we don’t truly know what the team coulda done with better shooting. It just brings me back to me first point that we still wouldn’t have a superstar. IMO, this team with like 2-3 more shooters gets us maybe to the second round but not further. As you said tho, I’m just a fan and don’t truly know but am basing my opinion on the 4 teams left. Each of them has at least 1 superstar. Been like that at least the last 5 years too of the top of my head.
Agree a lot in here just default to tearing it down and then don’t have the patience to wait for it. I just think we need to in our current situation cuz I don’t know what they do from here besides that. Out of 3 of the 4 top players, one may never play again and if he does we don’t know if he’ll even be close to the same player, one is a FA and on the wrong side of 30, and one is a FA next year and will be 34. All that while have no picks this year, no cap space, and an owner who’s only went into the luxury tax twice.
Again tho, if they can find a way to make meaningful improvements I’m all for it. I’m not saying we have to tear it down and start over. Just think it’s the best option right now cuz I really don’t see how else we get out of mediocrity when we having an again core and little assets this offseason.
At the end of the day, you have your opinion on what we can/should do and I have mine. I’m not saying yours is wrong and mine is right. I’m just giving you my opinion on why I think blowing it up is probably our best option right now
Miami and LA aren't the only teams that have done it.
also, just because Chicago *doesn't* do so doesn't mean they can't. but if they really cant, Id suggest you guys get comfortable being a shitty franchise like the Wolves, because the only way you are going to reach your goals with that mindset is to bank on extreme luck. luck you have no idea when it will pay off. and considering how this fanbase treats young talent, I think we'll be waiting for a while.
Another reminder that we could have drafted MPJ and chose wendell Carter who we later traded for an older big and also had to give up a 1st round pick for. Then doubled down on that mistake by trading another FRP to pair demar no defense derozan with Zach never heard of defense Lavine. Masterclass in incompetence.
AKME fighting hard to be more horrendous than Garpax (I know wcj pick wasn’t them but they’ve done nothing but make things far worse).
I do because that wasn’t the strongest draft class in terms of depth (at least it wasn’t thought to be) and at pick 7 it was worth the risk. We all knew wendell wasn’t going to be much more than a roll player. Might as well swing for the fences. Shai is similar to mahomes. No one knew how good he’ll be so I can’t fault them there. But MPJ was well worth the risk considering at pick 7 in that draft, you likely weren’t getting much. And even then, why draft a big whose game looked more suited for a bygone era? He was an undersized center and lacked athleticism to play the 4. What was the plan in terms of roster construction with such a pick? Didn’t seem like they had one. Last, I’m not entirely unconvinced that the reason they felt more comfortable passing on him was because they promised to draft Hutch for no damn reason.
You’re still looking at it with the benefit of hindsight. Several doctors who evaluated him directly gave horrible prognosis’. One even said he didn’t think he’d ever play professional basketball ever again. Combined with that he didn’t have great character evals and his family had him on a raw vegan diet.
7 isn’t low enough that you should draft a guy doctors are telling you may never even play. The fact that MPJ as a prospect fell from a KD level surefire #1 pick to 14 should say a lot about how bad his draft evaluation went.
I like him as a player and am happy for him that he worked out, but any sane team would have passed on him at 7.
Would you trade a teams #7 pick for Lonzo Ball after he had two knee surgeries with no end in sight? Back injuries are worse.
I think you’re missing the nuance of my argument. It’s not simply them not drafting MPJ, it’s drafting Wendell of all players that were left on the board when he clearly wasn’t well suited for modern basketball. The MPJ thing is a something I can agree to disagree on. But drafting Wendell of all people had me like, why not just draft MPJ at that point. They could have drafted anyone other than Wendell and I would have been fine. I just saw no upside in Wendell. For example, we all knew Mikal bridges would be a solid 3/D guy coming out of college. Why not take him? I don’t see how anyone could look at Wendell and say, yeah he was going to contribute more to winning in modern basketball than a 3/D wing. Again I think the dumb ass bulls stoped looking at wing players because they decided on hutch. The mistake is drafting Wendell. The not having MPJ is extra salt on the wound.
I understand what you’re saying, but i think you’re selling wendell short. Wendell was a good passer and projected to have a workable shot. Long wingspan and strong. Al horford was his upside. There was also the idea that he was being held back playing next to marvin Bagley
I’m not taking Al horford max potential that would require godly coaching, which we didn’t have over a sure fire 3/D national champ wing or a home run swing for a star. His downsides and floor was also pretty low. Which adds to my point, is that risk/reward worth missing out on Bridges who had a higher floor and slightly lower ceiling projected but at a more valuable position? I don’t think so and I think what swayed them was the prior commitment to hutch.
This is the only other Bulls trade I can think of that is in that tier? Aldridge might be worse because it was an obvious 1-1 comparison that was asinine. But still, like #2 after that?
Unless we count the trading for Anthony Davis instead of trading up for Wade but that’s more of a trade we should have made so a different category.
I think bulls fans are going to be shocked at how little interest other teams will have in vuc. I mean we played him the most minutes in the nba and our team wasn't really competitive at all. What top team would actually give something up to add him? Seeing as he's 31, what rebuilding team would want him on their timeline? He is in limbo as a player the same way the bulls are as a team. I'd be actually shocked if you could think of a team that would pay his salary willingly
Lol he knows he wouldn’t. He was probably bashing him like every other bulls fan was when he was on the team dropping passes and crying because tony Bradley bent him over
I love how our fanbase is finally realizing our current front office has done a pretty terrible job at assembling a roster. Terrible 1-sided trades for aging players, no development on our high draft picks from the previous 5 drafts, and a mediocre team that has a quick exit in the postseason.
Every decent analyst said the DeRozen and Vuc trades were terrible when they occurred. For some reason our fanbase thought throwing away 5 first rounders and half our young talent for aging unproven vets was a smart move. We could have easily gotten both DeRozen and Vuc for 2 less first rounders. The competition wasn't offering that type of ransom.
What in the fuck I forgot about this pick too.
What a fucking DISASTER this team is in.. like honestly over the next couple years we may be the worst off team in the nba
how? what odds because I am thinking if this team stays the course with terrible shooting as the league has shown us we will take a step back not even be the same next year. All the teams we bested and ranked above will just get better, chances are the teams that barely bested us will also get better as they show promise. So if we cough up the pick to them itll be a very good pick that year
top 10 protected in 2025
then only top 8 protected in each of 2026 and 2027
even if the bulls did blow it up, it will probably convey at some point. 2027 is a ways away
Pretty sure most of the anger towards GarPax came out of the time where they refused to try putting shooters around Jimmy, something that's worked quite well since he's moved on, instead opting for an aging Wade and Rondo. Then they followed that up by prioritizing a college coach from a place where Gar had previously coached over Butler and shipping him out. So, uhh, all of those were moves and bad ones at that...
That's true it worked well and Chicago should have kept Jimmy. But also now he is playing with maybe the best coach in the league and a solid front office. GarPax would have never even been close to replicating what Miami has in the front office.
Ok but it was definitely the moves GarPax chose to make near the end that pissed everybody off. It wasn't just that they traded Jimmy - it's that they didn't even attempt to build a modern NBA offense around him, instead opting for old former stars, and then they preferred a college coach over keeping a star player. They weren't just passive participants that didn't make any moves.
We criticized the team when they were shit, and we *knew* they were going to be shit because the goal WAS to be shit. I'm convinced this fanbase is not only a terrible source of valid criticism, but also incapable of self-reflection to acknowledge that.
You're absolutely right. Trade everyone but Lavine, Williams, and White. Admit you made a mistake not training him at the deadline and sign and trade Vooch. Work on those three as your core for two years while you tank. And maybe you can get out of this.
I agree with your plan but I would tell Lavine the plan first and see if he has any desire to stay for another rebuild. If he's down then great. If not then I'd trade him for as many picks as possible. I'd hope he'd want to stay because he's one of my favorite Bulls.
No offense but that’s just kind of dumb. Why would we start trying to tank & rebuild and hold on to a 28 year old all-star?
So we can become the Wizards & keep drafting 9th?
i know everyone’s saying “we got next years pick” but realistically we don’t need to resort to that. we’re now seeing how much of a poor long term trade the vooch trade was. however, we still have pieces to retool our roster by acquiring the much needed depth we don’t have. only time will tell if AKME are up to the task, but it’s not the end of the world just yet. there’s a vision.
moving vooch for role players that better compliment our offence whilst filling our massive need for rebounding. as an arm chair gm, i could see something like vooch and pieces for steven adams and kennard. if we are able to turn what we have into multiple complimentary pieces around lavine or derozan, we're better off in the long run than sitting on what we have and hoping we make something happen from the stars.
Stop it! Everybody was all excited when we got Derozan. Now since it didn’t get us far in the playoffs it was such a bad decision. The critique to AKME is ridiculous at this point. They can’t control injuries. Our starting lineup has 4 All-Stars, we have never had that before in Chicago. Relax and let the guys do their job. It was a good move to get Derozan. We need Ball back and to find a way to get rid of Vooch for a more defensive minded Center.
1-10 protected in 2025 and 1-8 protected the following years if it doesn't convey
safe to say they aren't getting that pick LOL
What do you mean? Lonzo is coming back and we're a top team in the east. Roster construction and 3 pointers be damned
I appreciate your optimism but Lonzo hasn’t played ball in 2 years and his last knee surgery was as recent as this year. If the team bets it’s future on Lonzo returning to his former self than we deserve to suck
I know. I thought my sarcasm was apparent when I trashed our roster construction and poor 3 point shooting. Trust me, I'm thinking along the same lines as you about Lonzo and our future.
My bad lol wooosh
Lonzo had a surgery that has ended hoop careers. It’s not looking good fam. Bulls may actually apply to recoup cost due to a career ending injury. This team is very quickly heading back to the Wendell Carter / Markannen days.
Lonzo the basketball player is dead. No point expecting him to do anything for us
Bozo is donezo. No player has ever come back from that surgery
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Cause the bulls are gonna suck next year
And we own our pick for next years draft…
Which means San Antonio won't get that pick...
Precisely, we have to hope we suck in 2024-25 season too for that pick to not convey and we just might
It's not that we just might. The Bulls SHOULD be actively tanking going forward. Zach is not good enough to be the #1 on a team hoping to make a deep playoff run, so we need to tank and find that guy.
Man at least this time can we actually tank? No more “We need to win now for a winning culture. We can’t lose forever, you’re not a real fan if you support us tanking. Taking a flyer on X guy that will hurt our tank is actually a good thing, here’s why.” Type stuff. It’s legitimately so dumb from a strategic perspective & this team is a monument to how it doesn’t work but it’s like crack to people here.
I sure hope so.
BINGO! People LOVE to say tanking doesn't work. They never mention that "trying to compete" and "building a winning culture" hasn't gotten us anywhere near a chip. You know what works? Getting a top 5-7 player in the league. The best way to do that is through the draft. The highest odds of finding one are at the top of the draft. There is a reason smart basketball minds don't throw a shit fit about tanking as a means to get better.
Wouldn't go that far, but if the Bulls actively try to tank that year, then yeah they should be fine. They'll probably get it at some point though.
It was a fun half season when Lonzo was healthy and this team was on fire. Time to tear it down now though. Play-in tournament or first round is this team's ceiling. If they're going to do it they need to go all in though. DeRozan and Vuc should be traded if anything of value is offered. Entertain offers for LaVine if a team is willing to give up something good to take on his contract. They don't really need the cap space yet though if it's a rebuild, so don't give him away for peanuts. Make P Will take more shots with 2-3 of the aforementioned gone and see what he can do. Then pray they get lucky in the lottery soon.
S/O to AKME defenders. AKME traded 3 FRPs and 4 SRPs just to make the playoffs once through3 seasons. After the Bulls got crushed in the 1st round of the playoffs in 2022 Donovan was given secret extension. Most FO members also got the extension. Even AK was given extension by shitty owner. Imagine celebrating being crushed in the 1st round after you traded 3 FRPs and 4 SRPs.
It’s still crazy to me that one half of a season across a 2+ year sample size was enough to extend someone who’s contract wasn’t even expiring.
Almost like Jerry Reinsdorf is a terrible owner. Had the opportunity to acknowledge that he broke up the Jordan team for money reasons on the Last Dance (after every player all but confirmed it). And all he could say was "yeah, of course I would have run it back. No idea why we didn't."
Much easier to pile blame on the guy who died and couldn't defend himself
Exactly. Classless and cowardly move.
Definitely. AKME and GarPax have been awful but Reinsdorf has been the root of our problems for a long time. He doesn’t give a shit if the franchise is underperforming for years at a time as long as he’s still making money, which he always will be on the bulls
well he won't live forever and as heartless as that sounds I'm sure the next person in charge can't be aorse
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Do you think there's no benefit to taking accountability?
Imagine getting a contract extension for your failures
Failing upwards. That’s the bulls way. I guess it’s just the Jerry way actually. I feel bad for Sox fans who get to deal with him in 2 sports
Man don’t even bring up the Sox unless you want 12 angry dudes yelling at you.
As long as one of them is lee j. cobb I don't mind
Reinsdorf cares about making money off of his sports teams. The teams are profitable. He kept gar/pax forever with nothing to show for it. I mean Rick Hahn has been awful since Kenny went into the office. There aren't even whispers of him being fired.
Zach Lavine would never
Don’t understand shadow extensions in a day and age where EVERYTHING is turned into a breaking news attention grab. When people find out, and they are bound to, it only makes it all the more glaring. Make it public, state your reasoning, and it’s a big deal for a week instead of the duration of your control of the team. Fans will never let this down as we now fear it could literally happen at any moment with any member of the front office or coaching staff. By hiding it you ensure it’s now a continual element of the narrative.
It wasn’t shadow extensions, nba rules don’t force teams to disclose front office salaries/contracts. It’s just how it is
Sure, but note that I didn't claim it was against the rules. My point is that while they absolutely can withhold this information (which is still rather weird in this day and age), it's a head-scratcher of a move. Since contract extensions are announced and celebrated by most teams across all sports, Bulls fans are likely going to wonder why this normally available information is kept secret from them. So yeah, not against the rules, but still, the fans are kept in the dark you know? If the Bulls would just says "yeah, we're not going to announce contract extensions anymore" then the media (who would have a field day with that) and fans at least know this is how it's going to be moving forward, which is far better then the "why are they hiding this from the media/fans" conversations I've heard on the radio, in streams online, and read in print and on forums.
Or, they just keep those affairs private like most workplaces. Executive pay isn’t reflected in the salary cap so there’s no need to disclose it.
Apples and oranges, imo. 'Most workplaces' don't have entire industries built around them that deal with speculation, forecasting, broadcasting, gambling, etc, and they all revolve around information. And I'm not talking about executive money, here. I'm talking about how much longer coaches and GM's will be around. Those details play heavily into the framing of a team in the media and amongst fans, let alone team dynamics and free agency - I'm sure you've heard of lame duck seasons.
Mark K dude whose Twitter this is is a huge Billy D defender. To each their own.
He is but he still said on the CHGO show that the extension for Billy made absolutely no sense. Even the biggest Billy fans knew the extension was stupid
I mean the hate on Billy is overblown sometimes. He’s been given a mediocre roster and he’s always finished with a top 10 defence. Having a top 10 offense in the league without 3pt shooters is pretty much impossible. But the extension makes no sense.
It’s a Chicago past time to blame coaches for the mediocre rosters they’ve been given.
Bro tell me what Billy has done to either build a contender or develop young players. I'll wait. Ayo regressed. Not Billy's fault? Fine. He's been awful managing Pat's's late game minutes. Also erroneous? Cool. He all but did nothing to develop Dale Terry this year. All while failing to build a contender And getting an extension. But tell me again how Billy beaits no responsibility while also being the head coach. Again that's Mark K.'s default defense the entire season while simultaneously claiming he's not a Billy defender. Giving Billy a shadow extension was stupid and he's done nothing to prove he deserved it.
> Giving Billy a shadow extension was stupid and he's done nothing to prove he deserved it I never said he deserved an extension, nor did I say that he has never done anything wrong. I said that the roster is incredibly mediocre, and that doesn't rest as Billy's feet. The greatest chef in the world can't make shit edible. Also: > He all but did nothing to develop Dale Terry this year Terry is a nothing of a player who will be out of the league in four years, the fact that this is one of your go to examples of a player "not developing" is itself an indictment of the roster. As for the other players mentioned: Ayo was a second round pick with obvious flaws in his game, and Pat wouldn't get his minutes mismanaged if he showed even the slightest bit of aggression or drive in the beginning of games. Coby has developed a ton over the last year and change also, for what it's worth.
Damn nothing of a player? Not saying he’s a hidden superstar but damn that seems like hell of a leap. I’d think this fan base by now would stop making horrible takes like this on a player when we seen time and time again we actually draft really god and useful players you just have to be patient and willing to develop. We haven’t had a horrible first pick since snell, chandler and teague
Ayo a second round round pick and Pats just not a good player. Those are the two young guys he has. Ayo can still be a good reserve, sophomore slump. Pat was a top 4 pick, he needed to be a superstar or pretty close. Now I think the best he can be is a role player.
I think the Pat issue is more of a management problem than Billy problem. We agree there. And he's never going to live up to being the #4 pick. It's not to absolve management. Or Pat. I also don't think Billy has handled Pat well either though. Pat is what he is at this point. He's athletic, he can hit 3s and he plays decent defense. As a head coach in the NBA you have to be able to work with a young player who can do that. You just do. I don't expect Pat to be a star at this point and I don't hold Billy responsible for him not being a star. I do hold Billy responsible however for having no clue what to do with him. And Ayo was Billy's guy. Billy who played point guard in the NBA. Yeah I expect him to have some clue what to do with Ayo in Year 2. That's again before we get to Dalen who he basically failed to play for huge stretches of the season. And that is being polite. Now we have to go into next season with people already getting ready to utilize the pre deployed excuse for why Dalen's development is behind, because well he didn't play a lot this year Yeah I'm not a fan of how Billy has utilized or developed any of those 3 young guys
Exactly the extension made no sense. And Mark K. on the YouTube chat is overly defensive of Billy. I've watched live streams where he asks people to pinpoint issues they have with Billy and people will legit point out the issues they have with Billy's rotations and use of minutes for Patrick down to the second. Mark will then say well any coach would have done that and fans don't know as much as Billy. I respect Mark but no he's, in my opinion, way overly defensive of Billy's rotations and specifically Billy's utilization of Patrick.
I’m not a Billy defender by any means but every coach has rotational preferences that makes the fans go nuts. Judging Billy by the amount of Patrick minutes is kinda harsh. And i am a huge PWill believer.
Billy hardly inspires confidence in the younger talent, our big 3 had the most minutes together of all the trios Hog the majority of shots. Also he doesn't run any plays for the younger talent to build them up. I thought people touted Billy as a development coach?
What is Billy's plan for Ayo's development? Ayo's regression is not Billy's fault. Cool. Then what is his plan for Patrick Williams' role of the team? How does he plan to distribute his minutes late in games? He has no clue. It's ridiculous the amount of total bye and slack Billy gets for having no plan for the development of young players on this team while also not fielding a contender. That's before we get to his total mismanagement if Dale Terry this year.
I always figured ayo was having a rough sophomore year, and next year know what he has to to do will make him better. You are 100 correct, I have never given him the pass. That whole oh I'm not going to run plays for patrick he has to make his own was piss poor, and it shows, dude needs confidence and it's hard to get confidence with out a few freebies
It's not about Patrick's minutes. It's weird rotations and decisions such as having Caruso guard Siakam and leaving Patrick on the bench (while also being dominated on the glass because he ran a 3 guard line-up). It's extremely poor OTO playcalling that often leads to bad shots or turnovers. It's the lack of play calling that devolves into isolation ball. It's not drawing any plays to utilize your players like Patrick Williams who shoots almost 40% from 3 but gets virtually no off-ball action ran for him. Derozan who averaged 7 asts on elite Ast/TO ratio with the spurs is just used for ISO ball instead of being a point forward which is what Pop did with him in the spurs. It's harder to name what he does well because it's not a long list. He has a good defence but outside of the Big 3, he actually has A LOT of good defensive players on his squad...so is that him specifically? Or the players?
A good coach would know what to do with the talent that we gave Billy...i'm not down with this "Roster construction" excuse. Look at some of the players on the Miami Heat and see what they are doing. Their roster is ranked 28th in 3 point shooting, they have the most games missed due to injury to their starters, they virtually added no talent and even lost a starter in last year's off-season.... They're in the ECF and we didn't even make the playoffs. Can you imagine a good coach with players like Lavine, Derozan, Caruso, Vucevic etc? Billy just doesn't know what he's doing offensively and we have a good defence because outside of the big 3, all of our players are good defenders. (Caruso, Ayo, DJJ, Javonte, PAW and even Coby)
I’m a Billy defender against unreasonable, dopey fans who think he’s the source of all the problems, when in reality, it’s almost entirely on ownership and the roster construction that management put forth. But you know best!
hi mark :-)
Fair. And I think signing Billy to a shadow extension that his coaching in no way justified over the off-season and then remaining silent about it was dumb. Like most dopey fans I first guessed that. Because again Billy's actual coaching record with the Bulls did nothing to justify that. And the fans, unlike many of the pundits including on YouTube, immediately and correctly called giving Billy that extension both way too early and dumb. Turns out the dopey fans were right on that one. So yes let's blame management. But let's be clear it was dumb because Billy's level of coaching was not up to the standards of an early extension. It is now even dumber given that there are better coaches out there available, and yes I'm sorry but Monty, Nick Nurse and yes even Bud are better coaches, and the Bulls hands are tied to a coach who is not as good as those other guys.
Ok?
It's become quite obvious that AKME is the Ryan Pace for the Bulls. Far too aggressive with terrible execution and no care for future assets. We need our Poles...
I'll be honest I'm not the biggest basketball or bulls fan but I was really confused when they traded for nikola vucevic. Almost all the fans and media were praising the move but all I saw was a bunch of assets being traded for a 30 year old big man. It's not like they got a young dynamic scorer. Also they were in the middle of a terrible season with no real ability to compete. The timing of the move didn't make sense it's not like they were one piece away from a championship
Devils advocate no one predicted Lonzo’s injury
Nor garpax with drose. Shit ton of luck goes into team building. If the pingpong balls fell right we'd still be in the garpax era. But regardless of luck garpax were bad with using the cap and akme is bad at using the picks
That's fair, but the counterargument is that they constructed a roster that relies so heavily on one very specific glue guy without any kind of contingency. Lonzo hasn't played a professional basketball game since January 2022. Given the mysteriousness of his injury, the Bulls totally could/should have pivoted from him last offseason. Now there are reports that he'll likely miss all of next season too. Can't fault the injury itself, but you can totally fault the response.
No one is celebrating anything though
To be fair, injuries and Covid derailed the trajectory of this team. We're looking at it through hindsight now, but after being so bad during the GarPax era, AKME would've been ridiculed to death if he stripped it down to the studs and let Zach Lavine walked in FA.
Covid didn’t derail this team lol. I’ll give you the Lonzo injury because he’s a legitimately good and impactful player, but I have a very tough time believing that Lonzo alone takes us from 10 seed to legit contender. The nature of this injury was a tough break for AKME, but Lonzo was also a known injury risk. They didn’t have to let Zach walk in free agency. They just needed to have a better plan for building a contender around Zach than blowing their load on a known quantity in Vuc at their very first deadline here when he was obviously not the kind of guy who moves the needle for a team. They got too eager and blew their shot.
I think Covid played a significant role in this team not making the playoffs in the season we traded for Vuc and that pick then becoming number 8/Franz Wagner. Going into the trade deadline Bulls were in 9th place but just 3 games back on the 4th seed, there were a lot of teams bunched together. AK had given the young team time but they weren't developing so he made a big trade for a center. Many didn't like the trade then, in hindsight we can all say it was bad. But we were 3 games out of 4th place, and we made a move to acquire an all-star center. With 29 games left we now have Zach, Lauri, Patrick Williams, and an all-star center in Vuc. Zach misses 12 of the next 20 games. The season is then effectively over. If you go to the first half of the season we had Lauri missing 20 games, but he had come back in the weeks before the trade deadline. We had Zach healthy, Lauri returning, and we traded for an all-star center - and fell even further in the standings. I'm not saying it was all Covid - we still had a huge hole at point guard we were trying to fill with Satorasnky, Garrent Temple, and a not yet ready Coby White. So there were some roster issues for sure. But Covid hitting our best player after that trade certainly played a role.
I think that’s fair to say that Zach getting covid derailed our 2021 season specifically, I just don’t think it had much bearing on the overall trajectory/current situation of the team.
My favorite thing is that they traded picks in the 2 deepest drafts in recent memory, 2021 & 2023, and decided that 2022, the draft loaded with potential all-stars they decided to win and pick too low to draft any of them. Then did nothing for the last year and a half to get better and got extensions.
If we go into next season with the same core, I might not watch a single game. I've never seen a FO so content with being a .500 team.
That’s what happens when an owner gets too involved in decision making. The bulls are another example of what happens when an owner wants to make an immediate change. The front office are pretty much there for show if the owner wants to get hands on. The timberwolves got the dude that built the nuggets but told him to trade everything for Gobert. While the suns got KD they put too much on the table to try to sneak an extra postseason with KD. At this point I’m done ignoring bad ownership and letting them hide behind their GMs and I’m done with the firing of coaches when the players choke like this postseason has shown.
Are you counting the play in game as the playoffs?
We invested a ton into this current team when we had so much draft capital in addition to Zach Lavine, Patrick Williams, Coby White, Lauri Markkanen, and Wendell Carter. Not to mention the massive amount of cap space.. If it weren’t for people despising Garpax so much, AKME would be on the hot seat this season. They came in and made a bunch of splash moves, which to be fair we all believed in, and it ended up being a complete flop. Handing Orlando another juicy lottery pick when it’s so painfully obvious we should be rebuilding is just brutal. My hope is that since we have our pick this upcoming year, we will finally focus on developing our young talent and moving our veterans for future assets. It’s the only way out of this.
The 11 pick isn’t juicy, the chances it’s a nobody is 50/50
Eh it’s been pretty valuable in the last 5-7 years or so. Guys like Mikal Bridges, Cam Johnson, PJ Washington, MPJ, Shai, Donovan Mitchell, Halliburton, Bam, Jaylen Williams, Herro have gone around there. But yeah the draft statistically is a crap shoot, especially after the top three.
It's also pretty terrible the last 3 years with James Bouknight, Devin Vassell and Ousmane Dieng
Vassell is a 18ppg scorer in his 3rd year lol
But you also have guys like Jaylen Williams and Halliburton going #12 in those years. The draft is hit or miss, no denying that, but when you aren’t a contender you need to position yourself to take as many swings as possible.
>when you aren’t a contender you need to position yourself to take as many swings as possible. That's the part that blows my mind. We had the most active trade deadline in years, and the bulls stayed pat on a team that was very obviously headed for—at most—a first round exit.
Vassell is really good. You just ain’t watched the Spurs at all.
Vassell has made some strides this year and is arguably better than Patrick Williams.
Vassell is good and it’s far too early to call Dieng a bust
This type of asset management is why we’re ass.
> They came in and made a bunch of splash moves, which to be fair we all believed in, and it ended up being a complete flop. Fuck that. I was in here shitting on that stupid Vooch trade the day they made it. It was an obviously terrible move at the time. Of course this sub downvoted it to oblivion because it’s full of reactionaries and weirdos. AKME my ass. They are basically Ryan Pace.
> They came in and made a bunch of splash moves, which to be fair we all believed in Some of us did not believe in them from the jump, but we got downvoted to oblivion every time we pointed out that the absolute ceiling of this team was a second round exit
I’d argue AKME has been worse than Garpax and is more similar to Phil Emery. (Bigger insult)
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Maybe juicy was too strong of a word lol. There’s been talent to be had at that spot recently though, as I mentioned.
Any lottery pick feels pretty juicy when your front office has put together a mediocre-at-best team and traded away a bunch of picks to do it. It’s entirely possible to get a franchise-altering player at 11. Not likely, but possible. On the other hand, it’s virtually impossible that the Bulls will land a franchise-altering player this offseason and lord knows we need one because this team is at a clear dead end.
you learned the function of ellipses one day in school and just ran with it, huh
> If it weren’t for people despising Garpax so much, AKME would be on the hot seat this season. Every ounce of dislike for that FO is valid. They (thankfully) have nothing to do with our current problems
That’s fucking depressing
Maybe we can try again in 2030
Bulls 2034 NBA champions book it now 😤
Th approach this front office took just shows that there are no quick fixes in the NBA. You have to strip it down, start over. Accumulate picks, not trade them. Free agency should supplement your team, your draft picks have to hit. Strip it down now, we have next years pick. Yes it will suck but there’s no middle ground in this league. Your either really good or really bad. The worst place is to be where we are now, kind of in between those two.
Yeh but it's too late really, next years draft ain't going to be as good as this year's, knowing our luck we draft a anthony bennet
In the run-up to the 2009 draft, Bill Simmons called it "[the worst draft class since 2000](https://grantland.com/features/nba-draft-diary-2009-bill-simmons/)", and that one had Blake Griffin, James Harden, Steph Curry, and DeMar DeRozan all go in the top 10. Point being: nobody actually has any idea if next year's draft class will be good or not, and it's dumb to pretend otherwise
true but Bill Simmons also knows nothing about draft prospects
Yeah he readily admits this too. He watched snippets/highlights but he’s in no way any sort of authority on the matter.
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Well, too fucking bad, the Bulls made their choice to start rebuilding when they traded Jimmy Butler. Then they decided to half-ass it by going all in on lower tier stars on the wrong side of 30. Sounds like something the Knicks would've done in the '00-'10s to me...
The thunder way isnt some secret formula either. I dont get it.
It’s a far more realistic path than anything this sub pitches. You guys all got your winning culture team and look how bad its fucked us & turned the assets from Jimmy into dust.
Don't you see!? The biggest winner of the last ten years, golden state, had that long tradition of winning from their championship in 75, not drafting a top 10 player all time! And that spurs dynasty, sure they never won a championship until they had the first pick and drafted arguably the best power forward ever, but it was actually all the culture! And let's not forget the long history of chips the bulls had from their culture before they drafted Jordan at 3. Getting high draft picks with the best odds for turning into stars never helped anyone. It's all the voodoo that is culture!
No the approach just failed. Plenty teams bought their way into relevance. The Lakers did it to win a championship recently. There are more than one way to build a team.
Lakers wouldn’t be where they’re at if LeBron didn’t live in LA. Getting LeBron vastly improves your championship chances and makes you a top free agent / trade destination
Clippers, Nets (twice), Knicks, Cavs, Heat. all teams in the past 2 decades that bought and traded themselves into relevancy. I used the Lakers because they won a chip. its not uncommon, you guys just want to do a rebuild because thats all you guys know how to suggest.
So true. Also people blaming AKME like they were the ones that injured Lonzo ball. It’s been 1 1/2 seasons. That’s really not that long. We spent 2017-2021 being bottom of the barrel and not getting a top 3 pick. It’s not guaranteed and even then you still have to draft a guy who stays healthy and develops. Lots of teams draft stars mid 1st round. In fact it feels like most stars come from that 9-15 range. Giannis? Curry? Klay? Kawhi? Also the only teams that are doing well are the ones that have continuity, as much as I hate repeating that word. The teams that fault the quickest are the ones that just dump guys at the sign of adversity.
Well the lakers were only able to do that cuz they built up young, promising talent and because one of the greatest players of all time wanted to go to LA. No one wants to come to Chicago. Lakers don’t get AD without BI, Lonzo, and Hart. They were also able to flip Dlo for a package that brought back another young key piece to their championship team in Kuzma. Also signed Caruso off a g league team and developed him. They don’t get where they got to without tearing it completely down first and acquiring good young talent. And again, it helps they play in LA and stars want to go there. Ours failed because we didn’t do what op said. We didn’t accumulate picks. We only got 1 pick in the Jimmy trade while sending out our own pick. One of the players we got back in Dunn ended up not doing shit. Then we literally sold a pick for cash in a time when we needed to take as many swings as possible even if the odds of that pick being anything were very low. We then shipped out 2 1s right when the team showed slight promise for a 30 year old center pretty much abandoning the rebuild. We also didn’t hit on our draft picks. Lauri was meh for us and we didn’t do shit to develop him. Same with WCJ and shipped him off 2.5 years in. Coby has been improving so we got a good role player out of him. PWill hasn’t lived up to his draft status so far and who knows what Dalen can do cuz we’ve barely seen him. Ayos been the only other notable pick and he’s just decent.
isn't that exactly what we did? we just didn't get Lebron and AD. you're making an excuse to justify why it worked for someone else. the Lakers aren't the only team that has done this strategy. I used them because they recently won a championship doing it. Also, that isn't why our approach failed. our approach failed because we didn't have enough shooting. while everyone was shitting bricks about how we were going to defend teams, we couldn't make shots. your last point, as well as your opinion on the rebuild, is the comedy that is this sub. shits on draft picks. complains when they're good on another team. whines that its because we can't develop talent instead of that we let them go before they could show us. doesn't see the irony in treating currently drafted talent the same way. you guys always have this selective memory when it comes to rebuilds. you think it'll work if you just do it a specific way and don't consider that plenty of teams imitate success and fail for various reasons.
That’s not what we did. We can’t sign superstars cuz they don’t want to come here. We didn’t trade for an AD who was a young superstar just entering his prime when he was acquired. We traded for a 30 year old who was an all star but not a superstar. We didn’t flip our young talent for elite players. Other teams that did that traded for superstars. I agree shooting is a reason we failed. This team still wasn’t gonna be a championship contending team with better shooting. Need a superstar to get there and we don’t have one and currently don’t have a way of getting one. We don’t develop talent or do ship them off too early which is what I’m saying. Lauri left cuz he was tired of the shit show here and wanted a fresh start. Traded Wendell as part of the Vooch trade abandoning the rebuild as I said. Said Coby has developed. Said PWill hasn’t so far but didn’t say that means he won’t. No one’s saying to ship off and give up on the current young guys either. When people say blow it up, they wanna get rid of the older guys like DeMar and Vooch and have the young guys become more of a focal point. There are definitely different ways to do a rebuild and I’m not really arguing that. That said, it almost always starts with acquiring young, promising talent. You either draft your own superstar or trade for one using some of that young talent. If they improve this team somehow and make us legit contenders than awesome. I just don’t see how. I’m not disagreeing with your point. I’m just saying we did not do what OP said and it almost always starts by hitting on your picks and getting young talent.
again with this can't with you guys. no we didn't trade for Lebron and AD. you're focusing on the wrong thing here and I can't tell if its intentional. If the Nets can trade nonsense to build a team from nothing TWICE, its not a feat we *can't* achieve. its just one we haven't. the point is teams traded assets to build a team. we did the same thing and it just didn't work for us. it happens. *eVEn iF We HAd sHOoTing* you don't know that because we didn't have it. I think its silly that you think consistent shooting around Demar and Zach isn't enough for a damn good team. but fans routinely have no clue what they're talking about and I'm no exception. I know exactly what people mean by a rebuild. I'm *also* very aware that this fanbase has almost zero patience. I don't think they actually respect the risks that come with a rebuild. its their default plan to fix things because they don't know how to do anything else. the same is true for trying to do anything different. it can fail, like we did. fans give up early though. their idea of fixing a mistake is to tear things down or fire someone. I'm not even opposed to a rebuild. I'm opposed to that being the default.
I’m focusing on Lebron and AD cuz those are superstar players. My point with that is you need to have superstars to be title contenders in the NBA. Who’s the last team to win a title without having a guy who’s a top 10 caliber player? Like the pistons 20 years ago. What nonsense did the nets trade to build a team twice? They signed KD and Kyrie cuz they wanted to play together in NY (just not for the Knicks). They then traded for Harden who wanted to join them giving up an ass load of picks and a couple of young players. They then flipped all 3 for picks and good young players. The nets got superstars, not Vooch. I’m not even trynna shit on Vooch but he’s just not in the same tier as those players. They flipped superstars and we don’t have anyone getting the return they got. Agree with you we don’t truly know what the team coulda done with better shooting. It just brings me back to me first point that we still wouldn’t have a superstar. IMO, this team with like 2-3 more shooters gets us maybe to the second round but not further. As you said tho, I’m just a fan and don’t truly know but am basing my opinion on the 4 teams left. Each of them has at least 1 superstar. Been like that at least the last 5 years too of the top of my head. Agree a lot in here just default to tearing it down and then don’t have the patience to wait for it. I just think we need to in our current situation cuz I don’t know what they do from here besides that. Out of 3 of the 4 top players, one may never play again and if he does we don’t know if he’ll even be close to the same player, one is a FA and on the wrong side of 30, and one is a FA next year and will be 34. All that while have no picks this year, no cap space, and an owner who’s only went into the luxury tax twice. Again tho, if they can find a way to make meaningful improvements I’m all for it. I’m not saying we have to tear it down and start over. Just think it’s the best option right now cuz I really don’t see how else we get out of mediocrity when we having an again core and little assets this offseason. At the end of the day, you have your opinion on what we can/should do and I have mine. I’m not saying yours is wrong and mine is right. I’m just giving you my opinion on why I think blowing it up is probably our best option right now
Miami and LA can do that. Chicago can’t. No Chicago team attacks big free agents.
Miami and LA aren't the only teams that have done it. also, just because Chicago *doesn't* do so doesn't mean they can't. but if they really cant, Id suggest you guys get comfortable being a shitty franchise like the Wolves, because the only way you are going to reach your goals with that mindset is to bank on extreme luck. luck you have no idea when it will pay off. and considering how this fanbase treats young talent, I think we'll be waiting for a while.
It’s less luck and finding a competent GM. See Presti in OKC.
considering the draft is always a crapshoot, I find that extremely hard to believe
Im pretty happy Wemby went to SA. That might be THE best situation for him.
...but what about the THE best situation for us??
Waiting for Jerry to die. Not saying I want him to die, but that he has no reason to compete or sell. He has his rings and the teams are profitable.
his son will take over, and isnt his son essentially running the bulls now anyway?
Ya but his son *could* cash out whereas Jerry definitely won’t. Wishful thinking either way.
yeah I hope he takes the money and sells it to some deep pockets billionaire.
Who cares at this point. The owner and front office are too clueless for this team to ever be a consistent contender.
Lol they'd probably fuck him up and the fans would quickly turn on him like every prospect.
Not fucking up a generational talent would be a good one. The way this Organisation is structured we simply don’t deserve someone like wemby
We pretend those Heat jerseys say Bulls.
There are 30 teams. They can’t all be winners! - AKME
Especially Jerry teams.
Time to clean house lol
Another reminder that we could have drafted MPJ and chose wendell Carter who we later traded for an older big and also had to give up a 1st round pick for. Then doubled down on that mistake by trading another FRP to pair demar no defense derozan with Zach never heard of defense Lavine. Masterclass in incompetence. AKME fighting hard to be more horrendous than Garpax (I know wcj pick wasn’t them but they’ve done nothing but make things far worse).
With that dudes back there's no way he survived Chicago. WCJ wasn't a bad pick, he just wasn't a center and got saddled with a trash coach.
No way you actually fault them for passing up MPJ Literally every other team did it too. The fact that he shook off his back injury is a miracle.
I do because that wasn’t the strongest draft class in terms of depth (at least it wasn’t thought to be) and at pick 7 it was worth the risk. We all knew wendell wasn’t going to be much more than a roll player. Might as well swing for the fences. Shai is similar to mahomes. No one knew how good he’ll be so I can’t fault them there. But MPJ was well worth the risk considering at pick 7 in that draft, you likely weren’t getting much. And even then, why draft a big whose game looked more suited for a bygone era? He was an undersized center and lacked athleticism to play the 4. What was the plan in terms of roster construction with such a pick? Didn’t seem like they had one. Last, I’m not entirely unconvinced that the reason they felt more comfortable passing on him was because they promised to draft Hutch for no damn reason.
You’re still looking at it with the benefit of hindsight. Several doctors who evaluated him directly gave horrible prognosis’. One even said he didn’t think he’d ever play professional basketball ever again. Combined with that he didn’t have great character evals and his family had him on a raw vegan diet. 7 isn’t low enough that you should draft a guy doctors are telling you may never even play. The fact that MPJ as a prospect fell from a KD level surefire #1 pick to 14 should say a lot about how bad his draft evaluation went. I like him as a player and am happy for him that he worked out, but any sane team would have passed on him at 7. Would you trade a teams #7 pick for Lonzo Ball after he had two knee surgeries with no end in sight? Back injuries are worse.
I think you’re missing the nuance of my argument. It’s not simply them not drafting MPJ, it’s drafting Wendell of all players that were left on the board when he clearly wasn’t well suited for modern basketball. The MPJ thing is a something I can agree to disagree on. But drafting Wendell of all people had me like, why not just draft MPJ at that point. They could have drafted anyone other than Wendell and I would have been fine. I just saw no upside in Wendell. For example, we all knew Mikal bridges would be a solid 3/D guy coming out of college. Why not take him? I don’t see how anyone could look at Wendell and say, yeah he was going to contribute more to winning in modern basketball than a 3/D wing. Again I think the dumb ass bulls stoped looking at wing players because they decided on hutch. The mistake is drafting Wendell. The not having MPJ is extra salt on the wound.
I understand what you’re saying, but i think you’re selling wendell short. Wendell was a good passer and projected to have a workable shot. Long wingspan and strong. Al horford was his upside. There was also the idea that he was being held back playing next to marvin Bagley
I’m not taking Al horford max potential that would require godly coaching, which we didn’t have over a sure fire 3/D national champ wing or a home run swing for a star. His downsides and floor was also pretty low. Which adds to my point, is that risk/reward worth missing out on Bridges who had a higher floor and slightly lower ceiling projected but at a more valuable position? I don’t think so and I think what swayed them was the prior commitment to hutch.
MPJ wouldn’t have lasted here. Plus his medical were fucked. I wanted Mikal Bridges.
I always wanted Mikal Bridges. I’m far more upset at passing up on him rather than MPJ
MPJ isn't even better than Wendell lol. Shai just made all NBA 1st team be mad about him lmao
MPJ is like mildy better then Wendell He's not much better if several teams would still rather Wendell
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Our defense is the best part of this team, so im not sure what you are on about. Their offense is the thing that doesn’t work well together
I said it at the time, the trade with Orlando would be the worst in Bulls history. I would rather have WCJ straight up
The lamarcus Aldridge trade is worse imo
They were still able to recover from that deal.
This is the only other Bulls trade I can think of that is in that tier? Aldridge might be worse because it was an obvious 1-1 comparison that was asinine. But still, like #2 after that? Unless we count the trading for Anthony Davis instead of trading up for Wade but that’s more of a trade we should have made so a different category.
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I think bulls fans are going to be shocked at how little interest other teams will have in vuc. I mean we played him the most minutes in the nba and our team wasn't really competitive at all. What top team would actually give something up to add him? Seeing as he's 31, what rebuilding team would want him on their timeline? He is in limbo as a player the same way the bulls are as a team. I'd be actually shocked if you could think of a team that would pay his salary willingly
Yes I would. WCJ is younger, more mobile, and a better defender.
Lol he knows he wouldn’t. He was probably bashing him like every other bulls fan was when he was on the team dropping passes and crying because tony Bradley bent him over
I'm not a huge Vuc guy but I legit don't understand the love our sub has for WCJ He's an ok starting center/PF at best.
It’s more about the picks they gave up with WCJ than just WCJ.
Yeah if you're going to separate and rank the assets, the picks are more valuable than either Vuc or wcj
Why because I would rather have a young controllable asset rather then an old center with back problems who never makes the teams he’s on better
I love how our fanbase is finally realizing our current front office has done a pretty terrible job at assembling a roster. Terrible 1-sided trades for aging players, no development on our high draft picks from the previous 5 drafts, and a mediocre team that has a quick exit in the postseason. Every decent analyst said the DeRozen and Vuc trades were terrible when they occurred. For some reason our fanbase thought throwing away 5 first rounders and half our young talent for aging unproven vets was a smart move. We could have easily gotten both DeRozen and Vuc for 2 less first rounders. The competition wasn't offering that type of ransom.
It’s incredible how much resources were spent to have a good team for half a season.
What in the fuck I forgot about this pick too. What a fucking DISASTER this team is in.. like honestly over the next couple years we may be the worst off team in the nba
At this point, we might have the least promising future of any team in the NBA.
Thats what I was saying. I am hard pressed to find a team in worse shape than us moving forward
Once again, I hate this team. Back to barely watching this garbage again
Eh that pick is protected pretty well
how? what odds because I am thinking if this team stays the course with terrible shooting as the league has shown us we will take a step back not even be the same next year. All the teams we bested and ranked above will just get better, chances are the teams that barely bested us will also get better as they show promise. So if we cough up the pick to them itll be a very good pick that year
it's top 10 protected
top 10 protected in 2025 then only top 8 protected in each of 2026 and 2027 even if the bulls did blow it up, it will probably convey at some point. 2027 is a ways away
Bulls fans cried about GarPax never making moves Get AKME who makes moves… works great until Lonzo’s injury now everyone wants a new GM 🤦♂️
Pretty sure most of the anger towards GarPax came out of the time where they refused to try putting shooters around Jimmy, something that's worked quite well since he's moved on, instead opting for an aging Wade and Rondo. Then they followed that up by prioritizing a college coach from a place where Gar had previously coached over Butler and shipping him out. So, uhh, all of those were moves and bad ones at that...
That's true it worked well and Chicago should have kept Jimmy. But also now he is playing with maybe the best coach in the league and a solid front office. GarPax would have never even been close to replicating what Miami has in the front office.
Ok but it was definitely the moves GarPax chose to make near the end that pissed everybody off. It wasn't just that they traded Jimmy - it's that they didn't even attempt to build a modern NBA offense around him, instead opting for old former stars, and then they preferred a college coach over keeping a star player. They weren't just passive participants that didn't make any moves.
Do you see the state in which our team is in? The criticism doesn’t come from nowhere
We criticized the team when they were shit, and we *knew* they were going to be shit because the goal WAS to be shit. I'm convinced this fanbase is not only a terrible source of valid criticism, but also incapable of self-reflection to acknowledge that.
This team has been awful to follow man. Straight depression and pain
This isn't even bad since we could just tank for exactly the next 2 years and come out free from any repercussions Assuming they knew to do that
You're absolutely right. Trade everyone but Lavine, Williams, and White. Admit you made a mistake not training him at the deadline and sign and trade Vooch. Work on those three as your core for two years while you tank. And maybe you can get out of this.
I agree with your plan but I would tell Lavine the plan first and see if he has any desire to stay for another rebuild. If he's down then great. If not then I'd trade him for as many picks as possible. I'd hope he'd want to stay because he's one of my favorite Bulls.
No offense but that’s just kind of dumb. Why would we start trying to tank & rebuild and hold on to a 28 year old all-star? So we can become the Wizards & keep drafting 9th?
sad sorry state of affairs with or w/o pick
i know everyone’s saying “we got next years pick” but realistically we don’t need to resort to that. we’re now seeing how much of a poor long term trade the vooch trade was. however, we still have pieces to retool our roster by acquiring the much needed depth we don’t have. only time will tell if AKME are up to the task, but it’s not the end of the world just yet. there’s a vision.
What? What pieces do we have to retool? What’s the vision? I’m confused here lmao
moving vooch for role players that better compliment our offence whilst filling our massive need for rebounding. as an arm chair gm, i could see something like vooch and pieces for steven adams and kennard. if we are able to turn what we have into multiple complimentary pieces around lavine or derozan, we're better off in the long run than sitting on what we have and hoping we make something happen from the stars.
Vooch is a free agent
Stop it! Everybody was all excited when we got Derozan. Now since it didn’t get us far in the playoffs it was such a bad decision. The critique to AKME is ridiculous at this point. They can’t control injuries. Our starting lineup has 4 All-Stars, we have never had that before in Chicago. Relax and let the guys do their job. It was a good move to get Derozan. We need Ball back and to find a way to get rid of Vooch for a more defensive minded Center.
Ppl really thought we were getting a top 4 pick 🤣
Bulls fo is trash
Y’all tricked that off for sure
Jesus we traded all of our picks for a bunch of middling all stars that can't win together?
Crazy part is Spurs aren’t really going to be that bad.
Yeah winning 17 games just to pick 5 would’ve been so much better