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Say miracles of miracles happen and Ball does come back and assume Zach is not traded what do the Bulls do? I doubt Ball is coming back but Zach will log a lot of minutes. You have to at least trade one of Caruso, Ayo or Coby if Zach is sticking around right?

Michael Jackson wrote:Say miracles of miracles happen and Ball does come back and assume Zach is not traded what do the Bulls do? I doubt Ball is coming back but Zach will log a lot of minutes. You have to at least trade one of Caruso, Ayo or Coby if Zach is sticking around right?

Ugh. In that hypothetical you would trade AC?

It’s frightening to ponder, because it would be very much “on brand” for AK to view the improvements of Coby and/or Ayo as a way to get a more established player to “help the veteran core compete at the highest levels right away.”

DuckIII wrote:

Michael Jackson wrote:Say miracles of miracles happen and Ball does come back and assume Zach is not traded what do the Bulls do? I doubt Ball is coming back but Zach will log a lot of minutes. You have to at least trade one of Caruso, Ayo or Coby if Zach is sticking around right?

Ugh. In that hypothetical you would trade AC?

It’s frightening to ponder, because it would be very much “on brand” for AK to view the improvements of Coby and/or Ayo as a way to get a more established player to “help the veteran core compete at the highest levels right away.”

Don’t say it Duck!!!

Lavine is still traded IMO. After shopping him around for an off-season, he wants out at this point not just AK. It's just bad business to piss Klutch off, since they're the most powerful agency in the league. We got Lonzo for Satoransky because Klutch wanted him in Chicago.

Klutch wants him out of here, Lavine wants out of here, AK doesn't want him; they'll make it work. The only reason he wasn't gone by the deadline was the surgery. I wouldn't be surprised if some informal deal is in place and Lavine just needs to show he can play next season til the deadline or maybe earlier.

DuckIII wrote:

Michael Jackson wrote:Say miracles of miracles happen and Ball does come back and assume Zach is not traded what do the Bulls do? I doubt Ball is coming back but Zach will log a lot of minutes. You have to at least trade one of Caruso, Ayo or Coby if Zach is sticking around right?

Ugh. In that hypothetical you would trade AC?

It’s frightening to ponder, because it would be very much “on brand” for AK to view the improvements of Coby and/or Ayo as a way to get a more established player to “help the veteran core compete at the highest levels right away.”

Oh I coould see them if Ball gets cleared trading Ayo, Caruso and White for something like Randle and let Carter and Javonte being the back bahahaha. Then Zach and Ball both go down before the in season tourney. Bitrim becomes the starting 2 guard.

DuckIII wrote:

Michael Jackson wrote:Say miracles of miracles happen and Ball does come back and assume Zach is not traded what do the Bulls do? I doubt Ball is coming back but Zach will log a lot of minutes. You have to at least trade one of Caruso, Ayo or Coby if Zach is sticking around right?

Ugh. In that hypothetical you would trade AC?

It’s frightening to ponder, because it would be very much “on brand” for AK to view the improvements of Coby and/or Ayo as a way to get a more established player to “help the veteran core compete at the highest levels right away.”

Optimistically, if everone is back, no way Ball is a starter. I think Caruso starts and shifts his minutes to the 4. Ball probably only gets around 18 MPG to see how long he can last, and splits his time between backing up 1-3 next to Ayo. Pat gets his backing up 3-4.

Once Zach is traded, I see Ayo getting his spot.

In theory the Bulls have Ball, Zach, Ayo, Coby, and Caruso as guards. Which makes one of Coby/Ayo a 4th guard and the other a 5th. Something tells me that won't be happening.

(Big) if Lonzo manages to make it back into an NBA game, I believe he'll be playing SF/PF minutes - especially for Donovan. There's just no way he'll have the quickness to defend guards anymore. He already lacked the first step to drive against anybody. Fortunately for him he has length, 3P range and vision, which makes for a perfect 3D tweener (off the bench). I don't think he'll be seeing any minutes at guard.

IF he even makes it past training camp. I'm skeptical he'll play next season. If anything I could see a Grant/Shaun type return in several years, in his late 20s. Probably for the LA Lakers.

The negative side of probably beating the Heat, is we're going to drop about 4 positions in the draft (and entirely lose our 10% top-4 odds), which is lame. And honestly, I think Isaiah Collier, Devin Carter and McCain will need a look.

Michael Jackson wrote:Say miracles of miracles happen and Ball does come back and assume Zach is not traded what do the Bulls do? I doubt Ball is coming back but Zach will log a lot of minutes. You have to at least trade one of Caruso, Ayo or Coby if Zach is sticking around right?

You could let DeMar walk and your minutes are all freed up.

Ice Man wrote:In theory the Bulls have Ball, Zach, Ayo, Coby, and Caruso as guards. Which makes one of Coby/Ayo a 4th guard and the other a 5th. Something tells me that won't be happening.

With those guys all being 6-4 to 6-7, you could play them at PG, SG, and SF, so toss in DeMar and that's 6 bodies for 3 positions which seems fine given that you probably can't rely on Ball to play any minutes whatsoever, and probably no more than 20 in the best case scenario while likely sitting back to backs.

Toss in that Caruso and Zach have massive injury histories and DeMar, if he were to return, is going to be 35 and thus also more likely to need some rest games even if healthy, and that doesn't seem like a big problem with minutes to me.

What are you guys stressing out about? There’s no guard glut. All of them are capable of playing center.

dougthonus wrote:

Ice Man wrote:In theory the Bulls have Ball, Zach, Ayo, Coby, and Caruso as guards. Which makes one of Coby/Ayo a 4th guard and the other a 5th. Something tells me that won't be happening.

With those guys all being 6-4 to 6-7, you could play them at PG, SG, and SF, so toss in DeMar and that's 6 bodies for 3 positions which seems fine given that you probably can't rely on Ball to play any minutes whatsoever, and probably no more than 20 in the best case scenario while likely sitting back to backs.

Toss in that Caruso and Zach have massive injury histories and DeMar, if he were to return, is going to be 35 and thus also more likely to need some rest games even if healthy, and that doesn't seem like a big problem with minutes to me.

It’s a problem if you’d like to see Coby and Ayo playing starters’ minutes with full responsibilities and freedom. Don’t see how we could possibly serve the present and the future with all those guys starting the season healthy and on the roster.

Granted it’s all a hypothetical and not one I expect.

dougthonus wrote:

Michael Jackson wrote:Say miracles of miracles happen and Ball does come back and assume Zach is not traded what do the Bulls do? I doubt Ball is coming back but Zach will log a lot of minutes. You have to at least trade one of Caruso, Ayo or Coby if Zach is sticking around right?

You could let DeMar walk and your minutes are all freed up.

Which is what SHOULD happen.

By now though you can’t trust Zach to play, def can’t trust Lonzo, and Pat misses games too.

we should 100% be trading caruso this offseason. i love him but he's 30, dinged up all the time, heading into the last year of an extreme value contract, and contenders should badly covet him.

ideally head into next season with ayo/coby as your starting backcourt; grit your teeth and roll out coby/zach if lavine's market has bottomed out to the point that you need him to rehab his value for a few months. lonzo is a We'll Make Room For Him When We Have To situation

nomorezorro wrote:we should 100% be trading caruso this offseason. i love him but he's 30, dinged up all the time, heading into the last year of an extreme value contract, and contenders should badly covet him.

ideally head into next season with ayo/coby as your starting backcourt; grit your teeth and roll out coby/zach if lavine's market has bottomed out to the point that you need him to rehab his value for a few months. lonzo is a We'll Make Room For Him When We Have To situation

I begrudingly agree. I'll add that we should also try to get something via S&T for Demar. Those two are somewhat of a package deal to me. We need both guys in order to win games. I think that the Demar has a couple good years left in him but we're more than a couple years away. Trading both would hopefully bring back a couple of assets that helps the team going forward. I think the next step is to give Ayo, Coby and Pat consistently larger roles to see if they can become consistently good.

Ice Man wrote:In theory the Bulls have Ball, Zach, Ayo, Coby, and Caruso as guards. Which makes one of Coby/Ayo a 4th guard and the other a 5th. Something tells me that won't be happening.

Caruso gets traded. Lavine gets at least 12 of his minutes at the 3, depending on how things shake out with Demar

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DuckIII wrote:

dougthonus wrote:

Ice Man wrote:In theory the Bulls have Ball, Zach, Ayo, Coby, and Caruso as guards. Which makes one of Coby/Ayo a 4th guard and the other a 5th. Something tells me that won't be happening.

With those guys all being 6-4 to 6-7, you could play them at PG, SG, and SF, so toss in DeMar and that's 6 bodies for 3 positions which seems fine given that you probably can't rely on Ball to play any minutes whatsoever, and probably no more than 20 in the best case scenario while likely sitting back to backs.

Toss in that Caruso and Zach have massive injury histories and DeMar, if he were to return, is going to be 35 and thus also more likely to need some rest games even if healthy, and that doesn't seem like a big problem with minutes to me.

It’s a problem if you’d like to see Coby and Ayo playing starters’ minutes with full responsibilities and freedom. Don’t see how we could possibly serve the present and the future with all those guys starting the season healthy and on the roster.

Granted it’s all a hypothetical and not one I expect.

But who wants to see Coby and Ayo as the starting backcourt? Only reason for that would be that you are tanking.

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Stratmaster wrote:

DuckIII wrote:

dougthonus wrote:
With those guys all being 6-4 to 6-7, you could play them at PG, SG, and SF, so toss in DeMar and that's 6 bodies for 3 positions which seems fine given that you probably can't rely on Ball to play any minutes whatsoever, and probably no more than 20 in the best case scenario while likely sitting back to backs.

Toss in that Caruso and Zach have massive injury histories and DeMar, if he were to return, is going to be 35 and thus also more likely to need some rest games even if healthy, and that doesn't seem like a big problem with minutes to me.

It’s a problem if you’d like to see Coby and Ayo playing starters’ minutes with full responsibilities and freedom. Don’t see how we could possibly serve the present and the future with all those guys starting the season healthy and on the roster.

Granted it’s all a hypothetical and not one I expect.

But who wants to see Coby and Ayo as the starting backcourt? Only reason for that would be that you are tanking.

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I prefer the term rebuilding in this context, but yes that’s part of the point.

nomorezorro wrote:we should 100% be trading caruso this offseason. i love him but he's 30, dinged up all the time, heading into the last year of an extreme value contract, and contenders should badly covet him.

ideally head into next season with ayo/coby as your starting backcourt; grit your teeth and roll out coby/zach if lavine's market has bottomed out to the point that you need him to rehab his value for a few months. lonzo is a We'll Make Room For Him When We Have To situation

Bobby Marks posted a video last night saying he thought the Bulls should offer Caruso a 4 year $70m extension (which I believe is about the max he can be offered). I love Caruso but we should be thinking long and hard about whether this is a good allocation of money or not, especially if we aren’t going to be a lux tax team.