Worst Prized Free Agent signing in GarPax era?

[Am2626]

Easy choice for me: Boozer. Had we made a better signing, we could have won a championship. None of the other signings arguably prevented a championship.

Boozer did not have a single good postseason.

We didn't have any better options. They colluded in South Beach and Hawks went insane with Joe Johnson. Who could we have signed that would have brought a championship?

A combo of Boozer and Joe Johnson probably would have been enough to get past the Heat that year.

[mymysql]

They're all different kinds of bad. I can't even vote lol

[coldfish]

It's Wallace and it's not even remotely close.

I understand why people say Wallace, but it's definitely not by a landslide.

Wallace was a critical piece to a playoff run at least. But we were able to move on. Wade's presence for even one more year could close the window on a desperately needed rebuild that could set this team back for a decade.

Now, that hasn't happened yet. But I am very concerned it will. If he opts out, Wade becomes a non-issue signing. It's going to be one extreme or another.

Just to note, the Bulls moved on from Wallace by taking on Larry Hughesless' equally bad contract. They just got away from Wallace's poisonous attitude but still had to pay the bill.

.....

I have to agree that Rip Hamilton should be up there. They were forced to dump Korver because they had Rip. Rip may not have got a huge contract but he was bad, you could see it coming and it created a huge negative ripple effect.

IMO, because of the negative ripple effects, I have to rank them:
1. Wallace
2. Rip
3. Boozer
4. Wade

The Bulls have been spiraling downhill and they had capspace. Wade didn't really change the direction of the franchise and he isn't going to be a problem for 4 years.

[Mech Engineer]

The common process with all these old free agents

1. The Bulls go under the cap thereby gutting the roster to bare bones level with no depth

2. They sign this old has-been star names to big money deals which makes them go up to the cap in salary

3. They have no money to spend on good vets or have no vets who they can resign by going over the cap

4. This has been star types who are typically old will be injury prone, demand big roles(touches) because of their past accomplishments. That leads to bad team chemistry/bad offense

5. The contending period is thus gone in a year or two.

6. Rinse/Repeat every few years.

[The Explorer]

Gasol was an all star both seasons in Chicago and still makes this list? Why?

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[Axl Rose]

Ben Wallace
-Cost us Tyson
-Bad locker room presence
-Made us deal with Larry Hughes and Drew Gooden in order to get rid of his contract.

Boozer is very close due to him eating so much money during our best years since Jordan but he was an outstanding teammate by all accounts which makes Wallace just edge him out of being the worst.

[TheSuzerain]

The Gasol signing was excellent.

[WindyCityBorn]

Easy choice for me: Boozer. Had we made a better signing, we could have won a championship. None of the other signings arguably prevented a championship.

Boozer did not have a single good postseason.

We didn't have any better options. They colluded in South Beach and Hawks went insane with Joe Johnson. Who could we have signed that would have brought a championship?

A combo of Boozer and Joe Johnson probably would have been enough to get past the Heat that year.

When I said the Hawks went crazy I was referring to Joe Johnson so how exactly was Chicago going to sign him? He wasn't an option. The Bulls used the money that would have gone to Johnson to sign the bench mob.

[Am2626]

We didn't have any better options. They colluded in South Beach and Hawks went insane with Joe Johnson. Who could we have signed that would have brought a championship?

A combo of Boozer and Joe Johnson probably would have been enough to get past the Heat that year.

When I said the Hawks went crazy I was referring to Joe Johnson so how exactly was Chicago going to sign him? He wasn't an option. The Bulls used the money that would have gone to Johnson to sign the bench mob.

The Hawks maxed him out at the start of free agency that year. If he decided to hold out and test free agency the Bulls would have had enough cap space to sign him and Boozer. That would have made the Bulls the most complete team and in my mind would have beaten the Heat that year. It's possible that the Bulls could have tried to just go after him and Boozer instead of getting conned by James, Wade, and Bosh. That's what I hated about what those 3 did that year. They never had any intentions of signing anywhere but in Miami but suckered teams to think that they had a chance to sign them.

[samwana]

If Wade wouldn't have been injured, we probably do not even make the playoffs. That's how bad the signing was.

It was a bad fit for too much money and we should have had a team option (that's stretching it a little bit maybe)

It messed up chemistry, it messed up development, it messed up the season.

Wallace was bad too though, but since it is long time ago the edges of that signing are gone a bit for me. And we have only had Wade one year now, I can imagine it being way worse next season if he stays.

I didn't like the Gasol signing, but at least he didn't drop off and we played better with him than without him.

Let's hope Wade finds a better place for next year. (and airs a lot of dirty laundry in the media)

[WindyCityBorn]

A combo of Boozer and Joe Johnson probably would have been enough to get past the Heat that year.

When I said the Hawks went crazy I was referring to Joe Johnson so how exactly was Chicago going to sign him? He wasn't an option. The Bulls used the money that would have gone to Johnson to sign the bench mob.

The Hawks maxed him out at the start of free agency that year. If he decided to hold out and test free agency the Bulls would have had enough cap space to sign him and Boozer. That would have made the Bulls the most complete team and in my mind would have beaten the Heat that year. It's possible that the Bulls could have tried to just go after him and Boozer instead of getting conned by James, Wade, and Bosh. That's what I hated about what those 3 did that year. They never had any intentions of signing anywhere but in Miami but suckered teams to think that they had a chance to sign them.

OK so you agree that he was never an option so he couldn't help us do anything. Bulls never even got a chance to make a pitch. So it's no like Chicago chose Boozer over him. GetBuLLish is making appear as if we passed over a better player for Boozer. We didn't.

[Rose2Boozer]

Ben Wallace. He was great for the Pistons, but didn't have much left in the tank when the Bulls signed him. They pretty much dumped a younger rebounder/defender in Chandler after the signing.

[sco]

Wallace ended up badly because, like many bigs he started having back issues...I don't think they were evident prior to the signing. Ironically, I think they went away from Chandler because they saw him going downhill because of injuries, which didn't happen much in reality.

I think the Boozer deal was the bad one because after loosing out in the big name sweepstakes, they settled and spent their money badly.

[Ctownbulls]

Despite how much people are currently dogging Wade he had a pretty solid year and was way better than anyone on that list other than Pau. Not to mention it is only a two year deal during a rebuild period. His deal didn't and won't stop the franchise from acquiring some other star.

The answer is and always will be Ben Wallace.

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[Ctownbulls]

Easy choice for me: Boozer. Had we made a better signing, we could have won a championship. None of the other signings arguably prevented a championship.

Boozer did not have a single good postseason.

We didn't have any better options. They colluded in South Beach and Hawks went insane with Joe Johnson. Who could we have signed that would have brought a championship?

Signing nobody would have been better. The Bulls made a reflex reaction to the South Beach madness.

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[AirP.]

The Gasol signing was excellent.

If you're just looking at him individually and the value, absolutely he was excellent. The problem was that the FO for some reason REFUSED to level out the rotation. That offseason Chicago added Gasol and Mirotic to Noah and Gibson, THAT was the year to move Gibson for wing near his value since Chicago basically only had MDJ. It once again was the FO that did nothing to help this team, in my opinion because they(someone named Gar) wanted Thibs gone and a more complete roster may have made that impossible to do, outside of that it makes ZERO sense to have 2 good bigs(although Noah wasn't 100%) on the roster, add another really good big(Gasol) and a PF with potential that had been playing professionally to the point he should be counted on as a backup if he had potential.

So I could see why people would say Gasol is the worst because it basically stopped Thibs from having a complete team and possibly making it to the finals(Cleveland was very beatable that season). Remember, that was the offseason Chicago tried to get Melo to sign for way under his value instead of making more cap space for him.

[kyrv]

The buried lead is that contrary to popular narrative, the Bulls have had quite a few big signings. Kudos to the OP for the myth busting. All of those signings had very good and some not so good aspects.

Without looking I will guess the current signing will win.

[HomoSapien]

There's only one right answer and his name is Ben Wallace.

[HomoSapien]

The buried lead is that contrary to popular narrative, the Bulls have had quite a few big signings. Kudos to the OP for the myth busting. All of those signings had very good and some not so good aspects.

Without looking I will guess the current signing will win.

You've come full force with the agenda, eh?

The issue with what you're saying is that often times the players they end up with are out of their prime. That said, I disagree with those who often say chasing FA is pointless. Like you said, the Bulls actually do have a history of signing big names it's just almost always the wrong big name.

[MrSparkle]

Ultimately, Joe Johnson would've been better than the bench mob, because the bench mob completely disbanded after 2 years. Plus they should've fore-seen that Billy King was going to **** things up and trade 1st picks for overpaid ex-stars.

A fair thing to do with Free agency is to remove the salary number from your head.

It's only bad if it prevents you from getting a better player. It's completely situational.

Wallace ended up being a horrible signing because we had to accept trash assets in exchange, and as it's been mentioned, we gave up a DPOY player in Chandler to accomplish it.

But Kirk and Noc were actually also both bad re-signings, because ultimately, we had to dump them for low-value packages in return. I mean, we gave up a 1st rounder to dump Kirk. Any regrets there? Cause I sure as hell was not happy with Kirk being our faux no. play-maker/captain for 4 years straight, nor with the SF super log-jam we had going on (Deng, Thabo, Tyrus, Khryapa.... Why the F*** was Noc brought back at above market value?).

Boozer was a productive player for 3 years. Perhaps my biggest criticism of Thibs is that he didn't have the balls to just start Taj in certain games. Regardless, Boozer would've been an even better asset coming off the bench. With the cap-space maxed...

Why isn't Rip Hamilton in the poll? This is what I'm talking about. We had ONE chance to get a difference player before Rose's max kicked in (MMLE) and they blew it.

Don't get me started on Dunleavy and Kirk pt. II.

What were the repercussions of signing Pau or Wade? I'd tell you what: NOTHING. The only transferred player worth hypothesizing about is Harrison Barnes, because no other premier FA was released by their home team... and it remains to be seen whether he'll be worth that money for 4 years.

And putting Pau at $12m/2y on this poll is a disgrace to humanity. Two all-star appearances on less salary than Andrew Nicholson and you want to cry about that?