How Bad are AKME?

[MrSparkle]

I'm disappointed in the lack of creativity.

They took some swings that first deadline. I liked the swings, though besides Javonte (and the Theis rental), they were ultimately all misses.

But I'm not surprised. They got themselves in a tall mess by over-paying Vuc, and then by (no fault of their own) having their starting $65M backcourt in surgery. I just don't know what they're going for at this point, other than punting the inevitable. Paxson seemed to lose patience after hitting the dead-end, and seemed to pivot within 2 years. This FO is pivoting after 4, almost 5 years. And there's nothing really to pivot to, unless Coby, Pat and Ayo become the 2014 Warriors. The cap is gonna be spent, the picks aren't coming, and 4 of the best-paid players have declined (or maybe will retire) from age or injury.

Like I said before- by not making moves the last 6 months, AK just makes his job monumentally harder. There seems to be little sense of urgency. I guess that's the back-end con of "continuity" and security: no sense of urgency. This team is not positioned for free agents, trades, nor draft picks, and they struggle to maintain a 500 win record in a legitimately weaker conference AFAIC (regardless of records). He's literally giving himself the slimmest of odds for improvement, besides for the long-shot chance that Pat, Ayo and Coby become way better than anybody could have ever imagined.

[ChiefILL53]

Havent watched, but I heard that the reporters were cooking AK with the questions. How true is that? lol. Good to hear that the media isnt letting him off the hook.

[League Circles]

AK took over a poor team and over 3.5 years later, he's 5 games under .500 total, despite a career ending injury to one of his 3 best players and significant injuries to another. He's had multiple good free agent signings. He hasn't done well but the hyperbole is laughable IMO. I stand by my grade of C-minus for him so far. I'm glad he didn't make a trade, not cause I'm happy with the roster, but cause I doubt there was a worthwhile one. Gotta go one way or another this summer. Really probably gotta pay tax next year to incrementally improve if we finish strong and make the playoffs and compete well in it. If we don't achieve that, gotta trim some fat and try to rebuild around Coby and cap space in 2025.

[dougthonus]

AK took over a poor team and over 3.5 years later, he's 5 games under .500 total, despite a career ending injury to one of his 3 best players and significant injuries to another. He's had multiple good free agent signings. He hasn't done well but the hyperbole is laughable IMO. I stand by my grade of C-minus for him so far. I'm glad he didn't make a trade, not cause I'm happy with the roster, but cause I doubt there was a worthwhile one. Gotta go one way or another this summer. Really probably gotta pay tax next year to incrementally improve if we finish strong and make the playoffs and compete well in it. If we don't achieve that, gotta trim some fat and try to rebuild around Coby and cap space in 2025.

He took over a team that if he had done nothing with at all except extend what was there, would be better than 5 games under .500.

He also made that team more expensive, older, and stripped future resources.

[MikeDC]

Ownership doesn't want to pay the tax. Thats what they care about. The rest is up to AKME. I fully believe that.

I think this is true, at least without a chance to win the title.

However, we are the 9th highest payroll in the NBA. We're the 19th best team. There are two more teams within like 5M of total salary (slightly in the tax) above us. The payroll isn't stopping us from begin good. Teams don't pay the tax unless they think they can win the title. The tax when you are building and expect to be 1stround/play-in is a red herring. No one in the NBA wants to pay the tax for that. I think the tax is an issue when you're one of the top 5-6 teams and there is parity and a small iterative change to your 6th-8th best player or adding one more rotation player might put you over the top.

According to Spotrac, the Bulls have the 12th highest payroll in the league at $163.585M. Basketball Reference for some reason still erroneously lists DJJ as counting against the Bulls cap, but that's not the case.
https://www.spotrac.com/nba/

And that includes Lonzo, but of course $16M of his salary isn't actually payroll, because it's being covered by insurance. That means the Bulls payrolls is actually only ~ $147.6M... which would rank them 23rd in payroll.

[MikeDC]

There's so many reasonable criticisms to be made, I'm just going to document one that's less obvious but really gets to why AKME is so terrible.

Let's talk about what it means to mismanage and waste assets.

The Bulls traded Gafford in February 2021. Three years later, in February 2024, the Wizards traded him for a 1st round pick. They also traded Luke Kornet to the Celtics. 3 years later, he's still not great, but he's a role player who plays on the best team in the league.

In exchange for giving up these two guys who still have significant value three years later, what do the Bulls have to show for it?

They got Daniel Theis, who played a total of 23 games for the Bulls. In the three seasons since, he's played 93 games (an average of 31 per season).

They got Troy Brown Jr, who played is a league minimum wing who just got traded to his 3rd team in two years.

They got Javonte Green, who's out of the league.

The initial construction of the deal was just between the Wiz and Bulls, and in that construction, the Bulls would have kept Kornet and also received Mo Wagner instead of Theis. Wagner is, like Kornet, not great, but a young role player getting steady minutes on a team that's much better than the Bulls while Daniel Theis is long gone with nothing to show for him ever being here.

This is what terrible GMing looks like.

[jnrjr79]

That press conference sucked.
This bums me out.

"What are you selling the fans at this point"
"I am selling a competitive group that is competing right now for the playoffs. And-and that is just evidence and-you bring it up the standings. I mean we are all bunched up in that area in the middle"

AK is a stooge

Yep, complete garbage.

I'm glad that one reporter pointed out that any team can cite a winning streak (or good play) during a season and use that as an excuse.

Hitting him over the head with "what do you consider competitive?" over and over and then following with "You have 1 playoff win in 2.5 years" was damn gold.

I think AK made it clear. He made a point that the Bulls missed the playoffs for 5 years before he got here. His job is to get that playoff revenue.

*He is conveniently ignoring the fact that we were have been a play-in team and not a playoff team

If his job is to get playoff revenue, then today was a total failure, because he did nothing to further that goal. The Bulls are currently viewed as unlikely to make the playoffs.

[League Circles]

AK took over a poor team and over 3.5 years later, he's 5 games under .500 total, despite a career ending injury to one of his 3 best players and significant injuries to another. He's had multiple good free agent signings. He hasn't done well but the hyperbole is laughable IMO. I stand by my grade of C-minus for him so far. I'm glad he didn't make a trade, not cause I'm happy with the roster, but cause I doubt there was a worthwhile one. Gotta go one way or another this summer. Really probably gotta pay tax next year to incrementally improve if we finish strong and make the playoffs and compete well in it. If we don't achieve that, gotta trim some fat and try to rebuild around Coby and cap space in 2025.

He took over a team that if he had done nothing with at all except extend what was there, would be better than 5 games under .500.

He also made that team more expensive, older, and stripped future resources.

Even if the first part is true, which it might be, so what? He's basically .500. pretty average job. I say a C minus grade, D+ at worst.

[dougthonus]

AK took over a poor team and over 3.5 years later, he's 5 games under .500 total, despite a career ending injury to one of his 3 best players and significant injuries to another. He's had multiple good free agent signings. He hasn't done well but the hyperbole is laughable IMO. I stand by my grade of C-minus for him so far. I'm glad he didn't make a trade, not cause I'm happy with the roster, but cause I doubt there was a worthwhile one. Gotta go one way or another this summer. Really probably gotta pay tax next year to incrementally improve if we finish strong and make the playoffs and compete well in it. If we don't achieve that, gotta trim some fat and try to rebuild around Coby and cap space in 2025.

He took over a team that if he had done nothing with at all except extend what was there, would be better than 5 games under .500.

He also made that team more expensive, older, and stripped future resources.

Even if the first part is true, which it might be, so what? He's basically .500. pretty average job. I say a C minus grade, D+ at worst.

So say you sell me your house for 200k and buy an older version of your house except it's got 200 less square feet and has a bad foundation, needs a new roof, new windows, new furnace and has an outdated lime green kitchen from the 70s for 500k.

I mean C-, D+ at worst.

[MikeDC]

AK took over a poor team and over 3.5 years later, he's 5 games under .500 total, despite a career ending injury to one of his 3 best players and significant injuries to another. He's had multiple good free agent signings. He hasn't done well but the hyperbole is laughable IMO. I stand by my grade of C-minus for him so far. I'm glad he didn't make a trade, not cause I'm happy with the roster, but cause I doubt there was a worthwhile one. Gotta go one way or another this summer. Really probably gotta pay tax next year to incrementally improve if we finish strong and make the playoffs and compete well in it. If we don't achieve that, gotta trim some fat and try to rebuild around Coby and cap space in 2025.

He took over a team that if he had done nothing with at all except extend what was there, would be better than 5 games under .500.

He also made that team more expensive, older, and stripped future resources.

Even if the first part is true, which it might be, so what? He's basically .500. pretty average job. I say a C minus grade, D+ at worst.

Applying grades is by definition misleading. It leads people to think of a school situation. But it's not.

I was a professor for a while, and with grade inflation and all, a C- or D+ generally means the student is incompetent and doesn't know what they're doing, but you feel bad for them 'cause they're ok kids who are trying. And really, it's not a big deal if the kid gets a C in history if he's going to go on to be... well... whatever he ends up being.

But that's not what's going on here. Would you hire a C- or D+ engineer to build a building or a bridge? **** no! Of course not. Nobody would do that.

That's what's going on here. Even by the most charitable interpretations, this guy is wholly and completely out of his depth. He's bad. Nobody's going to look at this record and give him another shot. If he's actually going to last with the Bulls, it's because of inertia and low expectations. Even a minimally competent owner would fire him.

I think Reinsdorf is minimally competent, and I would guess that the fact that they were open to a rebuild and AKME didn't take them up on it was more than eyebrow raising for them. That's the only good thing to happen today.

[kyrv]

AK took over a poor team and over 3.5 years later, he's 5 games under .500 total, despite a career ending injury to one of his 3 best players and significant injuries to another. He's had multiple good free agent signings. He hasn't done well but the hyperbole is laughable IMO. I stand by my grade of C-minus for him so far. I'm glad he didn't make a trade, not cause I'm happy with the roster, but cause I doubt there was a worthwhile one. Gotta go one way or another this summer. Really probably gotta pay tax next year to incrementally improve if we finish strong and make the playoffs and compete well in it. If we don't achieve that, gotta trim some fat and try to rebuild around Coby and cap space in 2025.

He took over a team that if he had done nothing with at all except extend what was there, would be better than 5 games under .500.

He also made that team more expensive, older, and stripped future resources.

Even if the first part is true, which it might be, so what? He's basically .500. pretty average job. I say a C minus grade, D+ at worst.

He's not basically.500, he's basically under .500.

And .500 isn't really average, there are rebuilding and tanking teams. Of the teams trying to win, he's factually not average.

National media is pretty much roasting the Bulls GMing of the past few years. Without using hyperbole, it's just not needed

[League Circles]

He took over a team that if he had done nothing with at all except extend what was there, would be better than 5 games under .500.

He also made that team more expensive, older, and stripped future resources.

Even if the first part is true, which it might be, so what? He's basically .500. pretty average job. I say a C minus grade, D+ at worst.

He's not basically.500, he's basically under .500.

And .500 isn't really average, there are rebuilding and tanking teams. Of the teams trying to win, he's factually not average.

National media is pretty much roasting the Bulls GMing of the past few years. Without using hyperbole, it's just not needed

.500 is by definition average. I don't divide the league into teams trying and teams not trying. Every coach and player in this league is trying to win all the time. The Bulls are a shade under average in what is now over 3.5 years in. It's not a small sample size anymore. I franky don't see a ton of unforgivable stuff. Vuc trade was pretty bad for sure, but IMO that's about it for terrible moves. Most execs have a terrible move every few years. I'm not satisfied with the team or a fair number of his choices, but I think they're mostly defensible and I think he's a below average, but still competent exec so far compared to peers.

[dougthonus]

According to Spotrac, the Bulls have the 12th highest payroll in the league at $163.585M. Basketball Reference for some reason still erroneously lists DJJ as counting against the Bulls cap, but that's not the case.
https://www.spotrac.com/nba/

And that includes Lonzo, but of course $16M of his salary isn't actually payroll, because it's being covered by insurance. That means the Bulls payrolls is actually only ~ $147.6M... which would rank them 23rd in payroll.

Go to spotrac and go to "luxury tax" and hit update, then refresh, Bulls are 10th currently. The other view on cap includes cap holds.

Could certainly argue what context is important, but I'm speaking about the willingness to allocate money on the roster. Ownership would pretty consistently not put any breakers on cost up to the tax barrier for their GM to use. Our problem is not that we are unwilling to allocate more money to the roster, the problem is how we allocated it.

It is generally a reasonable assumption that any FO should have that in order to get tax dollars allocated, they must be anticipated to be a top 8 team in the NBA at a minimum.

[ScrantonBulls]

According to Spotrac, the Bulls have the 12th highest payroll in the league at $163.585M. Basketball Reference for some reason still erroneously lists DJJ as counting against the Bulls cap, but that's not the case.
https://www.spotrac.com/nba/

And that includes Lonzo, but of course $16M of his salary isn't actually payroll, because it's being covered by insurance. That means the Bulls payrolls is actually only ~ $147.6M... which would rank them 23rd in payroll.

Go to spotrac and go to "luxury tax" and hit update, then refresh, Bulls are 10th currently. The other view on cap includes cap holds.

Could certainly argue what context is important, but I'm speaking about the willingness to allocate money on the roster. Ownership would pretty consistently not put any breakers on cost up to the tax barrier for their GM to use. Our problem is not that we are unwilling to allocate more money to the roster, the problem is how we allocated it.

It is generally a reasonable assumption that any FO should have that in order to get tax dollars allocated, they must be anticipated to be a top 8 team in the NBA at a minimum.

Unrelated question, but have podcasters like yourself or anybody you know ever been approached by an NBA team for a job in any capacity? I think you'd do better in the FO staff than what the Bulls are currently working with.

[ChiTownHero1992]

Just a few weeks ago I was at a D/D-, we have now dropped to F...and it is falling rapidly

[dougthonus]

Unrelated question, but have podcasters like yourself or anybody you know ever been approached by an NBA team for a job in any capacity? I think you'd do better in the FO staff than what the Bulls are currently working with.

It wasn't due to my podcast / comments here, but I did consulting work for the Kings, Thunder, and Spurs in the past through draftexpress when I worked there, though it was all technical in nature.

There are people who made the jump from podcast/writing into NBA front office. I think a lot of people who did sportsbiz class that Larry Coon / Nate Duncan started have made that leap.

[kyrv]

Even if the first part is true, which it might be, so what? He's basically .500. pretty average job. I say a C minus grade, D+ at worst.

He's not basically.500, he's basically under .500.

And .500 isn't really average, there are rebuilding and tanking teams. Of the teams trying to win, he's factually not average.

National media is pretty much roasting the Bulls GMing of the past few years. Without using hyperbole, it's just not needed

.500 is by definition average. I don't divide the league into teams trying and teams not trying. Every coach and player in this league is trying to win all the time. The Bulls are a shade under average in what is now over 3.5 years in. It's not a small sample size anymore. I franky don't see a ton of unforgivable stuff. Vuc trade was pretty bad for sure, but IMO that's about it for terrible moves. Most execs have a terrible move every few years. I'm not satisfied with the team or a fair number of his choices, but I think they're mostly defensible and I think he's a below average, but still competent exec so far compared to peers.

I mean I agree with you that they are below average, generally in sports after a long sample size that's not good enough, but the bar for retention seems limbo low.

[ScrantonBulls]

Unrelated question, but have podcasters like yourself or anybody you know ever been approached by an NBA team for a job in any capacity? I think you'd do better in the FO staff than what the Bulls are currently working with.

It wasn't due to my podcast / comments here, but I did consulting work for the Kings, Thunder, and Spurs in the past through draftexpress when I worked there, though it was all technical in nature.

That's awesome so it wasn't related to your basketball knowledge, per se?

[dougthonus]

Unrelated question, but have podcasters like yourself or anybody you know ever been approached by an NBA team for a job in any capacity? I think you'd do better in the FO staff than what the Bulls are currently working with.

It wasn't due to my podcast / comments here, but I did consulting work for the Kings, Thunder, and Spurs in the past through draftexpress when I worked there, though it was all technical in nature.

That's awesome so it wasn't related to your basketball knowledge, per se?

Nope, not really. For the Thunder/Spurs, I created statistical data feeds to ingest into their analytics platform. For the Kings I created a scouting platform integrated with data feeds.

[MikeDC]

According to Spotrac, the Bulls have the 12th highest payroll in the league at $163.585M. Basketball Reference for some reason still erroneously lists DJJ as counting against the Bulls cap, but that's not the case.
https://www.spotrac.com/nba/

And that includes Lonzo, but of course $16M of his salary isn't actually payroll, because it's being covered by insurance. That means the Bulls payrolls is actually only ~ $147.6M... which would rank them 23rd in payroll.

Go to spotrac and go to "luxury tax" and hit update, then refresh, Bulls are 10th currently. The other view on cap includes cap holds.

No, the right view to look at is "Cash". That's the actual payroll that teams are paying out, which includes dead money. So the Mavs, for example, are only at $162M (less than the Bulls) for the luxury tax calculation. But their actual payroll is $164M (more than the Bulls). And when you factor in the insurance, the Bulls are actually only paying out $147M.

Could certainly argue what context is important, but I'm speaking about the willingness to allocate money on the roster.

Right... the Bulls were only willing to spend $147M this year on payroll. That's 23rd.

Ownership would pretty consistently not put any breakers on cost up to the tax barrier for their GM to use. Our problem is not that we are unwilling to allocate more money to the roster, the problem is how we allocated it.

Well, that's literally not the case. The Bulls could have traded Lonzo's insurance-covered contract for an equivalent active player. Such a move would have save the receiving team a minimum of $16M, and maybe ~ $32M of actual payroll cash. That's a huge amount. Teams give up first round picks for less. And it wouldn't have affect the Bulls luxury tax position at all.

They chose not to. To me, that's clearly a financial decision. Really, that's what AK is trying to do. He's trying to have the 16th best team with the 23rd payroll. He could probably have the 12th highest payroll, but he's making the calculation that having the 23rd highest payroll (which puts a certain $16M change in ownership's hands) is a really good hedge against having the 12th highest payroll and not actually ending up with any playoff revenue (which might not even be that $16M).