How do we think about Patrick Williams and his contract in light of Giddey's?

[GoBlue72391]

Maybe unpopular, but I don't think Patrick's contract is that bad. I don't like it of course right now, but he's still making a flat rate over the next 4 years while the cap is expected to keep rising. It won't be long before his deal is essentially an MLE contract. Hell, today he's only making $4M above the NT MLE.

Pat did not look like an MLE player last season, but he doesn't have to do a lot to get to that level. He had the worst year of his career, and I think there's reason to believe it won't repeat. If he's the player he was the previous four seasons, I think he's paid about fairly. I don't think that's a huge "if" either.

I think Pat should only shoot 3s. No dribbles no dunks no turnovers.

Simply take and make your 3s. Think that would help him a ton.

And play physical aggressive D.

You're asking for Keith Bogans. That's fine. The problem is all that we've invested in him in terms of draft capital, money, and playing time. Bogans was on a minimum salary contract and was only here for one year and played 18 MPG. And he was the most obvious and glaring weakness on the roster.

[Red Larrivee]

I respect your take, but I strongly disagree with it. In 5 years, Patrick Williams has not improved at all. Not once. Not for a little bit. If anything, he's gotten marginally worse while also becoming less athletic. The sentence "he doesn't have to do a lot to get to that [MLE[ level" is false. He would have to change his entire behavior and mentality on the court and buck 5 years of data and trends.

Here are the per 36 numbers between three players.

Player A (age 21): 11.7 ppg, 5.4 rpg, 1.3 apg, 1.2 spg, 0.6 bpg, 45% FG, 33% 3P
Player B (age 22): 11.9 ppg, 4.5 rpg, 3.5 apg, 1.6 spg, 0.5 bpg, 45% FG, 36% 3P
Player C (age 23): 12.9 ppg, 5.4 rpg, 2.8 apg, 1.1 spg, 0.7 bpg, 40% FG, 35% 3P

Which player would you take? Is there a meaningful difference between the three?

Would that answer change if I told you their salaries?

Player A will make $2.2M this season.
Player B will make $5.4m this season.
Player C will make $18m this season.

Spoiler:

Player A is Julian Philips, Player B is Dalen Terry, and Player C is of course Pat. If there isn't much that Pat has to do to become a MLE-level player, then is that also true for Philips and Terry? Because they're basicaly matching if not out performing him.

I agree with you. Pat wasn't worth $18M last year. He had his worst season as a pro by a country mile. He was nowhere near an MLE player; that much is clear.

That version of Patrick Williams is not the same as he's been the previous 4 seasons. From 2020-24: 48% FG, 43% 3P. Just off shooting alone, if he was that player last season, he would more/less be worth $18M: A wing who can defend 1-3 (sometimes 4) and can make 3s at an above average clip at reasonable volume. You're overpaying a couple mil for upside, but again, that's the going rate for that level of a flawed player with upside.

As someone mentioned earlier, the league tends to have a little bit of a blindspot with 3D wings with upside. Jabari Smith just got 25M for having zero improvement to his game. PJ Washington just got 23M.

I'm with you. Pat hasn't really improved. There's a lot about his game that's frustrating. Still, there's things about his game that are useful. He can be a frustrating, yet useful rotation player for you at $18M and still be an asset. He's not right now, but I don't think it's a long road for him to just get back to the player he was from 2020-24.

If he improves? Even better. But again, the saving grace is that his salary is flat and the MLE could very well align to it and surpass it at some point in the near future.

[League Circles]

Patrick really was WAY better after he came back and got a consistent bench role last year. The eye test is backed up by the stats.

Still wasn't what we wanted, but inspired hope that his play and contract off the bench might not be catastrophic for us.

No, it's not. The stats don't support that at all.

As a starter: 9.6/3.9/2.3 on 51 TS% over 27 MPG (per 36: 12.8/5.2/3.1)

Off the bench: 8.2/3.6/1.6 on 51 TS% over 22.1 MPG (per 36: 13.2/5.8/2.6)

The difference is negligible.

Try it again pre and post all star break and you'll see what I mean

[MrSparkle]

I don’t think there’s any rational scenario where Patrick is worth his remaining $72M. It’s gonna end up in the top-5 worst Bulls contracts. Maybe top-3, since 5Y guaranteed is a long time… Felicio got 4Y at a time where the cap was rising a lot, and the team was project tank, so it didn’t hurt much at all in the big picture… Wallace, Rose, Boozer, Lonzo had asterisks (injuries or all-star age decline)… Jabari and Wade were short; Wade hurt any chance of giving Jimmy a better team, but the FO didn’t seem interested in picking Jimmy over Fred.

Best that can happen is Pat gets back to shooting 40% on his low-volume, wide-open 3PAs, regains a reputation as a good defender (on a good Billy defensive squad)… and somebody else falls for the bait at the deadline. On top of underperforming, he’s been injury prone.

The overall pattern of his game has just been rough. His best days were as a rookie in the crazy covid stretch. Since then, all we’ve done is wondered why the Bulls were better when Javonte, DJJ, Caruso, Beverley and even Torey Craig were on the floor at PF. That’s quite a list of cheap replacements (besides MLE Caruso who played beyond his money).

All this, a healthy, quicker Pat… turned 24… yes, the goal should be a pump and dump.

[DropStep]

My recollection was that Pat was seen by many here as a physically talented guy with a fatal flaw: no motor. Two seasons ago there were signs and flashes where, while he wasn't putting up gaudy stats, the motor was better and it looked like he was more comfortable using his athleticism. Some felt like he had shown enough at least remove the "no motor" dealbreaker - it looks like it's at least in there, to some degree - which might allow the him to continue to unleash his potential. I do remember thinking and probably saying here, I'm not sure what this is, but something is happening with this guy. I think the Bulls felt the same way and bet on the signs. It hasn't worked out, and he's looked sluggish and passive since. I don't think 1/3 or less of the max is franchise-crippling, but it hasn't worked out.

I will admit I thought the Williams deal was a decent bet at the time. But Giddey has shown more and has greater indications toward an upside, and he has the ability to make others better imo. I feel better about this deal than I did the Williams deal, even having been burned on Pat (so far).

[Stratmaster]

I'm trying to put AK's flawed market assessment aside on the PWill deal which, to AK's credit, he learned from and successfully managed very well with Giddey's. If you put Pat's poor play post-contract aside (with a lot of mental effort!), you might be able to get to the point that based on both guys' pre-contract play vs. their contracts that they net out to "fair market value".

I will say that Pat's post-contract underperformance is why I was so gunshy about overpaying Giddey based on potential.

Thoughts?

My issue with this characterization, is that Williams didn't under-perform after the contract. He performed exactly as poorly as he has his whole career. The only difference is last season there was another young guy named Matas showing signs of being really good to take minutes from him. Of course, there were always players outplaying Williams at the 4. Even though they weren't really 4's lol. Some weren't even really 3's.

Williams shouldn't have been offered anything other than the minimum contract required by league rules. There was absolutely no reason to negotiate anything other than that, other than AKME trying to "motivate" him so he could justify where he picked him in the draft. Williams was already a proven failure at the NBA level, and he paid him anyway. Ridiculous. And many of us said that BEFORE and then again WHEN the contract was signed.

[Chi town]

Pat won’t get the mins to improve enough to be tradable.

We are stuck with him as bad salary filler for a bad contract that fits better or a future buyout/stretch.

I will be shocked if he improves enough to be traded. We don’t have entitlement mins to give him anymore.

[sco]

I'm trying to put AK's flawed market assessment aside on the PWill deal which, to AK's credit, he learned from and successfully managed very well with Giddey's. If you put Pat's poor play post-contract aside (with a lot of mental effort!), you might be able to get to the point that based on both guys' pre-contract play vs. their contracts that they net out to "fair market value".

I will say that Pat's post-contract underperformance is why I was so gunshy about overpaying Giddey based on potential.

Thoughts?

My issue with this characterization, is that Williams didn't under-perform after the contract. He performed exactly as poorly as he has his whole career. The only difference is last season there was another young guy named Matas showing signs of being really good to take minutes from him. Of course, there were always players outplaying Williams at the 4. Even though they weren't really 4's lol. Some weren't even really 3's.

Williams shouldn't have been offered anything other than the minimum contract required by league rules. There was absolutely no reason to negotiate anything other than that, other than AKME trying to "motivate" him so he could justify where he picked him in the draft. Williams was already a proven failure at the NBA level, and he paid him anyway. Ridiculous. And many of us said that BEFORE and then again WHEN the contract was signed.

Yeah, the Pat deal felt a lot like the Vuc resign. You know what the guy was, and shouldn't have wanted him back, but AK seemed to feel the need to reup to not admit failure on the original decision (here, the decision to draft Pat).

The difference between Pat and Josh is that Pat never showed potential to be worth a deal like that, so you we were paying for potential production that was never demonstrated.

[MrSparkle]

Pat won’t get the mins to improve enough to be tradable.

We are stuck with him as bad salary filler for a bad contract that fits better or a future buyout/stretch.

I will be shocked if he improves enough to be traded. We don’t have entitlement mins to give him anymore.

This is another thing. When you consider Billy likes playing guards at forward, and he has 3 rotation centers… and Matas is here… besides Noa and Phillips being younger, it seems like Pat and Terry are gonna ride the pine unless they hit the G-League.

[MGB8]

Pat won’t get the mins to improve enough to be tradable.

We are stuck with him as bad salary filler for a bad contract that fits better or a future buyout/stretch.

I will be shocked if he improves enough to be traded. We don’t have entitlement mins to give him anymore.

He is still likely to get 18-22 minutes per game behind Matas (and Giddey, thinking of Giddey as the defensive 3). That should be enough for him to improve his stock if he reverts back to prior percentages plus just looking quicker and more aggressive.

Whether that is enough for him to be tradable is hard to gauge - will depend on the quality of 3&D combo forward options available to teams.

[MGB8]

Pat won’t get the mins to improve enough to be tradable.

We are stuck with him as bad salary filler for a bad contract that fits better or a future buyout/stretch.

I will be shocked if he improves enough to be traded. We don’t have entitlement mins to give him anymore.

This is another thing. When you consider Billy likes playing guards at forward, and he has 3 rotation centers… and Matas is here… besides Noa and Phillips being younger, it seems like Pat and Terry are gonna ride the pine unless they hit the G-League.

I doubt it. Terry and Phillips, yes. But unless Essengue shows a lot, quickly, my guess is that Noa will see veryy limited time. I see minutes distro as something like:

1: Coby 32, Jones 16
2: Okoro 24, Ayo 24
3: Giddey 30, Huerter 18
4: Matas 28, Pat 16, Noa 4 (to start the season - a bunch of DNPs plus some short stints - could increase later on)
5: Vuc/Collins, Smith

Keep in mind that Noa’s questionable shooting may limit how much time Billy is willing to give him.

[dougthonus]

Here's a comparison everyone will hate:

Both players got 1.5x to 2x their value by relatively short end of season runs.

Pat Williams looked a "do not sign" player at the start of the season prior to his contract year, and then had a short run of maybe a month or two that looked like was really starting to put it together prior to his foot injury. We paid him the maximal amount as if that run was his future sustainable floor rather than a skeptical outcome over a short sample size he had never maintaned.

Giddey isn't quite as bad in this sense, because he's shown aspects of sustaining pieces of his performance, but he had this short burst of incredibly high percentage shooting while still boasting terrible form against lousy teams, and if you take that one single thing away, he was pretty mediocre still. Prior to that on the previous 50 games he was probably worth about 10M less.

Now maybe Giddey's improvement will be more of a launch pad than Pat's was. Giddey didn't end the season on an injury, and Pat effectively missed the whole off-season while Giddey didn't. Giddey has more examples of sustained show of his strengths as well, but we also paid him quite a bit more.

The big difference here was approach. I don't think the Bulls could have gotten Giddey any cheaper really. They paid market value for him and will now hope the upside version of him is the legit version. They could have negotiated harder with Pat, and locked him in around 12M-14M (which still would be a disappointment today, but not as bad).

[coldfish]

Pat won’t get the mins to improve enough to be tradable.

We are stuck with him as bad salary filler for a bad contract that fits better or a future buyout/stretch.

I will be shocked if he improves enough to be traded. We don’t have entitlement mins to give him anymore.

Pat has played 7500 minutes in the NBA and really hasn't improved. I would argue him getting the entitlement minutes you mention has reinforced his bad habits. More minutes isn't going to fix him.

[coldfish]

Here's a comparison everyone will hate:

Both players got 1.5x to 2x their value by relatively short end of season runs.

Pat Williams looked a "do not sign" player at the start of the season prior to his contract year, and then had a short run of maybe a month or two that looked like was really starting to put it together prior to his foot injury. We paid him the maximal amount as if that run was his future sustainable floor rather than a skeptical outcome over a short sample size he had never maintaned.

Giddey isn't quite as bad in this sense, because he's shown aspects of sustaining pieces of his performance, but he had this short burst of incredibly high percentage shooting while still boasting terrible form against lousy teams, and if you take that one single thing away, he was pretty mediocre still. Prior to that on the previous 50 games he was probably worth about 10M less.

Now maybe Giddey's improvement will be more of a launch pad than Pat's was. Giddey didn't end the season on an injury, and Pat effectively missed the whole off-season while Giddey didn't. Giddey has more examples of sustained show of his strengths as well, but we also paid him quite a bit more.

The big difference here was approach. I don't think the Bulls could have gotten Giddey any cheaper really. They paid market value for him and will now hope the upside version of him is the legit version. They could have negotiated harder with Pat, and locked him in around 12M-14M (which still would be a disappointment today, but not as bad).

Giddey's PER by year:
13.3
17.1
16.6
18.1 (got paid)

Patrick's PER by year:
10.5
12.7
11.2
11.0 (got paid)
9.0

Overall, Giddey's year last year averaged out a little more than his typical year. While we can focus on the end being great, the start to his year was among the worst of his career which also may have been an aberration. If Giddey was a free agent after his second year, I bet he would have got an even better deal than his $25m per year given his age at the time.

Patrick has just sucked as a Bull and he got paid anyways. His got paid year wasn't even his best.

[League Circles]

Pat won’t get the mins to improve enough to be tradable.

We are stuck with him as bad salary filler for a bad contract that fits better or a future buyout/stretch.

I will be shocked if he improves enough to be traded. We don’t have entitlement mins to give him anymore.

This is another thing. When you consider Billy likes playing guards at forward, and he has 3 rotation centers… and Matas is here… besides Noa and Phillips being younger, it seems like Pat and Terry are gonna ride the pine unless they hit the G-League.

I think Patrick should and will get at least 15 mpg:

5: 3 headed monster
4: Matas, Essengue
3: Giddey, Patrick
2: Okoro, Huerter or Ayo
1: Coby, Jones

That's what I think the rotation will look like. Yes I think the loser of the Ayo/Huerter battle will mostly get DNP-CDs. I think Patrick having 4 years left on his deal for significant money will get him a role over those two guys, who are 2-3 years older, on expiring contracts, and who both shoot worse than him for career 3pt% (and volume for Ayo). Pretty easy to make the case that Patrick is a better defender than either of them also.

Unless one of them played way better than Patrick for a while, I don't think Phillips or Terry have a chance at a regular rotation role when everyone is healthy.

[Chi town]

Pat won’t get the mins to improve enough to be tradable.

We are stuck with him as bad salary filler for a bad contract that fits better or a future buyout/stretch.

I will be shocked if he improves enough to be traded. We don’t have entitlement mins to give him anymore.

Pat has played 7500 minutes in the NBA and really hasn't improved. I would argue him getting the entitlement minutes you mention has reinforced his bad habits. More minutes isn't going to fix him.

Less mins make him untradable at his contract.

Who is trading for an 18M player that plays 15mpg?

[dougthonus]

Giddey's PER by year:
13.3
17.1
16.6
18.1 (got paid)

Patrick's PER by year:
10.5
12.7
11.2
11.0 (got paid)
9.0

Overall, Giddey's year last year averaged out a little more than his typical year. While we can focus on the end being great, the start to his year was among the worst of his career which also may have been an aberration. If Giddey was a free agent after his second year, I bet he would have got an even better deal than his $25m per year given his age at the time.

Patrick has just sucked as a Bull and he got paid anyways. His got paid year wasn't even his best.

To clarify, I had two basic conclusions, the first, your point is kind of stating one of them:
We negotiated hard with Giddey and landed on a good market rate deal compared to a bidding war UFA type deal. We didn't negotiate hard with Pat, and agreed to a deal that didn't really take our leverage, his injury, or the situation into account, and had we waited that deal would have been for a lot less.

The second point was that each guy's projected value in the off-season went up dramatically over a short run. Giddey's shown a bit more evidence of being able to sustain that, but they were both really poor earlier. I don't think the PER numbers really show anything about that one way or the other, a point on PER in these ranges is basically noise, and Giddey plays a style and role that tends to generate better PER numbers than Pat does (PER overvalues usage and rebounding IMO and undervalue efficiency so when looking at role players its not a good evaluation tool).

[League Circles]

IMO it's really, really worth remembering that Patrick Williams is the guy assigned to guard a guy like Giannis. I think that's incredibly important - who a team has available to guard the very hard covers in the league. Patrick may not be great at it, but he's arguably our best, and that has a big impact on a team.

Man thank God his deal is flat instead of decreasing. If he can at least be a solid bench 20 mog 3 and D guy, I think he'll be pretty tradable in a couple years or so.

[MrSparkle]

IMO it's really, really worth remembering that Patrick Williams is the guy assigned to guard a guy like Giannis. I think that's incredibly important - who a team has available to guard the very hard covers in the league. Patrick may not be great at it, but he's arguably our best, and that has a big impact on a team.

Man thank God his deal is flat instead of decreasing. If he can at least be a solid bench 20 mog 3 and D guy, I think he'll be pretty tradable in a couple years or so.

Giannis made him look like a plush toy. I’m not sure it really matters that he has the size to atleast try and contest a shot.

[jnrjr79]

IMO it's really, really worth remembering that Patrick Williams is the guy assigned to guard a guy like Giannis. I think that's incredibly important - who a team has available to guard the very hard covers in the league. Patrick may not be great at it, but he's arguably our best, and that has a big impact on a team.

Man thank God his deal is flat instead of decreasing. If he can at least be a solid bench 20 mog 3 and D guy, I think he'll be pretty tradable in a couple years or so.

For 2025 purposes, I don't really care who defends Giannis, because this is a developmental season and I care more about how the young guys are coming along than wins and losses (and to some extent, losses are A-ok, for draft pick purposes). I think this should be Matas's job primarily and Essengue should get some experience with it, as well.