Bulls viewed AK's rebuild as a success / other tidbits

[Dan Z]

Last year I think was a big improvement. Drafting Buzelis, getting Giddey for Caruso straight up (I feel that both teams won that trade) and was patient with Lavine. It was widely reported this time last year that they really didn't wanna enter the season with Zach, but at the time the only way to trade him was to pay someone to take him on. He rolled the dice on him building up atleast positive value and got his pick back from a previous mistake. Plus Zach Collins is a fine player on top of it. Hell, we probably would have ended up being happy with Zach for Zach straight up, let alone getting our pick back !

Of course though, extending Patrick to a big deal while buffing against nobody.... That still docks him a letter grade last summer.

Directionally, it was probably their best year, that said, they did lousy in the DDR S&T and they bungled the Pat extension.

The Caruso/Giddey swap depends a lot on how you feel about Giddey, but I think the market value was fine and it was the better risk to take vs pick #13 based on what their options were at the time. Agree with your thoughts on the Zach trade, it was good to exercise patience.

I recommended moving Coby/Ayo in the off-season for as many picks as you can get, that definitely would have been the good play with Ayo, harder to say with Coby.

Overall though, they got younger and are still mediocre and have more flexibility. I don't think they're on the path to anywhere, but they did achieve some reasonable macro level success in doing those things.

The Giddey trade is fine, but we'll see what his next contract will be (which is a big part of it).

However, let's say they traded Caruso for picks instead of Giddey. Could they get OKC's 2024 pick? More? Less? That pick ended up being Topic, but Ware and McCain were also available at that time.

The other thing that "no Giddey" does is it makes the 2025 team worse and the 2025 pick better. At one point the Bulls record was close to Phillies. Would it be possible that they'd be so bad and end up with the 5th pick? Maybe, but that's difficult to say (because who knows how the lottery would play out).

Anyway...I think the team is a long way from contending and wanted them to build through the draft. Like I said, the Giddey trade is fine, and maybe they do well with the 2025 pick and are able to build something with Giddey, Matas, Coby and the pick. I hope so.

[LateNight]

Remember when Jordan said in the press conference after game 6 of the 97 finals that Cubs have been rebuilding for 40 something years? That's what the bulls are now. Those cubs that Jordan was referencing. It's been 26 years now.

This is really unfair to the 2010-2015 teams. Those were legitimately fun, good teams

[Guru]

A couple tidbits from the By The Horns podcast (owned by CHSN and thus the Bulls) with KC Johnson and Cam Smith discussing the extension.

1: Extension runs through 27/28 season. I'm sure the Bulls could trivially just fire these guys, it's unlikely they're paying more than 5M a year combined for them, so at the end of this season you probably have a cap of 10M dollar hit on replacing them. In the context of team revenues that's very small.

2: The Bulls viewed AK's first rebuild as a success. They think he is 1 for 1 so far in his roster make overs and this next year is the start of attempt #2.

3: The Bulls intend to be methodical with this rebuild and we should be patient, we will not be looking to make big swings like the Vuc trade.

Ive said all of this for years and was told I was a troll.

[dougthonus]

The Giddey trade is fine, but we'll see what his next contract will be (which is a big part of it).

However, let's say they traded Caruso for picks instead of Giddey. Could they get OKC's 2024 pick? More? Less? That pick ended up being Topic, but Ware and McCain were also available at that time.

The other thing that "no Giddey" does is it makes the 2025 team worse and the 2025 pick better. At one point the Bulls record was close to Phillies. Would it be possible that they'd be so bad and end up with the 5th pick? Maybe, but that's difficult to say (because who knows how the lottery would play out).

Anyway...I think the team is a long way from contending and wanted them to build through the draft. Like I said, the Giddey trade is fine, and maybe they do well with the 2025 pick and are able to build something with Giddey, Matas, Coby and the pick. I hope so.

I definitely do not align with all of their moves as being the optimal way to do everything, but realistically there are risks with just getting draft picks, and to point to two guys who exceeded expectations but were drafted later than the guys they took is too much of a "happy path" alternate future.

Most fans here (based on my recollection) would have wanted Devin Carter with that pick if we had it.

I don't think we're on the way to winning a title or even being a contender, but I'm not sure the draft path would have been any better if we just had traded Caruso for pick #12 or #13.

[Dan Z]

The Giddey trade is fine, but we'll see what his next contract will be (which is a big part of it).

However, let's say they traded Caruso for picks instead of Giddey. Could they get OKC's 2024 pick? More? Less? That pick ended up being Topic, but Ware and McCain were also available at that time.

The other thing that "no Giddey" does is it makes the 2025 team worse and the 2025 pick better. At one point the Bulls record was close to Phillies. Would it be possible that they'd be so bad and end up with the 5th pick? Maybe, but that's difficult to say (because who knows how the lottery would play out).

Anyway...I think the team is a long way from contending and wanted them to build through the draft. Like I said, the Giddey trade is fine, and maybe they do well with the 2025 pick and are able to build something with Giddey, Matas, Coby and the pick. I hope so.

I definitely do not align with all of their moves as being the optimal way to do everything, but realistically there are risks with just getting draft picks, and to point to two guys who exceeded expectations but were drafted later than the guys they took is too much of a "happy path" alternate future.

Most fans here (based on my recollection) would have wanted Devin Carter with that pick if we had it.

I don't think we're on the way to winning a title or even being a contender, but I'm not sure the draft path would have been any better if we just had traded Caruso for pick #12 or #13.

I don't think Ware would've been an unrealistic draft pick when you consider that Vucevic is on his way out. Also, like I said the 2025 pick would be better without Giddey.

I say that and don't hate the Giddey trade, it's just not what I would've done. Hopefully Giddey continues to improve and the team is a surprise in a year or two.

[The Force.]

2024-2025 was only a good year in a vacuum. Taken in context with the last 5 years it was mediocre, only salvaged by lucking into Matas. Sure Giddey had flashes but, until he proves otherwise, remains a poor foundational piece for a contending team.

The return for Zach and DeMar was the equivalent of selling the dip. An AKME staple. Sure they got something back, but moves like this reek of incompetence and myopia.

I fully expect AK to overpay Giddey and lose whatever trade he ends up making for Coby/Ayo. I also won’t be surprised if he drafts Egor Demin and holds a press conference preaching patience while he builds his championship team of 9-10 really good players.

[Dominator83]

Remember when Jordan said in the press conference after game 6 of the 97 finals that Cubs have been rebuilding for 40 something years? That's what the bulls are now. Those cubs that Jordan was referencing. It's been 26 years now.

actually its been 27

[chefo]

I wonder what a 'failure' would have looked like, if the last several years of limping into the play-in and losing is considered 'successful'.

Given their starting point of a pristine payroll with:

* Productive and incredibly cheap young bigs (Lauri, WCJ, Gafford)
* A huge expiring in Otto
* A very productive cheap vet big in Thad
* Still cheap, 25ppg Zach
* 2nd year Coby
* and a #4 pick plus all your upcoming picks...

... to end up where you end up and consider it a success if laughably idiotic from ownership. 2nd generation money running things, I guess.

[Dominator83]

Spin it as much as you want Doug. There is absolutely no way you are going to convince me the Bulls are not doing well financially.

Bulls ranked 7th in revenue in 2023/24, an 11% increase from the previous year. I have no idea why you would quote the past decade average and include their rebuild period when we are talking about AK's tenure. Either way they are FAR from struggling financially and are easily one of the most profitable teams in the NBA.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/193704/revenue-of-national-basketball-association-teams-in-2010/

Feel free to disagree.

I picked a longer back starting point because it reduces noise. The Bulls used to be the 3rd most valuable franchise, and in 2008 I wrote an article called a decade of profits showing they had generated the most profit of any team in the NBA for the previous 10 years even after Jordan sales crashed hard. Even more profit than the Lakers whom were a major market and won a bunch of titles. They are no where near that now.

I'm not laying this on AKME's feet. I'm just saying the Bulls on the whole have not been running an effective growth franchise, and AKME isn't turning it around either. They don't have good TV ratings, they don't have any interest, their ability going forward to negotiate contracts on TV/Radio has been poor (as seen by them getting murdered in the comcast deal for CHSN).

The Bulls on the whole are still making a crap ton of money, don't get me wrong. Just they should be making 1.5x whatever that crap ton of money is.

Another thing that makes the Reinsdorfs clueless. If the Bulls were actually a success on the court, they would have had more leverage in their negotiations with Comcast. The major thing that kept them from having any leverage was the fact that the team stinks and doesn't even have any potential future superstars to sell the fanbase on (and of course the Sox and hawks don't help with any leverage either because they suck too). You would think by how money driven ownership is, that they would be pissed at the lack of leverage they had, which a big reason was the lack of a good product on the floor.

[Dominator83]

I know it's a tiny non-move, but it's the one that completely pisses me off the most and to me, exemplifies this FO. Failing to trade Drummond at the deadline when you were 26-29 and had a deal for 3 2ds from PHL. Undervaluing picks, focusing on "success" as making the playin, institutional inertia as a strategy. Throw in overvaluing your own guys and ignoring either big picture or actual contributions from the players in question.

It's the same thing from the Vuc trade carried over (undervaluing picks), from the PW extension (overvaluing your own guys and ignoring actual contributions), from failing to make deals at the deadline involving the mid 3, from failing to demand a pick from OKC in the Caruso deal (and that's from someone who's bullish on Giddey). So I don't hold out much hope of "learning," their "build slow through the draft" (assuming that is the real plan) to me suggests "overdraft toolsy guys like Pat/Dalen and hope they develop, meanwhile passing on actual skilled basketball players."

I miss Garpax.

two things that make that Drummond fumble even worse:

1) They ended up letting Philly outright sign him for nothing.
2) They proceeded to continue barely ever even playing Drummond after refusing to trade him!

Now point #1, i was OK with the next day, because i liked the upside signing of Jalen Smith. But, all they really did was give him the Drummond treatment of barely getting any minutes unless Vuc was out.

The Vuc trade was not only a disaster with giving up the two picks, getting bad play on the floor outside of his empty stats, but also because they stubbornly insist on giving him 35 minutes a night, when a big chunk of those should have been going to better players. They were better with Drummond, and WAYYYY better with Zach Collins.

The funnest stretch of Bulls basketball over the last 3 years was the stretch late in this season when both Patrick and Vuc were out for a handful of games. They were much more fun to watch with Huerter and Collins in their places. I dreaded the thought of those 2 returning.

[Dan Z]

Watch on YouTube

[Dan Z]

I know it's a tiny non-move, but it's the one that completely pisses me off the most and to me, exemplifies this FO. Failing to trade Drummond at the deadline when you were 26-29 and had a deal for 3 2ds from PHL. Undervaluing picks, focusing on "success" as making the playin, institutional inertia as a strategy. Throw in overvaluing your own guys and ignoring either big picture or actual contributions from the players in question.

It's the same thing from the Vuc trade carried over (undervaluing picks), from the PW extension (overvaluing your own guys and ignoring actual contributions), from failing to make deals at the deadline involving the mid 3, from failing to demand a pick from OKC in the Caruso deal (and that's from someone who's bullish on Giddey). So I don't hold out much hope of "learning," their "build slow through the draft" (assuming that is the real plan) to me suggests "overdraft toolsy guys like Pat/Dalen and hope they develop, meanwhile passing on actual skilled basketball players."

I miss Garpax.

two things that make that Drummond fumble even worse:

1) They ended up letting Philly outright sign him for nothing.
2) They proceeded to continue barely ever even playing Drummond after refusing to trade him!

Now point #1, i was OK with the next day, because i liked the upside signing of Jalen Smith. But, all they really did was give him the Drummond treatment of barely getting any minutes unless Vuc was out.

The Vuc trade was not only a disaster with giving up the two picks, getting bad play on the floor outside of his empty stats, but also because they stubbornly insist on giving him 35 minutes a night, when a big chunk of those should have been going to better players. They were better with Drummond, and WAYYYY better with Zach Collins.

The funnest stretch of Bulls basketball over the last 3 years was the stretch late in this season when both Patrick and Vuc were out for a handful of games. They were much more fun to watch with Huerter and Collins in their places. I dreaded the thought of those 2 returning.

That year I wanted them to package Drummond with Caruso and offer that to OKC for the most you can get.

[Dominator83]

Remember when Jordan said in the press conference after game 6 of the 97 finals that Cubs have been rebuilding for 40 something years? That's what the bulls are now. Those cubs that Jordan was referencing. It's been 26 years now.

This is really unfair to the 2010-2015 teams. Those were legitimately fun, good teams

2015 in particular was really sabotaged by injuries. Rose and Noah really did have a great supporting cast,(Jimmy, Gasol, Taj, Niko, Dunleavy) but were shells of themselves by that point already.

[coldfish]

Spin it as much as you want Doug. There is absolutely no way you are going to convince me the Bulls are not doing well financially.

Bulls ranked 7th in revenue in 2023/24, an 11% increase from the previous year. I have no idea why you would quote the past decade average and include their rebuild period when we are talking about AK's tenure. Either way they are FAR from struggling financially and are easily one of the most profitable teams in the NBA.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/193704/revenue-of-national-basketball-association-teams-in-2010/

Feel free to disagree.

I picked a longer back starting point because it reduces noise. The Bulls used to be the 3rd most valuable franchise, and in 2008 I wrote an article called a decade of profits showing they had generated the most profit of any team in the NBA for the previous 10 years even after Jordan sales crashed hard. Even more profit than the Lakers whom were a major market and won a bunch of titles. They are no where near that now.

I'm not laying this on AKME's feet. I'm just saying the Bulls on the whole have not been running an effective growth franchise, and AKME isn't turning it around either. They don't have good TV ratings, they don't have any interest, their ability going forward to negotiate contracts on TV/Radio has been poor (as seen by them getting murdered in the comcast deal for CHSN).

The Bulls on the whole are still making a crap ton of money, don't get me wrong. Just they should be making 1.5x whatever that crap ton of money is.

+1. More likely than not a rather mediocre human being would have the Bulls in a better place than they are now if they had taken over in 2000. There are some owners who may have been worse but they are outliers.

[Indomitable]

Spin it as much as you want Doug. There is absolutely no way you are going to convince me the Bulls are not doing well financially.

Bulls ranked 7th in revenue in 2023/24, an 11% increase from the previous year. I have no idea why you would quote the past decade average and include their rebuild period when we are talking about AK's tenure. Either way they are FAR from struggling financially and are easily one of the most profitable teams in the NBA.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/193704/revenue-of-national-basketball-association-teams-in-2010/

Feel free to disagree.

I picked a longer back starting point because it reduces noise. The Bulls used to be the 3rd most valuable franchise, and in 2008 I wrote an article called a decade of profits showing they had generated the most profit of any team in the NBA for the previous 10 years even after Jordan sales crashed hard. Even more profit than the Lakers whom were a major market and won a bunch of titles. They are no where near that now.

I'm not laying this on AKME's feet. I'm just saying the Bulls on the whole have not been running an effective growth franchise, and AKME isn't turning it around either. They don't have good TV ratings, they don't have any interest, their ability going forward to negotiate contracts on TV/Radio has been poor (as seen by them getting murdered in the comcast deal for CHSN).

The Bulls on the whole are still making a crap ton of money, don't get me wrong. Just they should be making 1.5x whatever that crap ton of money is.

+1. More likely than not a rather mediocre human being would have the Bulls in a better place than they are now if they had taken over in 2000. There are some owners who may have been worse but they are outliers.

To bad the Grizzlies owner did not get into Chicago.

[KeithBoothfan]

The Caruso/Giddey swap depends a lot on how you feel about Giddey, but I think the market value was fine and it was the better risk to take vs pick #13 based on what their options were at the time.

Getting Giddey as a piece, even the main piece, of the Caruso trade is fine. Giddey is a pretty good player, still super young, and put up some video game-ish stats while the team was winning some games at the end of the year. All good things! I wouldn't bet on him ever being a top 1-2 player on a contender, but I think he *could* be a 3rd or 4th if he keeps improving and the rest of the roster balances out some of his shortcomings.

But is there a reason you frame it so that the Bulls either trade for Giddey OR a pick, but not both? Maybe they don't get a 1st rounder in this draft, but it seems like they could have picked at least one 1st from OKC's stash, or multiple 2nds, or something. It seemed like OKC and perhaps other teams valued Caruso highly enough to include some draft capital. Not Bridges/Bane type hauls, but a pick or two along with Giddey or a similarly valued player. Are you privy to info suggesting this kind of deal wasn't feasible? It just seemed to me that AK had leverage he didn't use in that deal, and OKC has more picks than they can realistically use so it shouldn't have been a hard ask.

[Dominator83]

The Caruso/Giddey swap depends a lot on how you feel about Giddey, but I think the market value was fine and it was the better risk to take vs pick #13 based on what their options were at the time.

Getting Giddey as a piece, even the main piece, of the Caruso trade is fine. Giddey is a pretty good player, still super young, and put up some video game-ish stats while the team was winning some games at the end of the year. All good things! I wouldn't bet on him ever being a top 1-2 player on a contender, but I think he *could* be a 3rd or 4th if he keeps improving and the rest of the roster balances out some of his shortcomings.

But is there a reason you frame it so that the Bulls either trade for Giddey OR a pick, but not both? Maybe they don't get a 1st rounder in this draft, but it seems like they could have picked at least one 1st from OKC's stash, or multiple 2nds, or something. It seemed like OKC and perhaps other teams valued Caruso highly enough to include some draft capital. Not Bridges/Bane type hauls, but a pick or two along with Giddey or a similarly valued player. Are you privy to info suggesting this kind of deal wasn't feasible? It just seemed to me that AK had leverage he didn't use in that deal, and OKC has more picks than they can realistically use so it shouldn't have been a hard ask.

You somehow messed up the quote and gave me Doug's line lol

But i can answer that. Presti is no fool! We were getting a 21 year old, recent #6 overall pick who had shown atleast flashes of success to the tune of a dozen career triple doubles in exchange for a 30 year old defensive specialist. Thats as good of a return as it gets. Previously, Golden State refused to give us Kuminga, who was drafted right after Giddey in the same draft, and had shown even less flashes of success (he had less career double-doubles, than Giddey had triple doubles!). I was honestly surprised that AKME didn't have to sweeten the pot in that trade.

Taking a look at Giddey beats a late 1st, which is all that was on the table in alternative offers.

[dougthonus]

But is there a reason you frame it so that the Bulls either trade for Giddey OR a pick, but not both? Maybe they don't get a 1st rounder in this draft, but it seems like they could have picked at least one 1st from OKC's stash, or multiple 2nds, or something. It seemed like OKC and perhaps other teams valued Caruso highly enough to include some draft capital. Not Bridges/Bane type hauls, but a pick or two along with Giddey or a similarly valued player. Are you privy to info suggesting this kind of deal wasn't feasible? It just seemed to me that AK had leverage he didn't use in that deal, and OKC has more picks than they can realistically use so it shouldn't have been a hard ask.

I've never heard a meaningful argument that the Bulls had leverage.

What do you think is traditionally valued more:
An elite defensive bench player that's 30 and often injured
A 22 year old that put up star level stats a year ago with some significant weaknesses

The Bulls shopped Caruso everywhere, they chose this offer. The reported other offers were Knicks (two late 1sts) and Kings pick #13 or Josh Giddey. Of those three packages, Giddey would match what the Bulls would want the most and IMO was likely the highest value. I don't see why anyone thinks the Bulls had a bunch of leverage.

The Thunder could have gone after any player in the league with all their assets for a trade, the Bulls didn't really have any other options to get a young player with upside.

The argument for why they had leverage is "the Thunder had a lot of picks", that isn't a reason that the Bulls have leverage.

Could we have maybe played hard ball and gotten a second rounder or two? Maybe. Maybe not. But I think that's a really minor complaint relative to the amount of talk of we should have gotten more picks for Caruso. We passed on trading Drummond for three second rounders and that gets way less attention than not getting a pick for Caruso, which implies to me people think we should have gotten Giddey + 1sts.

When you look at the other offers on the table, I see no reason to think that the Thunder had any reason to offer that, they knew they had the winning hand with the only player the Bulls could get that had this kind of upside and also knew the Bulls wanted players.

Any leverage the Bulls would have had would have been due to simply out bluffing OKC. That isn't leverage. Maybe an elite negotiator could have faked it, but it isn't leverage.

[lostonbase]

What a disappointment, why do I cheer for a team whose owner sucks and shows time and time again that winning isn't as important as making money. Maybe this is the year I break free from Jerry and AKME? sadly, I need help to break this bad habit.

[Guru]

If you hire good people you don't fire them because of one mistake. They are still good people and now they have the knowledge gained from the mistake.