Zach Lavine: Offered 4/80 from Kings update p26 Bulls Matched

[Benedict Miller]

I'll try to keep an open mind. It always hurts losing talent for nothing.

We wouldn't have lost him for nothing. We would have kept $20 million in cap room. That's not nothing.

I hear you. Cap room for who though? Not everyone is lined up to come play for the Bulls.

[kulaz3000]

this "knee protection" **** is peak Chicago spin. Christ, serious vesting options/protections are not even a thing in the NBA. Worst case if he tears up his knee we don't have to pay him. Great. Still wasted investment. It's a meaningless spin. Polishing a turd. Lipstick on a pig.

Spin? Surely, this addition to the contract is something that the Kings put in place, and not the Bulls.

it literally doesn't matter. If Zach Lavine blows out his knee so badly that the language as allowed by the CBA voids the contract (or close enough) Chicago will have long ago come out poorly in this signing. Can't have one without the other.

Chicago is betting he isn't going to blow out his knee again. Duh. Personally I think it's at least 5-10% odds. Which is partly why I wouldn't have matched.

Wait what, you're saying it's spin, as though the Bulls put it in place to soften the blow for fans who they feel may not have agreed with the matching. I'm saying that the Kings put it in the contract, and if the Bulls match, they bring those conditions along as well. It's not spin, it just is what it is.

I'm not sure how it doesn't matter, there aren't too many contracts currently from my knowledge that protects franchises from player injuries, or even if teams had tried, not many players/agents have agreed. Point being, it's too unique of a contract, to simply disregard it at face value because you simply don't like the resigning of a player.

And has it been confirmed that the Bulls are matching? Why does it feel like we already have?

[TheSuzerain]

Lavine can easily break out in terms of scoring the ball. But people vastly overrate the value of that.

I see hardly any upside at all for his defense/playmaking. That looks to be wired in.

[RememberLu]

I don't think the contract hampers us much at all, I don't understand why so many are freaking out. Who was gonna come here that won't come here now?

It's about more than that. It's about the entirety of a flawed process ending in matching the Kings in stupidity.

The Kings and the Bulls both happen to be in a position where they can gamble on high ceiling young players. I don't understand what all the mad is about. We have 45m in cap room next season. Nobody who wants to come will be unable to come even with Zach here.

[TheGOATRises007]

I don't think the contract hampers us much at all, I don't understand why so many are freaking out. Who was gonna come here that won't come here now?

Well no one now.

Considering we only have space for 1 max fa. Can't get people that want to buddy up.

The point is that flexibility in the NBA is great. If the 2019 FA class is loaded, have the capacity to go after players. The worst that can happen is you miss out and reset. It's at least a plan, but in the meantime you internally develop your draft picks.

[Ben]

You can always trade him considering how young he is. There will always be a GM willing to take on the risk of a 25-26 year old Lavine. And if it pans out, then good thing we matched.

Ahem. You cannot always trade him if he underperforms his contract and if other teams know that you need the capspace to sign, oh, I dunno, two superstars who want to play together.

You can only trade him if he seems to be outperforming his contract. And if he seems to be doing that, there'll be no reason to trade him.

By your reasoning, it's always wise to match ANY young player's offer sheet because, hey, some GM will be willing to take the multi-year risk on him after you've screwed up. It's demonstrably untrue using historical data. And the flawed psychology of "sunk costs" still have not been addressed.

We probably aren't signing 2 max free agents next summer anyways. There aren't 2 guys that want to come here.

You do realize what a disappointingly inadequate response this is, right? You've been called out on the nonsense that you wrote-- nonsense with regard to historical evidence and economic rationality-- and you've focused on one point that you can contest. Maybe we aren't signing Butler and Kyrie. Are you saying that we couldn't do better, with trades and capspace, than a $20M/multiyear Lavine? And that other GMs will bail us out if we've made a mistake? Is that really, REALLY your position?

[TheGOATRises007]

Lavine can easily break out in terms of scoring the ball. But people vastly overrate the value of that.

I see hardly any upside at all for his defense/playmaking. That looks to be wired in.

Hey, he'll be Demar DeRozan if he pans out.

That's great..... or not.

[DanTown8587]

"We can't afford to pay Jimmy Butler, it will be too expensive" says the franchise that gave 110 million for Felicio + Lavine.

The FO simply doesn't operate like they know what they're doing.[/quote']

This is just inaccurate. I have no idea why we keep seeing it.
The Bulls were worried about paying Jimmy 200+ mil contract not the 19.5 he was making.

No, the issue the Bulls had was paying an all-nba second team player 200+ million so instead let's pay guys 100 million based on potential. I can buy an argument that you don't like Jimmy long-term but the idea to basically tie up his cap space for three of the five years with Lavine/Felicio at the same price is massively stupid.

[TheSuzerain]

I'll try to keep an open mind. It always hurts losing talent for nothing.

We wouldn't have lost him for nothing. We would have kept $20 million in cap room. That's not nothing.

I hear you. Cap room for who though?

Carmelo. Wilson Chandler. Cap room is an asset that can be leveraged for picks. You'd think that would pique our interest since we're supposedly building through the draft (hint: we're not).

[kulaz3000]

Lavine can easily break out in terms of scoring the ball. But people vastly overrate the value of that.

I see hardly any upside at all for his defense/playmaking. That looks to be wired in.

I'm not entirely sure how many different ways you can post the same thing in one thread.

[madvillian]

Gotta love the people that in the same sentence talk about how it's not set in stone that zach sucks -- that it's set in stone no FA would come here.

[RememberLu]

I don't think the contract hampers us much at all, I don't understand why so many are freaking out. Who was gonna come here that won't come here now?

Well no one now.

Considering we only have space for 1 max fa. Can't get people that want to buddy up.

The point is that flexibility in the NBA is great. If the 2019 FA class is loaded, have the capacity to go after players. The worst that can happen is you miss out and reset. It's at least a plan, but in the meantime you internally develop your draft picks.

We might not need two max FA's. we might only need one if Lauri, Lavine, WCJ, Hutchison or some of these other guys grow into their ceilings. 45m in cap is a lot of money to throw around. And we've seen stars take less money to get into a good situation before, look at what Cousins just did.

[TheSuzerain]

I don't think the contract hampers us much at all, I don't understand why so many are freaking out. Who was gonna come here that won't come here now?

Well no one now.

Considering we only have space for 1 max fa. Can't get people that want to buddy up.

The point is that flexibility in the NBA is great. If the 2019 FA class is loaded, have the capacity to go after players. The worst that can happen is you miss out and reset. It's at least a plan, but in the meantime you internally develop your draft picks.

We might not need two max FA's. we might only need one if Lauri, Lavine, WCJ, Hutchison or some of these other guys grow into their ceilings. 45m in cap is a lot of money to throw around. And we've seen stars take less money to get into a good situation before, look at what Cousins just did.

*Bulls sign Portis to $12 million per year*

[chefo]

Just for some perspective--Lavine and Shrek next year will make as much as Jimmy and Niko, the best player and 2nd/3rd best player on WC playoffs teams. Niko and Jimmy have a 43 combined PER and are plus defenders, with an average TS of 59%. Zach and Felicio have a combined PER of 27 and both suck on D.

They will make a combined $110M or thereabouts, but paying Jimmy $120-$150M, a top 10 player in the NBA was too much.

If you add Asik to the bill, the glorious trio will make what? Near $40M this year and $120M overall?

I mean, who signs the performance reviews on these guys?

[thxfrthmmrs]

The point many people are missing here is this isn't just about Lavine, matching this deal takes Bulls out of 2 max deals next season. (while they have failed in the past, next year may be their best chance yet to sign a star). Unfortunately with how the NBA operates, getting 2 max level player is the only we become a true contender again, unless Lauri becomes a top 10 player (unlikely).

With this move, I fully expect us to extend Portis for >$12M per year, leaving us with room for just one max and at the end of the day we end up overpaying a second tier player with the remaining cap space next year.

God I hate this FO, and even more so Reinsdorf for giving out lifetime job security for incompetent employees.

[SensiBull]

'Improved' doesn't just mean increases in per game stats, which Zach has modestly done. There is also the addiing of facets to one's game, and on that front...

[kulaz3000]

We wouldn't have lost him for nothing. We would have kept $20 million in cap room. That's not nothing.

I hear you. Cap room for who though?

Carmelo. Wilson Chandler. Cap room is an asset that can be leveraged for picks. You'd think that would pique our interest since we're supposedly building through the draft (hint: we're not).

This is what I don't understand about your posts.There are two main points you continue to post about over and over and over again, simply presented with different wording.

One point is that we've steered away from building through the draft, and yet you continue to bash Zach as a player. Second, he is just a bad player who hasn't improved, if he is so bad as a player, doesn't he help the team continue to be bad? I'd say your two points you continue to hammer across comes across as extremely contradictory.

[TheGOATRises007]

I don't think the contract hampers us much at all, I don't understand why so many are freaking out. Who was gonna come here that won't come here now?

Well no one now.

Considering we only have space for 1 max fa. Can't get people that want to buddy up.

The point is that flexibility in the NBA is great. If the 2019 FA class is loaded, have the capacity to go after players. The worst that can happen is you miss out and reset. It's at least a plan, but in the meantime you internally develop your draft picks.

We might not need two max FA's. we might only need one if Lauri, Lavine, WCJ, Hutchison or some of these other guys grow into their ceilings. 45m in cap is a lot of money to throw around. And we've seen stars take less money to get into a good situation before, look at what Cousins just did.

Cousins was a 1 in a million situation because of his Achilles.

But this FO will probably botch that 45m in cap space too and waste it all somehow.

[Calinks]

LaVine haven't improved his game in his 4 season's in NBA. He haven't improved his game during the time players should learn quicly. Why would anyone think he could improve his game in the future when he finally got paid huge money. What you saw will be best you will ever get from him (shooting will go nearer the Minnesota level, but that's all). It is nice to see someone is positive about him, but there are lots of players who are just happy to get to the nba and are not willing to do any true work to improve them selves and sadly I think LaVine belongs to this category.

The heck are you talking about? That is bull crap. He has steadily improved from rookie to when he hurt his ACL. When we started him over Kevin Matin in year 2 I thought Flip was crazy but LAvine was up to the task. His jumpshot alone got so much better. He didn't go from scrub to Kobe Bryant but to sit there and say he hasn't improved... come on son.

Come on Calinks. You know the majority of the improvement from season 1 to season 2 was that he was able to play his natural position, instead of laughably being forced to play PG (Which I am convinced was a stealthy tank move by Flip).

That was a big part of his numbers but he also improved as a player. His defense has always been trash but his shooting has gotten better and his ability to get shots. No it has not been massive leaps and bounds but there has been improvement and I think its reckless to act like he is the exact same player he was as a rookie.

[TheSuzerain]

Just for some perspective--Lavine and Shrek next year will make as much as Jimmy and Niko, the best player and 2nd/3rd best player on WC playoffs teams. Niko and Jimmy have a 43 combined PER and are plus defenders, with an average TS of 59%. Zach and Felicio have a combined PER of 27 and both suck on D.

They will make a combined $110M or thereabouts, but paying Jimmy $120-$150M, a top 10 player in the NBA was too much.

If you add Asik to the bill, the glorious trio will make what? Near $40M this year and $120M overall?

I mean, who signs the performance reviews on these guys?

Probably some farmhand that Gar met in Sumner during his yearly pilgrimage to Ames.