Josh Giddey Thread 2.0

[dougthonus]

You like Quickley better?

Quickley is the most obviously better of the group to me. He's a clear two way player that could fit onto any good team easily and play with any players because he can defend, shoot, score, and pass. He's maybe not elite at any of those things, but he doesn't take anything off the table so you could put two guys better than him on the team and take the ball out of his hands and he'd still be valuable to your team.

[dougthonus]

I don’t really agree with that. Offloading DeMar, Zach, and Caruso in a single year is a rebuild. It might be a bad one if you’re down on doing thing like trading for Giddey instead of picks (though notably the Zach trade did involve getting this year’s FRP back/future protections eliminated), but it can’t be viewed as anything other than a rebuild IMO. The fact that the Bulls took back some short-term mediocre player contracts is just a function of contract matching.

Maybe this is just semantics, but I don’t think getting rid of your three best players is a mere retool.

It is definitely semantics. If you view changing the core parts of your team for different core parts as a rebuild, then this is a rebuild. I agree we changed all the core pieces.

In the way I define this, the "build" part of "rebuild", means you are taking something that doesn't exist and you are constructing it over time and watching it grow. We aren't doing that. We swapped out a bunch of players, but I don't think our upside as a team is meaningfully different than it was prior to doing so, nor do I expect us to grow over time with these players.

There is no building going on. To use the house analogy, we sold our house and bought a new house. We didn't buy a lot and build a house of our own. I view the second of those things as a rebuild.

You don't have to use the terms the same way, and it doesn't really matter to me if we call this a rebuild or a retool. To be more explicit, we did not build via the draft, nor did we build with a collection of players that I feel have a lot of headroom to grow, because of that, I feel there is a very clear ceiling as to where this group will go that is not meaningfully different than before except that it isn't in imminent decline (which is an improvement).

[Jcool0]

You like Quickley better?

Quickley is the most obviously better of the group to me. He's a clear two way player that could fit onto any good team easily and play with any players because he can defend, shoot, score, and pass. He's maybe not elite at any of those things, but he doesn't take anything off the table so you could put two guys better than him on the team and take the ball out of his hands and he'd still be valuable to your team.

Where are we getting he is a good defender from? He is 20th in defensive rating on the Raptors

[dougthonus]

You like Quickley better?

Quickley is the most obviously better of the group to me. He's a clear two way player that could fit onto any good team easily and play with any players because he can defend, shoot, score, and pass. He's maybe not elite at any of those things, but he doesn't take anything off the table so you could put two guys better than him on the team and take the ball out of his hands and he'd still be valuable to your team.

Where are we getting he is a good defender from? He is 20th in defensive rating on the Raptors

Most defensive stats are useless, but defensive rating is especially useless. Mostly my thoughts are based on reputation than actually watching a ton of Raptors games. I saw him a lot more when he was on the Knicks, but some examples:

https://www.reddit.com/r/NYKnicks/comments/11k7mo4/immanuel_quickley_now_leads_the_league_in/

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/zh55qh/opponents_shoot_70_worse_than_their_average_when/

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/11n5wc3/jj_reddick_discusses_immanuel_quickleys_elite/

https://www.reddit.com/r/torontoraptors/comments/18wsbcy/examples_of_immanuel_quickleys_high_feel_as_an/

I'm not going to pretend I'm an elite judger of defense watching 1000 basketball games a season, but the consensus opinion of Quickley is certainly that he is a plus defender.

[Red Larrivee]

I think he's not part of that major luck and also makes the other avenues for that major luck less likely.

If Giddey is closer to the player he was post-ASB, I don't see how he isn't a part of the major player development luck we need. That player is capable of fitting next to a wider range of player archetypes to become a winning team.

I agree it isn't a Giddey problem per se. It's a problem that we have a FO that sought out Giddey as a solution to their problems vs taking a longer term view, and now we are here having the exact conversation everyone predicted we would have last off-season. Giddey compiled a lot of counting stats, but fits poorly next to a lot of players and is difficult to build around and will require a massive deal which we should be skeptical he is worth.

I had the same view last year and I would've preferred a draft pick instead of Giddey. It's not an ideal situation for evaluation, but here we are.

Giddey is a natural stat padder. The difference though is that the Bulls were winning games and he was producing in sync with a high volume scorer and ball handler in Coby White.

I have no issue with anyone who's skeptical of signing him long-term. I'm just pointing out that:

- The $30M number is in line with what players of his caliber are getting.
- The $20M number is closer to a "we don't want you" number, and begging him to sign the QO.
- The Bulls are bare of talent and can't afford to let a productive, but flawed 22-year-old walk out the door.

Treadmill? Sure, but you get what you sign up for. It's not impossible to get off that treadmill in a positive direction, but AK hasn't shown he's capable.

[dougthonus]

I think he's not part of that major luck and also makes the other avenues for that major luck less likely.

If Giddey is closer to the player he was post-ASB, I don't see how he isn't a part of the major player development luck we need. That player is capable of fitting next to a wider range of player archetypes to become a winning team.

I agree it isn't a Giddey problem per se. It's a problem that we have a FO that sought out Giddey as a solution to their problems vs taking a longer term view, and now we are here having the exact conversation everyone predicted we would have last off-season. Giddey compiled a lot of counting stats, but fits poorly next to a lot of players and is difficult to build around and will require a massive deal which we should be skeptical he is worth.

I had the same view last year and I would've preferred a draft pick instead of Giddey. It's not an ideal situation for evaluation, but here we are.

Giddey is a natural stat padder. The difference though is that the Bulls were winning games and he was producing in sync with a high volume scorer and ball handler in Coby White.

I have no issue with anyone who's skeptical of signing him long-term. I'm just pointing out that:

- The $30M number is in line with what players of his caliber are getting.
- The $20M number is closer to a "we don't want you" number, and begging him to sign the QO.
- The Bulls are bare of talent and can't afford to let a productive, but flawed 22-year-old walk out the door.

Treadmill? Sure, but you get what you sign up for. It's not impossible to get off that treadmill in a positive direction, but AK hasn't shown he's capable.

I'm not saying you are wrong, all the conversation has been had a lot of times. I don't believe in Giddey. I don't think what he did is sustainable, and he did it largely against lousy teams trying to lose. I also am completely aware and open to the possibility that he will get a lot better. I'd just bet against it.

I will also say that if in 5 years, Giddey is an all-NBA player and superstar, then this year would be what you would have been reasonable steps to take on the path towards it, so I think there is legitimate reason to feel hopeful for those who are. I don't think its nuts to take the opposite side of the argument that I am on or anything.

[jnrjr79]

I don’t really agree with that. Offloading DeMar, Zach, and Caruso in a single year is a rebuild. It might be a bad one if you’re down on doing thing like trading for Giddey instead of picks (though notably the Zach trade did involve getting this year’s FRP back/future protections eliminated), but it can’t be viewed as anything other than a rebuild IMO. The fact that the Bulls took back some short-term mediocre player contracts is just a function of contract matching.

Maybe this is just semantics, but I don’t think getting rid of your three best players is a mere retool.

It is definitely semantics. If you view changing the core parts of your team for different core parts as a rebuild, then this is a rebuild. I agree we changed all the core pieces.

In the way I define this, the "build" part of "rebuild", means you are taking something that doesn't exist and you are constructing it over time and watching it grow. We aren't doing that. We swapped out a bunch of players, but I don't think our upside as a team is meaningfully different than it was prior to doing so, nor do I expect us to grow over time with these players.

There is no building going on. To use the house analogy, we sold our house and bought a new house. We didn't buy a lot and build a house of our own. I view the second of those things as a rebuild.

You don't have to use the terms the same way, and it doesn't really matter to me if we call this a rebuild or a retool. To be more explicit, we did not build via the draft, nor did we build with a collection of players that I feel have a lot of headroom to grow, because of that, I feel there is a very clear ceiling as to where this group will go that is not meaningfully different than before except that it isn't in imminent decline (which is an improvement).

You're right it could be semantics, but I think I disagree with this to a certain extent.

The Bulls didn't switch "core pieces" for "core pieces." They swapped out their three best players and received only one prospect that might be a "core piece." The rest of the stuff was non-core pieces and draft capital.

The assertion is somewhat untrue when you say "we did not build via the draft." The Zach trade restored control of the Bulls' future draft picks. I think it's quite fair to say the rebuild did not focus enough on the draft, mainly by going after Giddey instead of picks in the Caruso deal, but to me that's just a different flavor of rebuild rather than not being a rebuild. And that rebuild is continuing to some extent by virtue of the Bulls having their picks and having aligned contracts to expire next season to give them the ability to make further moves.

I have zero faith this attempt is going to work, but I think that's a different question than whether AK is rebuilding the team or not.

In any event, whatever you call it, there's plenty to criticize - I certainly agree with that. There are ways I could see the Bulls putting something quite good together given where they are situated now, but I just have no faith in AK to execute it. I'll be happy if he surprises me, I guess.

[jnrjr79]

I think he's not part of that major luck and also makes the other avenues for that major luck less likely.

If Giddey is closer to the player he was post-ASB, I don't see how he isn't a part of the major player development luck we need. That player is capable of fitting next to a wider range of player archetypes to become a winning team.

I agree it isn't a Giddey problem per se. It's a problem that we have a FO that sought out Giddey as a solution to their problems vs taking a longer term view, and now we are here having the exact conversation everyone predicted we would have last off-season. Giddey compiled a lot of counting stats, but fits poorly next to a lot of players and is difficult to build around and will require a massive deal which we should be skeptical he is worth.

I had the same view last year and I would've preferred a draft pick instead of Giddey. It's not an ideal situation for evaluation, but here we are.

Giddey is a natural stat padder. The difference though is that the Bulls were winning games and he was producing in sync with a high volume scorer and ball handler in Coby White.

I have no issue with anyone who's skeptical of signing him long-term. I'm just pointing out that:

- The $30M number is in line with what players of his caliber are getting.
- The $20M number is closer to a "we don't want you" number, and begging him to sign the QO.
- The Bulls are bare of talent and can't afford to let a productive, but flawed 22-year-old walk out the door.

Treadmill? Sure, but you get what you sign up for. It's not impossible to get off that treadmill in a positive direction, but AK hasn't shown he's capable.

I'm not saying you are wrong, all the conversation has been had a lot of times. I don't believe in Giddey. I don't think what he did is sustainable, and he did it largely against lousy teams trying to lose. I also am completely aware and open to the possibility that he will get a lot better. I'd just bet against it.

I will also say that if in 5 years, Giddey is an all-NBA player and superstar, then this year would be what you would have been reasonable steps to take on the path towards it, so I think there is legitimate reason to feel hopeful for those who are. I don't think it's nuts to take the opposite side of the argument that I am on or anything.

One thing I would say here is that if Giddey is re-signed at $30M, the trade for Giddey does not require him to be a superstar for it to have been a success. $30M is not going to be one of your two highest players on a contending team.

But where the Bulls go to get those #1 and #2 guys - who knows. I definitely have hope that Matas can become one of them, but obviously it'll be a while before that plays out. The problem is the Bulls are likely to be stuck without draft picks high enough to find those guys, barring some real luck, so it would appear they will need the stars to align in the trade market, which is suspect at best.

This goes to my overall concern about the Bulls' approach. If you look at a team like the Pistons, they spent a bunch of draft capital to get good young players, *then* surrounded those pieces with some solid contributing vets. The Bulls seem to be amassing some good 2nd tier guys first, which will likely keep them too good to use the picks to find the 1st tier guys. It's a backward rebuild that would seem like it's only fixable via trade.

[Dan Z]

If Giddey is closer to the player he was post-ASB, I don't see how he isn't a part of the major player development luck we need. That player is capable of fitting next to a wider range of player archetypes to become a winning team.



I had the same view last year and I would've preferred a draft pick instead of Giddey. It's not an ideal situation for evaluation, but here we are.

Giddey is a natural stat padder. The difference though is that the Bulls were winning games and he was producing in sync with a high volume scorer and ball handler in Coby White.

I have no issue with anyone who's skeptical of signing him long-term. I'm just pointing out that:

- The $30M number is in line with what players of his caliber are getting.
- The $20M number is closer to a "we don't want you" number, and begging him to sign the QO.
- The Bulls are bare of talent and can't afford to let a productive, but flawed 22-year-old walk out the door.

Treadmill? Sure, but you get what you sign up for. It's not impossible to get off that treadmill in a positive direction, but AK hasn't shown he's capable.

I'm not saying you are wrong, all the conversation has been had a lot of times. I don't believe in Giddey. I don't think what he did is sustainable, and he did it largely against lousy teams trying to lose. I also am completely aware and open to the possibility that he will get a lot better. I'd just bet against it.

I will also say that if in 5 years, Giddey is an all-NBA player and superstar, then this year would be what you would have been reasonable steps to take on the path towards it, so I think there is legitimate reason to feel hopeful for those who are. I don't think it's nuts to take the opposite side of the argument that I am on or anything.

One thing I would say here is that if Giddey is re-signed at $30M, the trade for Giddey does not require him to be a superstar for it to have been a success. $30M is not going to be one of your two highest players on a contending team.

But where the Bulls go to get those #1 and #2 guys - who knows. I definitely have hope that Matas can become one of them, but obviously it'll be a while before that plays out. The problem is the Bulls are likely to be stuck without draft picks high enough to find those guys, barring some real luck, so it would appear they will need the stars to align in the trade market, which is suspect at best.

This goes to my overall concern about the Bulls' approach. If you look at a team like the Pistons, they spent a bunch of draft capital to get good young players, *then* surrounded those pieces with some solid contributing vets. The Bulls seem to be amassing some good 2nd tier guys first, which will likely keep them too good to use the picks to find the 1st tier guys. It's a backward rebuild that would seem like it's only fixable via trade.

That's why I wouldn't be surprised if the Bulls keep "running in circles".

They moved on from the big three (Zach/DDR/Vuc...I know Vuc is still here) to a team that's likely to have similar results.

Regarding the Zach trade...I'm glad they moved on, but question getting their pick back. I say that because it was protected 1-10 and had they tanked (even slightly) then they could've kept it.

The good thing is that they don't owe a pick in the future.

It'll be interesting to see how much Giddey gets paid on his next contract. I could see it either being okay (because nba contracts are crazy) or he ends up being a player we'll complain about here (over paid for what he does). Hopefully it's the former and not the later.

[Jcool0]

Quickley is the most obviously better of the group to me. He's a clear two way player that could fit onto any good team easily and play with any players because he can defend, shoot, score, and pass. He's maybe not elite at any of those things, but he doesn't take anything off the table so you could put two guys better than him on the team and take the ball out of his hands and he'd still be valuable to your team.

Where are we getting he is a good defender from? He is 20th in defensive rating on the Raptors

Most defensive stats are useless, but defensive rating is especially useless. Mostly my thoughts are based on reputation than actually watching a ton of Raptors games. I saw him a lot more when he was on the Knicks, but some examples:

https://www.reddit.com/r/NYKnicks/comments/11k7mo4/immanuel_quickley_now_leads_the_league_in/

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/zh55qh/opponents_shoot_70_worse_than_their_average_when/

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/11n5wc3/jj_reddick_discusses_immanuel_quickleys_elite/

https://www.reddit.com/r/torontoraptors/comments/18wsbcy/examples_of_immanuel_quickleys_high_feel_as_an/

I'm not going to pretend I'm an elite judger of defense watching 1000 basketball games a season, but the consensus opinion of Quickley is certainly that he is a plus defender.

Come on your response cant be reddit posts as evidence of something... There was a time Kobe was making All Defensive teams when he was mostly coasting on that end. Consensus is going to usually be much worse then any stat.

[dougthonus]

The Bulls didn't switch "core pieces" for "core pieces." They swapped out their three best players and received only one prospect that might be a "core piece." The rest of the stuff was non-core pieces and draft capital.

Our core, to the extent it exists is Pat, Coby, Giddey, and Matas.

Giddey (acquired via trade for a previous piece) and Matas (our own draft pick) are the new pieces. We don't really view Pat as part of the core because he was a failure last year, but he's the guy currently locked up for the longest tenure on the team, and was intended to be part of it. Of those guys, Matas is the only one whom doesn't have a reasonably predictable curve going forward to me. Perhaps one of the other three will surprise me though.

The assertion is somewhat untrue when you say "we did not build via the draft." The Zach trade restored control of the Bulls' future draft picks. I think it's quite fair to say the rebuild did not focus enough on the draft, mainly by going after Giddey instead of picks in the Caruso deal, but to me that's just a different flavor of rebuild rather than not being a rebuild. And that rebuild is continuing to some extent by virtue of the Bulls having their picks and having aligned contracts to expire next season to give them the ability to make further moves.

I don't view "using your own draft pick" as rebuilding through the draft, especially when you make moves so that your draft picks are not high in the draft. The default is that you use your own draft pick every year, so that simply doesn't count as rebuilding IMO.

In any event, whatever you call it, there's plenty to criticize - I certainly agree with that. There are ways I could see the Bulls putting something quite good together given where they are situated now, but I just have no faith in AK to execute it. I'll be happy if he surprises me, I guess.

You are never more than one player away in the NBA from massive change and given the current best player in the league was drafted in the middle of the second round, luck can come from very unexpected places on occasion. That said, we do not have a player on the roster that I'm confident could be in the top 3 best players on a title team, so that's pretty far away, so while I can see that if we play this perfectly, we can maybe get to be a solid 5-6 seed, possibly as high as 4 if the East just sucks, I struggle to see the path to any real contention without absurd levels of luck that could happen to any team regardless of how they are presently situated.

[dougthonus]

One thing I would say here is that if Giddey is re-signed at $30M, the trade for Giddey does not require him to be a superstar for it to have been a success. $30M is not going to be one of your two highest players on a contending team.

I agree. For the Giddey trade to be a success he needs to establish himself as a player that can fit in next to two guys better than him and make the team better when he is on the floor. That's a weird thing to say and a hard thing to prove without at least one guy better than him on the roster. At times it looks like he's on the path to do that when playing next to Coby too.

People massively overrated the return you could expect for Caruso. No one should think we were going to get a future franchise player for him.

This goes to my overall concern about the Bulls' approach. If you look at a team like the Pistons, they spent a bunch of draft capital to get good young players, *then* surrounded those pieces with some solid contributing vets. The Bulls seem to be amassing some good 2nd tier guys first, which will likely keep them too good to use the picks to find the 1st tier guys. It's a backward rebuild that would seem like it's only fixable via trade.

Relying on trades to do your major lifting is almost always a failure IMO. Trades generally are going to be even in terms of total value, and to the extent you can get #1/#2 options via trades, it typically demands that they want to play for you. Trades are way better at refining your roster or finding the missing niche piece when you don't need to gain massive value than they are at massively changing your value proposition. Ie, I can afford to give up a couple draft picks to bring in the 6th best player on the team, total value is pretty similar but time value is in my favor or trading a Forward for a Guard of similar abilities etc.

People often think they can trade a dime for a dollar, and that's generally really unlikely.

[Dan Z]

One thing I would say here is that if Giddey is re-signed at $30M, the trade for Giddey does not require him to be a superstar for it to have been a success. $30M is not going to be one of your two highest players on a contending team.

I agree. For the Giddey trade to be a success he needs to establish himself as a player that can fit in next to two guys better than him and make the team better when he is on the floor. That's a weird thing to say and a hard thing to prove without at least one guy better than him on the roster. At times it looks like he's on the path to do that when playing next to Coby too.

People massively overrated the return you could expect for Caruso. No one should think we were going to get a future franchise player for him.

This goes to my overall concern about the Bulls' approach. If you look at a team like the Pistons, they spent a bunch of draft capital to get good young players, *then* surrounded those pieces with some solid contributing vets. The Bulls seem to be amassing some good 2nd tier guys first, which will likely keep them too good to use the picks to find the 1st tier guys. It's a backward rebuild that would seem like it's only fixable via trade.

Relying on trades to do your major lifting is almost always a failure IMO. Trades generally are going to be even in terms of total value, and to the extent you can get #1/#2 options via trades, it typically demands that they want to play for you. Trades are way better at refining your roster or finding the missing niche piece when you don't need to gain massive value than they are at massively changing your value proposition. Ie, I can afford to give up a couple draft picks to bring in the 6th best player on the team, total value is pretty similar but time value is in my favor or trading a Forward for a Guard of similar abilities etc.

People often think they can trade a dime for a dollar, and that's generally really unlikely.

I think the Bulls could've got a decent pick for Caruso. Maybe OKCs 2024 pick? Plus 2nds? Or the 2024 pick and a heavily protected first?

The reason why I wanted AK to get picks is so they could build through the draft. Giddey is a decent player, but the Bulls now have to re-sign him. Giddey at $30+ million a year has different value.

If the Bulls got the 2024 pick for Caruso maybe they pick someone like Ware (as a Vuc replacement) and that gives them another young player to build with.

[dougthonus]

Come on your response cant be reddit posts as evidence of something... There was a time Kobe was making All Defensive teams when he was mostly coasting on that end. Consensus is going to usually be much worse then any stat.

Given your counter argument is absolutely nothing except defensive rating which holds absolutely 0 value in the statistical community, I think pointing out that he lead the NBA in the best defensive statistic that exists (RAPM) for a year, and had various NBA experts talking about his elite defense would be considerably more than you provided, and it is now on you to show why you think I'm wrong.

I'm not linking you to the views of random reddit posts, the reddit posts are articles which show his defensive impact or are sourced by NBA experts. If you think otherwise on Quickly, feel free. I've stated that my view is based on consensus discussion of him.

Kobe was also a great defender, and even if he coasted at times, in important games, moments, and the playoffs he could ramp up his defense. We're comparing Quickley to Giddey, and I didn't call Quickley an all-NBA elite defender or make an outrageous claim of any kind, I said he was a plus defender. You've provided nothing that contradicts that statement.

Fair enough that consensus opinion can drag, but Quickley isn't a 35 year old living off of reputation, and you didn't provide any meaningful statistical evidence otherwise because defensive rating doesn't capture individual defense.

[MrSparkle]

One thing I would say here is that if Giddey is re-signed at $30M, the trade for Giddey does not require him to be a superstar for it to have been a success. $30M is not going to be one of your two highest players on a contending team.

I agree. For the Giddey trade to be a success he needs to establish himself as a player that can fit in next to two guys better than him and make the team better when he is on the floor. That's a weird thing to say and a hard thing to prove without at least one guy better than him on the roster. At times it looks like he's on the path to do that when playing next to Coby too.

People massively overrated the return you could expect for Caruso. No one should think we were going to get a future franchise player for him.

This goes to my overall concern about the Bulls' approach. If you look at a team like the Pistons, they spent a bunch of draft capital to get good young players, *then* surrounded those pieces with some solid contributing vets. The Bulls seem to be amassing some good 2nd tier guys first, which will likely keep them too good to use the picks to find the 1st tier guys. It's a backward rebuild that would seem like it's only fixable via trade.

Relying on trades to do your major lifting is almost always a failure IMO. Trades generally are going to be even in terms of total value, and to the extent you can get #1/#2 options via trades, it typically demands that they want to play for you. Trades are way better at refining your roster or finding the missing niche piece when you don't need to gain massive value than they are at massively changing your value proposition. Ie, I can afford to give up a couple draft picks to bring in the 6th best player on the team, total value is pretty similar but time value is in my favor or trading a Forward for a Guard of similar abilities etc.

People often think they can trade a dime for a dollar, and that's generally really unlikely.

I know I’m devil-advocating your general point, but most of the best teams of the past few years were entirely due to lop-sided trades (OKC, Boston).. or more fairly made trades (Cleveland, NYK)… Indiana somewhere in-between (clearly won the Haliburton trade despite giving up a star).

But to the point, if you’re drafting Pats and Dalens, Ayos on the high end, it’s really quite impossible to build a good team. Heat would’ve accomplished nothing with the Jimmy S&T if they hadn’t drafted Bam, Herro, etc.

[dougthonus]

I know I’m devil-advocating your general point, but most of the best teams of the past few years were entirely due to lop-sided trades (OKC, Boston).. or more fairly made trades (Cleveland, NYK)… Indiana somewhere in-between (clearly won the Haliburton trade despite giving up a star).

Trades can turn out lopsided, but they don't start out lopsided. OKC gave up an all-NBA players to get a lot of prospects and picks and got enough that some of them panned out (along with their own picks). Boston did the same thing. The fact that those other franchises weren't able to get enough immediate return out of those players in short term moves didn't necessarily make them poor value trades. Same is true for Haliburton and Sabonis.

So you can absolutely win trades in the long run, but at the moment the trade is executed, you generally are giving up similar (but different types) of value. A lot about whether you win or lose the trade depends on how well you execute on your piece of the trade.

Ie, OKC gets a prospect in SGA whom becomes an all-NBA player and the Clippers aren't able to put together healthy seasons under George/Kawhi, so OKC wins. If Kawhi stays healthy and LAC wins a title then that trade may have been a win / win. If SGA topped out as a good player and George/Kawhi stayed healthy that trade may look like a loss for OKC.

The end outcomes always have variance and aren't predictable and are contingent on a lot of factors.

[MrSparkle]

I know I’m devil-advocating your general point, but most of the best teams of the past few years were entirely due to lop-sided trades (OKC, Boston).. or more fairly made trades (Cleveland, NYK)… Indiana somewhere in-between (clearly won the Haliburton trade despite giving up a star).

Trades can turn out lopsided, but they don't start out lopsided. OKC gave up an all-NBA players to get a lot of prospects and picks and got enough that some of them panned out (along with their own picks). Boston did the same thing. The fact that those other franchises weren't able to get enough immediate return out of those players in short term moves didn't necessarily make them poor value trades. Same is true for Haliburton and Sabonis.

So you can absolutely win trades in the long run, but at the moment the trade is executed, you generally are giving up similar (but different types) of value. A lot about whether you win or lose the trade depends on how well you execute on your piece of the trade.

Ie, OKC gets a prospect in SGA whom becomes an all-NBA player and the Clippers aren't able to put together healthy seasons under George/Kawhi, so OKC wins. If Kawhi stays healthy and LAC wins a title then that trade may have been a win / win. If SGA topped out as a good player and George/Kawhi stayed healthy that trade may look like a loss for OKC.

The end outcomes always have variance and aren't predictable and are contingent on a lot of factors.

Right. Well, at the time I did think the OKC and BOS mother-load returns were both insane for the aging/injured stars going out. I (and everybody) thought the Gobert return was insane as well, and generally think that trading 4+ (of your own) FRPs for anybody is a recipe for disaster unless you have some guaranteed dynasty (which seems to be a curse more often than not, as I did think Brooklyn or LAC were gonna atleast win 1), or you’re getting back Lebron/Jordan (I think we agree on this)… or you already have a duo of star power.

On that note, even Davis and Jrue were 2 trades in similar vein that I thought were risky, but they did help claim (single) chips for LAL and MIL.

Funnily enough, some of the best prime players traded in recent history were “steals” (Kawhi to Toronto, Luka to Lakers). Obviously Lakers have a lot of work…

Then of course, going back, Lakers got Pau for Kwame (and an unestablished late 2nd Marc - miraculous development for Memphis)… Pistons got Rasheed for Zebraca and Chucky (of course a whole other animal given Sheed’s rep)…

But I’m all about making the lop-side trade, or the beneficial/“fair” one. Presti, Ainge have proven to be good at it, and the results are there. As well as Pacers GM (Buchanan? Didn’t even know his game).

Maybe Giddey ends up being AK’s saving point; personally I thought there was another way to get Giddey without giving up our FRP or Caruso. Buy-low target, we sent our top-3 asset. I thought the Lonzo trade was clever, but it backfired in multiple ways (inc. the collusion fine). AKME seem to lose the margin on every trade.

[jnrjr79]

I'm not saying you are wrong, all the conversation has been had a lot of times. I don't believe in Giddey. I don't think what he did is sustainable, and he did it largely against lousy teams trying to lose. I also am completely aware and open to the possibility that he will get a lot better. I'd just bet against it.

I will also say that if in 5 years, Giddey is an all-NBA player and superstar, then this year would be what you would have been reasonable steps to take on the path towards it, so I think there is legitimate reason to feel hopeful for those who are. I don't think it's nuts to take the opposite side of the argument that I am on or anything.

One thing I would say here is that if Giddey is re-signed at $30M, the trade for Giddey does not require him to be a superstar for it to have been a success. $30M is not going to be one of your two highest players on a contending team.

But where the Bulls go to get those #1 and #2 guys - who knows. I definitely have hope that Matas can become one of them, but obviously it'll be a while before that plays out. The problem is the Bulls are likely to be stuck without draft picks high enough to find those guys, barring some real luck, so it would appear they will need the stars to align in the trade market, which is suspect at best.

This goes to my overall concern about the Bulls' approach. If you look at a team like the Pistons, they spent a bunch of draft capital to get good young players, *then* surrounded those pieces with some solid contributing vets. The Bulls seem to be amassing some good 2nd tier guys first, which will likely keep them too good to use the picks to find the 1st tier guys. It's a backward rebuild that would seem like it's only fixable via trade.

That's why I wouldn't be surprised if the Bulls keep "running in circles".

They moved on from the big three (Zach/DDR/Vuc...I know Vuc is still here) to a team that's likely to have similar results.

Regarding the Zach trade...I'm glad they moved on, but question getting their pick back. I say that because it was protected 1-10 and had they tanked (even slightly) then they could've kept it.

The good thing is that they don't owe a pick in the future.

It'll be interesting to see how much Giddey gets paid on his next contract. I could see it either being okay (because nba contracts are crazy) or he ends up being a player we'll complain about here (over paid for what he does). Hopefully it's the former and not the later.

I see a lot of posts like this where people say "but they could have kept it anyway if they tanked," but that seems dodgy to me for two reasons. First, at the time of the Zach trade, the Bulls were on the precipice of losing it. It was too late at that time to tank, but the prevailing wisdom when the trade was made was that Zach had been playing so well that the team was likely to play worse once he was gone, which led people to say "well, we didn't need to get the pick back, because by trading Zach, we're now doing to be top 10 and would have kept it anyway." That ended up being wrong, because the Bulls played better post-trade and ended up number 12, which means (absent lottery luck), they'd have been without a 1st this year. But the more important factor, which you note but just sort of in passing, is they got out of the prospect of losing draft picks in the upcoming years, since if the pick didn't convey this year, it was going to convey in the future, either in the form of a future 1st or as 2nds when the protections expired. This was bad both because losing the future draft capital would be bad, to varying degree depending on what conveyed, but also because it encumbered future assets for years, limiting what the Bulls could do in trade.

Getting full control over their future picks back, to me, is pretty signifiant.

[jnrjr79]

The Bulls didn't switch "core pieces" for "core pieces." They swapped out their three best players and received only one prospect that might be a "core piece." The rest of the stuff was non-core pieces and draft capital.

Our core, to the extent it exists is Pat, Coby, Giddey, and Matas.

Giddey (acquired via trade for a previous piece) and Matas (our own draft pick) are the new pieces. We don't really view Pat as part of the core because he was a failure last year, but he's the guy currently locked up for the longest tenure on the team, and was intended to be part of it. Of those guys, Matas is the only one whom doesn't have a reasonably predictable curve going forward to me. Perhaps one of the other three will surprise me though.

I do not fully agree with this. Pat is not part of the core. The fact that he is under contract is a result of an unfortunate mistake, but he has been relegated to the bench and I do not believe the Bulls view him as a core piece.

I think Giddey and Matas are part of the core (in part because I have no real belief the Bulls will play hardball with Giddey). I think the jury is out on Coby. I would be unsurprised if the Bulls view him that way and intend to keep him, but equally unsurprised if they view him as a guy they'd like to trade.

The assertion is somewhat untrue when you say "we did not build via the draft." The Zach trade restored control of the Bulls' future draft picks. I think it's quite fair to say the rebuild did not focus enough on the draft, mainly by going after Giddey instead of picks in the Caruso deal, but to me that's just a different flavor of rebuild rather than not being a rebuild. And that rebuild is continuing to some extent by virtue of the Bulls having their picks and having aligned contracts to expire next season to give them the ability to make further moves.

I don't view "using your own draft pick" as rebuilding through the draft, especially when you make moves so that your draft picks are not high in the draft. The default is that you use your own draft pick every year, so that simply doesn't count as rebuilding IMO.

I think in the context of the Bulls making a move with Zach this year to reacquire future draft capital they did not control, this is not fully accurate. But I take your point insofar as the Bulls have done nothing to accumulate a trove of picks from other teams, like many of us (including me) would have preferred. AK has talked repeatedly about how he wants to jump-start the rebuild, so the Bulls are in this odd (and probably doomed) situation where they are placing some importance on the draft via acquiring their own picks, but are also doing things like trading for Giddey to try to accelerate the rebuild. The Bulls may well stand pat, more or less, this summer, but it also wouldn't be shocking to see if they send out expiring salary and other stuff to get some other immediate contributor.

In any event, whatever you call it, there's plenty to criticize - I certainly agree with that. There are ways I could see the Bulls putting something quite good together given where they are situated now, but I just have no faith in AK to execute it. I'll be happy if he surprises me, I guess.

You are never more than one player away in the NBA from massive change and given the current best player in the league was drafted in the middle of the second round, luck can come from very unexpected places on occasion. That said, we do not have a player on the roster that I'm confident could be in the top 3 best players on a title team, so that's pretty far away, so while I can see that if we play this perfectly, we can maybe get to be a solid 5-6 seed, possibly as high as 4 if the East just sucks, I struggle to see the path to any real contention without absurd levels of luck that could happen to any team regardless of how they are presently situated.

Yeah, I agree with all of this. I hope I've been clear that my view is the Bulls are in fact rebuilding, but doing so in a way that jeopardizes the ceiling by virtue of a desire to "remain competitive."

Relatedly, nothing irks me more than when AK says he wants to "remain" competitive. Remain? Squeaking into the play-in and losing every year and describing it as competitive should be fairly offensive to the fan base.

[jnrjr79]

One thing I would say here is that if Giddey is re-signed at $30M, the trade for Giddey does not require him to be a superstar for it to have been a success. $30M is not going to be one of your two highest players on a contending team.

I agree. For the Giddey trade to be a success he needs to establish himself as a player that can fit in next to two guys better than him and make the team better when he is on the floor. That's a weird thing to say and a hard thing to prove without at least one guy better than him on the roster. At times it looks like he's on the path to do that when playing next to Coby too.

People massively overrated the return you could expect for Caruso. No one should think we were going to get a future franchise player for him.

This goes to my overall concern about the Bulls' approach. If you look at a team like the Pistons, they spent a bunch of draft capital to get good young players, *then* surrounded those pieces with some solid contributing vets. The Bulls seem to be amassing some good 2nd tier guys first, which will likely keep them too good to use the picks to find the 1st tier guys. It's a backward rebuild that would seem like it's only fixable via trade.

Relying on trades to do your major lifting is almost always a failure IMO. Trades generally are going to be even in terms of total value, and to the extent you can get #1/#2 options via trades, it typically demands that they want to play for you. Trades are way better at refining your roster or finding the missing niche piece when you don't need to gain massive value than they are at massively changing your value proposition. Ie, I can afford to give up a couple draft picks to bring in the 6th best player on the team, total value is pretty similar but time value is in my favor or trading a Forward for a Guard of similar abilities etc.

People often think they can trade a dime for a dollar, and that's generally really unlikely.

Yeah, I think this is spot-on. Sort of the reverse of this is I see a lot of (IMO foolish) posts saying the Bulls "have to" trade Pat this offseason. Sure, everyone wants to unload sucky contracts. I'd love to unload him as much as anyone else.

But in terms of trades being a difficult way to build a team, I'm not sure I fully agree, but I understand the point. A team like Houston this year could be well-suited to make a leap because of their trade capital. The "trade for one big piece to get you over the top" can work, like it did for Toronto with Kawhi. But it's probably harder to pull off than a draft-based approach, and has the potential to blow up in your face à la Philadelphia or Phoenix, because a lot of the stars who will get traded are going to be old and expensive.

To some extent, I think is why the Zion discussion has gotten so much traction - he's not old and his deal is non-guaranteed, so the risk is less in some sense, but obviously it has a very high probability of failure given his health and apparent maturity issues.

I also agree on Caruso. The Bulls may have been able to get more had they traded him earlier, but when they did, he was entering the last year of his deal and needed a relatively sizable new contract. He's perfect for OKC where they have a lot of younger inexpensive guys and can afford a luxury player like him who will have a huge impact in limited minutes (limited both per game and because he misses games with injuries), but there aren't a lot of teams that are going to be trading away big assets for a trade like that.