Perspective on the Butler trade, was there a better rebuild option?

[Stratmaster]

IDK where some of this is coming from.

If the Bulls had started two seasons ago and got the 13th pick (LaVine), decided it was time to rebuild and were bad enough to get the number #7 the next season, and then the #5...it wouldn't have been the best return but you are never guaranteed more than the #4 anyway, right? Essentially, that is what the Bulls picked up in the trade. A #13, a #7 and a #5.

Most on the board have already dismissed the #5 as a bust, slapped the "role player label" on the #7, and talk about the #13 like he is a net negative player. The Bulls picked up all 3 with their very first tanking decision,and likely will add 2 more #5 or better picks in the next 2 seasons (certainly at least one).

For the purpose it was intended, I don't see how there could have been a better offer out there, especially when you consider the cap space the Bulls are going to have for FA additions. When you consider that part of the FO job is making money, it kinda smacks a little like genius. They managed to not tank for 2 seasons (kept the facade of a playoff team with a star player) and still ended up with 3 young, high quality assets... and they kept their goal of maintaining flexibility going into the 2018 off-season.

[JeremyB0001]

Assumption: The goal of the rebuild is to create a team winning 50 or more games

Fact: 80% or more of all 50 win teams have top 15 players as a "foundational" piece.
Fact: Players who are not top 15 players but are top 100 average more than $15m per year in free agency
Fact: Better players win more games than worse players, even if they don't get you to 50
Fact: Some, but not many, top 15 players are acquired with capspace

Therefore, in order to meet the assumed goal of 50 wins, the best way to achieve this is to get as many high lottery picks as possible and go for high upside players. Getting role players, then paying them market value, makes it harder to acquire a top 15 player by draft OR free agency.

This just reinforces that these are generalizations, i.e., at most they're true more often than not. (It's not at all clear to me that these are actually facts. For instance, I'm skeptical that you put together rankings of the top 100 players and averaged out their salaries.) And that's the point, that the Bulls shouldn't do a rebuild based on what's true 55% of the time. That's paint by numbers. The Bulls should make decisions based on the actual circumstances confronting them. If it's their opinion that the high-risk-high-reward options are long shots and that a lower upside player actual has high upside or will become a valuable trade chip or will be an important piece in the rebuild, they should go for that.

[JeremyB0001]

This is just too dogmatic for me, this notion that a team must start a rebuild by drafting a high-risk-high-reward player. If the Bulls thought the best prospect available in this draft was more of a high-end role player without huge upside, why not draft the best player available rather than making the mistake of drafting for this supposed need to immediately swing for the fences in the ope of landing a franchise player at the very beginning of the rebuild. The Bulls are likely, hopefully going to have two high draft picks the next two seasons where they can draft high-ceiling, foundational players without much risk. And why can't Lavine be the high-risk-high-reward player? His upside seems unquestionable: He's an elite athlete, he posted excellent scoring numbers at a very young age, and he's younger than the vaunted Jordan Bell and other players in this most recent draft. The risk is his ACL injury and contract situation. There you go: a high-risk-high-reward player with the potential to be a foundational piece.

Coldfish just covered this, but the idea is that role players will make the team too good to be drafting in a position more likely to yield a star, so you'd rather go for your stars first with drafting high several years in a row, and then acquire your role players.

What I don't understand is how everyone seems to have determined that Lauri is a role player-type and not someone with upside.

Agreed on both counts. Coldfish is right about the notion of big impact guys before role players, but IMO wrong on pegging Lauri as a role player, unless it's the role of scoring 25 ppg on nice efficiency.

It doesn't make sense to me. I've been following the NBA very closely for a long time and this is the first I've heard that one of the main tenets of rebuilding is that teams must swing for the fences with their initial draft picks because otherwise, god forbid, they might actual land some good non-star players. I can't really think of a team that's ever pursued the strategy. The Sixers, for instance, who tanked more aggressively and controversially than any team, horded all kinds of picks, including ones late in the draft, which led them to end up with good-not-great prospects like Covington, Saric, Holmes, McDaniels, Grant, etc. It seems so odd and counterproductive to me to draft players hoping that they'll bust so they don't win you too many games. And if they're not busts, they're not going to win you fewer games than players who look more like role players. And this is all based on the questionable assumption that we can do a good job of pegging players' upsides when they're drafted.

[League Circles]

Coldfish just covered this, but the idea is that role players will make the team too good to be drafting in a position more likely to yield a star, so you'd rather go for your stars first with drafting high several years in a row, and then acquire your role players.

What I don't understand is how everyone seems to have determined that Lauri is a role player-type and not someone with upside.

Agreed on both counts. Coldfish is right about the notion of big impact guys before role players, but IMO wrong on pegging Lauri as a role player, unless it's the role of scoring 25 ppg on nice efficiency.

It doesn't make sense to me. I've been following the NBA very closely for a long time and this is the first I've heard that one of the main tenets of rebuilding is that teams must swing for the fences with their initial draft picks because otherwise, god forbid, they might actual land some good non-star players. I can't really think of a team that's ever pursued the strategy. The Sixers, for instance, who tanked more aggressively and controversially than any team, horded all kinds of picks, including ones late in the draft, which led them to end up with good-not-great prospects like Covington, Saric, Holmes, McDaniels, Grant, etc. It seems so odd and counterproductive to me to draft players hoping that they'll bust so they don't win you too many games. And if they're not busts, they're not going to win you fewer games than players who look more like role players. And this is all based on the questionable assumption that we can do a good job of pegging players' upsides when they're drafted.

Many of us have written at length on this forum about how it's important to find your core, high impact guys first. One of the reasons for this is that you don't know which types of role players you'll later need to complement your core. Another is the reasons mentioned about bumping up team success. Another is positional flexibility in the sense that you want maximum flexibility to fit 2 or 3 high impact guys on the court together, so having a good role player "occupying" one of the 5 positions can hinder that.

Another enormous reason is that role players are pretty routinely available, when needed, for cap exceptions.

But, in general, bad teams pick high and go for stars. Rarely in the modern era do you see a team picking in the top 10 intentionally pick a lower ceiling player because they fit a role and/or are more ready, more low risk.

I think the Bulls went for a star in picking Lauri, as they should have.

[jnrjr79]

Coldfish just covered this, but the idea is that role players will make the team too good to be drafting in a position more likely to yield a star, so you'd rather go for your stars first with drafting high several years in a row, and then acquire your role players.

What I don't understand is how everyone seems to have determined that Lauri is a role player-type and not someone with upside.

Agreed on both counts. Coldfish is right about the notion of big impact guys before role players, but IMO wrong on pegging Lauri as a role player, unless it's the role of scoring 25 ppg on nice efficiency.

It doesn't make sense to me. I've been following the NBA very closely for a long time and this is the first I've heard that one of the main tenets of rebuilding is that teams must swing for the fences with their initial draft picks because otherwise, god forbid, they might actual land some good non-star players. I can't really think of a team that's ever pursued the strategy. The Sixers, for instance, who tanked more aggressively and controversially than any team, horded all kinds of picks, including ones late in the draft, which led them to end up with good-not-great prospects like Covington, Saric, Holmes, McDaniels, Grant, etc. It seems so odd and counterproductive to me to draft players hoping that they'll bust so they don't win you too many games. And if they're not busts, they're not going to win you fewer games than players who look more like role players. And this is all based on the questionable assumption that we can do a good job of pegging players' upsides when they're drafted.

Nobody is arguing this. The argument is you shouldn't focus picks on solid, low upside players, before you've first drafted some players with star potential. Nobody wants the star potential players to bust out. They want them to become stars.

[JeremyB0001]

Agreed on both counts. Coldfish is right about the notion of big impact guys before role players, but IMO wrong on pegging Lauri as a role player, unless it's the role of scoring 25 ppg on nice efficiency.

It doesn't make sense to me. I've been following the NBA very closely for a long time and this is the first I've heard that one of the main tenets of rebuilding is that teams must swing for the fences with their initial draft picks because otherwise, god forbid, they might actual land some good non-star players. I can't really think of a team that's ever pursued the strategy. The Sixers, for instance, who tanked more aggressively and controversially than any team, horded all kinds of picks, including ones late in the draft, which led them to end up with good-not-great prospects like Covington, Saric, Holmes, McDaniels, Grant, etc. It seems so odd and counterproductive to me to draft players hoping that they'll bust so they don't win you too many games. And if they're not busts, they're not going to win you fewer games than players who look more like role players. And this is all based on the questionable assumption that we can do a good job of pegging players' upsides when they're drafted.

Nobody is arguing this. The argument is you shouldn't focus picks on solid, low upside players, before you've first drafted some players with star potential. Nobody wants the star potential players to bust out. They want them to become stars.

Sure people are arguing that. Something like three people have said, "Role players are bad because they will win you more games." The obvious implication there is that the high upside players are better because if they don't turn into stars, they will be worse than the role players. The hope is, "If we don't nail this pick, at least his player won't be good enough to help us win."

[League Circles]

It doesn't make sense to me. I've been following the NBA very closely for a long time and this is the first I've heard that one of the main tenets of rebuilding is that teams must swing for the fences with their initial draft picks because otherwise, god forbid, they might actual land some good non-star players. I can't really think of a team that's ever pursued the strategy. The Sixers, for instance, who tanked more aggressively and controversially than any team, horded all kinds of picks, including ones late in the draft, which led them to end up with good-not-great prospects like Covington, Saric, Holmes, McDaniels, Grant, etc. It seems so odd and counterproductive to me to draft players hoping that they'll bust so they don't win you too many games. And if they're not busts, they're not going to win you fewer games than players who look more like role players. And this is all based on the questionable assumption that we can do a good job of pegging players' upsides when they're drafted.

Nobody is arguing this. The argument is you shouldn't focus picks on solid, low upside players, before you've first drafted some players with star potential. Nobody wants the star potential players to bust out. They want them to become stars.

Sure people are arguing that. Something like three people have said, "Role players are bad because they will win you more games." The obvious implication there is that the high upside players are better because if they don't turn into stars, they will be worse than the role players. The hope is, "If we don't nail this pick, at least his player won't be good enough to help us win."

I actually think there's a lot of truth to that implication.

Nonetheless, I disagree with coldfish if he thinks the Bulls deliberately drafted a role player in LM. I think they saw a potential star and that's what I see also.

[JeremyB0001]

Many of us have written at length on this forum about how it's important to find your core, high impact guys first.

Yes, I can see that - it's where some of my skepticism is coming from, that everyone is talking like this is Rebuilding 101, yet I've only ever seen this concept on this message board, as opposed to seeing it implemented by NBA teams or discussed by NBA writers.

One of the reasons for this is that you don't know which types of role players you'll later need to complement your core.

There are certain types of players - 3-n-D wings, stretch fours - that are needed on my every team. And yet again, everyone seems to be forgetting that the Bulls aren't stuck with the players they draft for life. If they take the best player available and he doesn't fit, that's an asset that can be moved for a piece that fits better. Heck, the Bulls might even be able to pair a few players like that and move them for a star or a prospect with high star potential. Isn't that similar to what the Wolves just did with acquiring Butler? Isn't everyone complaining that the Bulls don't have any quality young players on rookie contracts to use as trade bait when a player like Irving goes on the market?

Another is the reasons mentioned about bumping up team success.

You reading this, jnrjr79? Another suggestion that it's better to draft high upside players because you might win less.

Another is positional flexibility in the sense that you want maximum flexibility to fit 2 or 3 high impact guys on the court together, so having a good role player "occupying" one of the 5 positions can hinder that.

NBA rotations include eight to 10 players so there are more than five spots. And again, trades are an option.

Another enormous reason is that role players are pretty routinely available, when needed, for cap exceptions.

Not the good ones. Houston paid $20 million a year for Ryan Anderson last season.

But, in general, bad teams pick high and go for stars. Rarely in the modern era do you see a team picking in the top 10 intentionally pick a lower ceiling player because they fit a role and/or are more ready, more low risk.

Not really because if they were all players with star potential then we wouldn't be having this debate. Markkanen by virtue of being a consensus top-10 pick would be a player with star potential and people like coldfish wouldn't be able to argue otherwise.

[coldfish]

I actually kind of like Markannen. His shot is beautiful. I just don't think that a team just starting a rebuild needs that piece. You need foundational players and have to take risks to get them.

LaVine has already torn an ACL at 21. Markkanen is not a high ceiling prospect.

This is just too dogmatic for me, this notion that a team must start a rebuild by drafting a high-risk-high-reward player. If the Bulls thought the best prospect available in this draft was more of a high-end role player without huge upside, why not draft the best player available rather than making the mistake of drafting for this supposed need to immediately swing for the fences in the ope of landing a franchise player at the very beginning of the rebuild. The Bulls are likely, hopefully going to have two high draft picks the next two seasons where they can draft high-ceiling, foundational players without much risk. And why can't Lavine be the high-risk-high-reward player? His upside seems unquestionable: He's an elite athlete, he posted excellent scoring numbers at a very young age, and he's younger than the vaunted Jordan Bell and other players in this most recent draft. The risk is his ACL injury and contract situation. There you go: a high-risk-high-reward player with the potential to be a foundational piece.

Coldfish just covered this, but the idea is that role players will make the team too good to be drafting in a position more likely to yield a star, so you'd rather go for your stars first with drafting high several years in a row, and then acquire your role players.

What I don't understand is how everyone seems to have determined that Lauri is a role player-type and not someone with upside.

As I said earlier, I actually like what I have seen from Lauri. I don't intend to beat the hell out of him as a future bust or something. If he turns into a top 15 player, I'll happily eat crow. I just don't see the athleticism, ball handling, passing or defense to create a top 15 player. Pretty one dimensional, which makes him a role player.

[League Circles]

Many of us have written at length on this forum about how it's important to find your core, high impact guys first.

Yes, I can see that - it's where some of my skepticism is coming from, that everyone is talking like this is Rebuilding 101, yet I've only ever seen this concept on this message board, as opposed to seeing it implemented by NBA teams or discussed by NBA writers.

That's because it goes without saying. All bad teams need great players. IMO, where coldfish is wrong is that the Bulls think Lauri can be a great player. I'd be surprised if there's been a top 10 pick in the last 15 years that the drafting team didn't think could be a great player.

There are certain types of players - 3-n-D wings, stretch fours - that are needed on my every team. And yet again, everyone seems to be forgetting that the Bulls aren't stuck with the players they draft for life. If they take the best player available and he doesn't fit, that's an asset that can be moved for a piece that fits better. Heck, the Bulls might even be able to pair a few players like that and move them for a star or a prospect with high star potential. Isn't that similar to what the Wolves just did with acquiring Butler? Isn't everyone complaining that the Bulls don't have any quality young players on rookie contracts to use as trade bait when a player like Irving goes on the market?

Those types of players aren't needed on every team.

And guys who are role players rarely have any trade value on bad teams. Their role just doesn't show up because there aren't any good lead players for them to complement.

This is a tricky discussion to have, though, as IMO "role player" is used very differently by many people.

I mean, what I define as a role player is a guy who has nearly no trade value. And there is rarely such a thing as a good role player on a rookie deal in the NBA. It just doesn't really exist. 95% of them are lead players in various stages of acceptance of how likely they are or aren't to actually make it that way.

Another is the reasons mentioned about bumping up team success.

You reading this, jnrjr79? Another suggestion that it's better to draft high upside players because you might win less.

Another is positional flexibility in the sense that you want maximum flexibility to fit 2 or 3 high impact guys on the court together, so having a good role player "occupying" one of the 5 positions can hinder that.

NBA rotations include eight to 10 players so there are more than five spots. And again, trades are an option.

Another enormous reason is that role players are pretty routinely available, when needed, for cap exceptions.

Not the good ones. Houston paid $20 million a year for Ryan Anderson last season.

I don't consider him a role player. He's just a bad featured player.

But, in general, bad teams pick high and go for stars. Rarely in the modern era do you see a team picking in the top 10 intentionally pick a lower ceiling player because they fit a role and/or are more ready, more low risk.

Not really because if they were all players with star potential then we wouldn't be having this debate. Markkanen by virtue of being a consensus top-10 pick would be a player with star potential and people like coldfish wouldn't be able to argue otherwise.

coldfish is simply wrong on this IMO.

[coldfish]

Assumption: The goal of the rebuild is to create a team winning 50 or more games

Fact: 80% or more of all 50 win teams have top 15 players as a "foundational" piece.
Fact: Players who are not top 15 players but are top 100 average more than $15m per year in free agency
Fact: Better players win more games than worse players, even if they don't get you to 50
Fact: Some, but not many, top 15 players are acquired with capspace

Therefore, in order to meet the assumed goal of 50 wins, the best way to achieve this is to get as many high lottery picks as possible and go for high upside players. Getting role players, then paying them market value, makes it harder to acquire a top 15 player by draft OR free agency.

This just reinforces that these are generalizations, i.e., at most they're true more often than not. (It's not at all clear to me that these are actually facts. For instance, I'm skeptical that you put together rankings of the top 100 players and averaged out their salaries.) And that's the point, that the Bulls shouldn't do a rebuild based on what's true 55% of the time. That's paint by numbers. The Bulls should make decisions based on the actual circumstances confronting them. If it's their opinion that the high-risk-high-reward options are long shots and that a lower upside player actual has high upside or will become a valuable trade chip or will be an important piece in the rebuild, they should go for that.

If I said that it was a fact that most people are right handed and as a result, someone would have to select several people in order to give themselves a good chance of having one left handed person, it would be a factual comment laying out the most prudent course of action.

If you want to make a case that the Bulls had some unique scenario where players like Dennis Smith had no shot of being a role player or better while Markannen was guaranteed to be a good role player, go ahead. That's what you are implying and you are wrong.

[League Circles]

To me, the notion of role player vs lead player really mostly boils down to how good a guy is off ball and defensively. Most rookies are pretty bad at both. LM seems like he's good off ball. That may help his potential to play as an effective role player if he can't cut it as a lead player, but doesn't decrease his chances of making it as a lead player.

Really, though, the term "role player" is very difficult to use in discussions. Nobody means the same thing when they use it.

A lot of people use it to refer to any non star.

A lot of people use it to refer to scrubs.

A lot of people use it to refer to a guy who plays a very specific and somewhat narrow role, and doesn't play in other situations (that's how I use it).

[jmajew]

I was on the keep Butler bandwagon, but I understood why we traded him this offseason. I believe GarPax came to the conclusion Butler was not worth the supermax and they felt that would hamstring us for the future. I get that argument and concede the point that Butler would be declining by that point and on an albatross of a contract. Do I wish the return from Butler was better...yes. But I am not as high on these guys as they are. Their evaluations obviously differed from mine. I hope I am wrong.

The ideal trade for Butler IMO would have revolved around getting Wilson Chandler & Gary Harris, but that was presumably never offered.

[JeremyB0001]

If I said that it was a fact that most people are right handed and as a result, someone would have to select several people in order to give themselves a good chance of having one left handed person, it would be a factual comment laying out the most prudent course of action.

Well, only 10% of people are left-handed. If you had a job where right-handed people would be no use to you, you should certainly do everything in your power to up than 10% chance, even if you're only upping it to 11%. But that breaks down as an analogy because it's not only the highest upside players that could have value to the Bulls. That's why it's complicated here and a rigid one-size-fits-all approach doesn't work.

If you want to make a case that the Bulls had some unique scenario where players like Dennis Smith had no shot of being a role player or better while Markannen was guaranteed to be a good role player, go ahead. That's what you are implying and you are wrong.

I'm not implying anything about the specifics of this situation. Smith may very well have been the better pick. I would have drafted him over Markkanen. I'm disagreeing with your assertion that because Smith had the higher upside, that meant it was a mistake to draft anyone else because teams early in a rebuild need to draft for upside 100% of the time. I think it would have been totally reasonable for the Bulls to view Smith as the higher upside player but to nonetheless view Markkanen is the better, more valuable pick for the rebuild for other reasons. You're seemingly taking the rigid view that it's always wrong at this stage of a rebuild it's always wrong to take the player with lower upside, regardless of the reasoning and I disagree.

[Ben]

If you want to make a case that the Bulls had some unique scenario where players like Dennis Smith had no shot of being a role player or better while Markannen was guaranteed to be a good role player, go ahead. That's what you are implying and you are wrong.

I'm not implying anything about the specifics of this situation. Smith may very well have been the better pick. I would have drafted him over Markkanen. I'm disagreeing with your assertion that because Smith had the higher upside, that meant it was a mistake to draft anyone else because teams early in a rebuild need to draft for upside 100% of the time. I think it would have been totally reasonable for the Bulls to view Smith as the higher upside player but to nonetheless view Markkanen is the better, more valuable pick for the rebuild for other reasons. You're seemingly taking the rigid view that it's always wrong at this stage of a rebuild it's always wrong to take the player with lower upside, regardless of the reasoning and I disagree.

Man, you sound like me defending the Bulls' selection of Tyrus Thomas in 2006 (while also stipulating that I had wanted Aldridge). Did I really come off this badly?

[Ferulci]

I think there are several questions :
- Was it the better offer (for them) on the table at the moment they did the trade ? Obviously it would take a new level of dumbness to willingly take a worse offer.
- Did they miss on a better offer before or could they have got a better return if they waited ? Sources tend to say yes but we will never know for sure. I think that's the line and the sand between FO apologists and other bulls fans.
- Had they had been a better FO, could they've got better leverage ? I think so. We're kind of known for getting robbed in the league (2014 draft trade, Doug/Gibson trade). Our FO isnt respected by players, by coaches or by journalists, why would GM's give us some respek ? People like to say "but DMC, but Paul George" while willingly forgetting the return obtained for Kevin Love or Chris Paul this very summer.
-Was there a better rebuild option ? YES ! Keep freaking Jordan Bell ! Dont do that idiotic Doug/Gibson trade or if you do, try to grab picks instead of sending them ! Try to move Robin for draft pick or a youngster you like ! Create as much space as possible to be a salary dump team !
I'm not even counting drafting DSJ or Malik Monk or Mitchell because jury is still out, even though I'm sure we will look like fools in 5 years (and you can quote me on that).
Do we truly believe that Daryl Morey wont have done a better job ?

Our FO only knows how to do half-measures.
- We hire a pace and space coach but dont give him the roster to play his style.
- We give the keys to Butler but don't create a team fitting his strengths
- We had the 2017 free agency plan, but we added long-term salary (like robin lopez) to cripple the cap space.
- We go on a rebuild but then trade 1st and 2nd round picks and get low-upside prospects (even though I like Dunn he averaged 4 points on 37% as a 23 years old rookie !).
Always the same people defending the front office and unfortunately always the same result.

[bad knees]

The better rebuild option was to not seek Dunn in trade, and thus to rather end up trading Butler for Lavine and 7 (and possibly a future pick), while keeping 16.

Then draft DSJ at 7, and trade 16 and a young player - say Grant - to Denver for the opportunity to draft Mitchell at 13. Plus keep 38 and draft Bell.

Drafting DSJ rather than Lauri would have been better because: (1) DSJ has more upside than Lauri; and (2) DSJ can get his own shot and create for others, something that every good team needs and both of which Lauri does not do. Going for Mitchell makes sense because of his obvious talent and the fact that next year's draft is deep in bigs.

When you are rebuilding, you do want to try to draft for stars because you need stars in order to get where you want to go and they are the hardest to get. So you try to maximize the number of home run swings that you are taking. You know that sometimes, even when swinging for a home run, you will whiff, and sometimes you will get a single (i.e., a role player). That is okay. The idea is to keep swinging. The roleplayers can always be added after the stars are identified, regardless of whether you add some roleplayers along the way by hitting for a few singles.

It's not so much that drafting roleplayers might get you wins - it won't, because we are talking about drafting young players who won't be good for several years anyway. The problem with roleplayers is when you sign them as FAs. A rebuilding team should do this only to the extent necessary to provide the structure that is necessary to determine what you have in your young players. Anything above and beyond that is counterproductive, because it does add marginally to wins, and they won't be here anyway when the rebuild is done. Similarly, assuming you have enough veteran roleplayers to allow organized NBA basketball to occur, the roleplayers and potential roleplayers on our current team serve no purpose other than helping us to take more swings at high upside players. We should have dumped Grant, Val, Payne at the least at draft time in order to get more swings at high upside players in this deep draft.

A rebuilding team also has an interest in developing assets at several different levels (potential stars, potential roleplayers, and draft picks of all stripes) because they can be used in various combinations to trade for a great player in the few occasions when one is available. See, e.g., what Houston did to get Harden. The Sixers have been doing the same thing to prepare for the next Harden opportunity.

[jnrjr79]

It doesn't make sense to me. I've been following the NBA very closely for a long time and this is the first I've heard that one of the main tenets of rebuilding is that teams must swing for the fences with their initial draft picks because otherwise, god forbid, they might actual land some good non-star players. I can't really think of a team that's ever pursued the strategy. The Sixers, for instance, who tanked more aggressively and controversially than any team, horded all kinds of picks, including ones late in the draft, which led them to end up with good-not-great prospects like Covington, Saric, Holmes, McDaniels, Grant, etc. It seems so odd and counterproductive to me to draft players hoping that they'll bust so they don't win you too many games. And if they're not busts, they're not going to win you fewer games than players who look more like role players. And this is all based on the questionable assumption that we can do a good job of pegging players' upsides when they're drafted.

Nobody is arguing this. The argument is you shouldn't focus picks on solid, low upside players, before you've first drafted some players with star potential. Nobody wants the star potential players to bust out. They want them to become stars.

Sure people are arguing that. Something like three people have said, "Role players are bad because they will win you more games." The obvious implication there is that the high upside players are better because if they don't turn into stars, they will be worse than the role players. The hope is, "If we don't nail this pick, at least his player won't be good enough to help us win."

No, nobody is arguing that they want the players with star potentials to become busts. They might be arguing that they hope the players are raw and take a year or two to develop (in the interim, allowing the team to be bad and accumulate high draft picks), but I have not seen anyone hoping that the Bulls would draft outright busts so that they can pick non-busts in the future. The fact that that a high upside guy might be more likely to bust out and therefore leave you at the top of the draft would be Plan B in this scenario. It is not what you're hoping for, but what could be acceptable if Plan A (the player becoming a star) does not occur.

Anyway, I'm not convinced the phenomenon that we're arguing about - whether high upside players have more bust potential, while role players are more easily identified and have a higher floor - is even true. The Bulls have drafted solid non-upside types that nevertheless have proven to have quite low floors as well (Denzel, Portis, etc.).

[Stratmaster]

To me, the notion of role player vs lead player really mostly boils down to how good a guy is off ball and defensively. Most rookies are pretty bad at both. LM seems like he's good off ball. That may help his potential to play as an effective role player if he can't cut it as a lead player, but doesn't decrease his chances of making it as a lead player.

Really, though, the term "role player" is very difficult to use in discussions. Nobody means the same thing when they use it.

A lot of people use it to refer to any non star.

A lot of people use it to refer to scrubs.

A lot of people use it to refer to a guy who plays a very specific and somewhat narrow role, and doesn't play in other situations (that's how I use it).

Agree with needing the definition of role player in this discussion.

Role player originally referred to someone who was a single skill specialist, almost always off the bench. Now I see it being used, as you mention, to refer to any non-star.

[League Circles]

To me, the notion of role player vs lead player really mostly boils down to how good a guy is off ball and defensively. Most rookies are pretty bad at both. LM seems like he's good off ball. That may help his potential to play as an effective role player if he can't cut it as a lead player, but doesn't decrease his chances of making it as a lead player.

Really, though, the term "role player" is very difficult to use in discussions. Nobody means the same thing when they use it.

A lot of people use it to refer to any non star.

A lot of people use it to refer to scrubs.

A lot of people use it to refer to a guy who plays a very specific and somewhat narrow role, and doesn't play in other situations (that's how I use it).

Agree with needing the definition of role player in this discussion.

Role player originally referred to someone who was a single skill specialist, almost always off the bench. Now I see it being used, as you mention, to refer to any non-star.

Yeah, it's bonkers. People like Luol Deng have been referred to as role players. Umm, like the role of doing everything on a basketball court for almost the entire game?

As you say, the original meaning of role player was a guy who came in to hit a single three (Craig Hodges), a guy who came in to foul the opposing players, a guy who came in to guard so and so for a few minutes, etc.