Pickled Prunes wrote:Scalabrine wrote:Pickled Prunes wrote:IDK, they're pretty deep for the EC. I mean, how many teams in the East have even 5 trusted guys? I think the NYK might have 2.
But that's kind of my point. They had enough depth to be good and when they lost a couple of players they couldn't stay afloat. Trading 3 for 1 will set them back, even if I believe in Gobert more than most people seem to.
The Bulls 6th best player is who? Coby White? Patrick Williams?
Both guys have potential but I'd take Randle, RJ, Robinson, Rose, Fournier, Burks, Quickley, Toppin all over those guys. Noel too.
You can't compare the 6th guy to the first guy on any team. But how many CHI players would you take over Randle or Fournier with contracts as part of the equation?
But I'll give you this, maybe "depth" was the wrong term. CHI had 7-8 reliable players to start the season and when it got down to 5-6 they were toast. It was collective success, and as LAL saw this past season, guys 3-7 are often the most important. Trading away three reliable players for one brings them right back down to 5-6. That's a problem. On top of that Vuc/DeRozan fit better than Gobert/DeRozan even though Gobert is clearly the better player.
Best case scenario after that trade: CHI is a 5-seed... but I think it would be worse.
Only reason I compared them is because you brought it up. I agree with your point though. The Bulls two biggest issues are depth and lack of outside volume 3 point shooting. Trading depth and shooting for someone who can't shoot is just going to exasperate that problem.
To answer your question, Randle regress last year, but he still averaged 20/10/5. He's the 43rd highest paid player in the league, and that ranking will probably drop into the 50's after contracts are doled out this off-season. Add in the guys still on rookie contracts that are number 1 options... That means he's being paid like a 2nd or 3rd option, which I think he's good enough for, so his contract is fair. Fournier is in the same salary tier as most other elite shooters (Joe Harris, Duncan Robinson, Hardway Jr, both Bogdanovic's, Kevin Huerter), that's just the going rate for an elite shooter. Those are constantly talked about as bad contracts on here, but I don't really understand why...neither are bargain deals, but both are fair.