Josh Giddey - Conundrum Killer

[FriedRise]

It's a long season so there's plenty of time for him to turn it around, but let's say worse comes to worst, the way I look at it: if we end up having to let Giddey walk, it's really not that big of a deal. The initial asset we traded for him was Caruso, who probably was gonna walk anyway. Just don't make the situation worse by overpaying and holding on to a player you have no intention of playing and developing.

And if things really do get worse (i.e. team continues to lose), we're likely talking about keeping our pick which I'm obviously fine with.

He's a restricted FA; I hope they make him test the market and sign an offer sheet for us to match rather than extending/overpaying outright. But again, plenty of games to play and situations to monitor how he responds to adversity, they probably won't know what they're gonna do until the March/April.

[Stratmaster]

The Josh Giddey situation leads me to the 2 questions no one asks enough.

Why does every player who comes to the Bulls play worse once they are a Bull (DDR being the one exception)?

Why does every player the Bulls trade seem to thrive one they are gone (and usually in a slightly different role)?

Here is some more Trident Billy.

[jnrjr79]

Just let him walk, that is all:

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This drives me nuts because what he did is the worst of your three options. The best thing is try to take the charge. The next best is to just concede the bucket. The worst is a very weak foul against a strong player that's certain to lead to a three-point opportunity.

[Stratmaster]

Just let him walk, that is all:

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This drives me nuts because what he did is the worst of your three options. The best thing is try to take the charge. The next best is to just concede the bucket. The worst is a very weak foul against a strong player that's certain to lead to a three-point opportunity.

I agree.

Honestly there are so many issues with Giddey's defense that not being willing to get run over by Giannis isn't a biggie for me. Not many guys would have taken that charge. If his defense was generally good everyone would just chuckle at it. I also am not a fan in general of players taking full speed charges.

But FFS then just get out of the way and give it to him. Happens multiple times in every NBA game. Don't swat at him.

[League Circles]

I've seen enough of Giddey. IMO, he's an NBA bench guy. We shouldn't even dream of signing him to a big long term deal. We should try to trade him for something decent. If that's not available, bench him for Ayo and let him walk this summer. Fun player to watch, obviously high level passing ability plus good ball handling and rebounding instincts, but he's not an NBA athlete, nobody respects his shot and he's big time fools gold.

[DuckIII]

Just let him walk, that is all:

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This drives me nuts because what he did is the worst of your three options. The best thing is try to take the charge. The next best is to just concede the bucket. The worst is a very weak foul against a strong player that's certain to lead to a three-point opportunity.

1. I continue to love Doris Burke every single time I get to hear her call a game.

2. Giddey regularly does this with blow bys. This was a little different because it’s a charge scenario. But when he gets beat off the dribble he often turns and gives a weak reach and commits a foul.

That said, I have seen some better effort at times since the Knicks game. But as I said in the OP, the effort is great but it’s never really going to translate much. He can improve to solidly bad at best.

[MrSparkle]

It's a long season so there's plenty of time for him to turn it around, but let's say worse comes to worst, the way I look at it: if we end up having to let Giddey walk, it's really not that big of a deal. The initial asset we traded for him was Caruso, who probably was gonna walk anyway. Just don't make the situation worse by overpaying and holding on to a player you have no intention of playing and developing.

And if things really do get worse (i.e. team continues to lose), we're likely talking about keeping our pick which I'm obviously fine with.

He's a restricted FA; I hope they make him test the market and sign an offer sheet for us to match rather than extending/overpaying outright. But again, plenty of games to play and situations to monitor how he responds to adversity, they probably won't know what they're gonna do until the March/April.

Well, thus far- AKME have not let any "talent" walk, even if it means executing a rather fruitless S&T (like Demar). Although I think the goal will be to sign him to $20M annually, which for his skillset, age and potential would be solid. Biggest hang up is he is 6th man quality, whereas he thinks he's a starter.

Bulls have to pay Ayo and Coby next year too, so it'll be interesting to see if they pay starter money to all 3.

The MLE salary should be around $13M, so that sounds right for Ayo. Unless he somehow plays well above this and catches higher offers on the open market, I think he'll be a long-time Bull, cause this FO loves mid-level glue guys.

Coby at his current play would seek $30M, which is too much IMO. He's not in position to ask for the max unless he makes the ASG (like Maxey) - seems like a long shot, but also a worst-case scenario if he did (unless he did actually improve into a top-10 PG, which I don't see on the horizon). FWIW Maxey is having a rough start to that $200M deal. But I think they're too invested in Coby to entertain letting him walk. The big problem is that 2026, a lot of teams are ready to make their FA moves: Brooklyn, Utah, Detroit.. Spurs (way under the cap, Castle and Coby would be a good pairing, and Wemby will still be on his last year of rookie scale, so that'll be their time to buy FAs).

With Giddey, Bulls have a few things in their favor: he's underperforming so terribly that nobody in their right mind would pay top dollar for his services, and 2025 capspace landscape is thin: it's just Brooklyn. Problem is, I don't know if he'll want to stay in Chicago. Might want to just take a cheap deal for a better team, where he fits and gets to play his way.

So if you have ~ $70M locked on these 3 guys, throw in Pat... What is this core, exactly? $90M locked into a team that can't make the playoffs? Your 2 best scorers (Vuc/Zach, $70M) are likely gone at that point. The core doesn't make sense to me.

[GoBlue72391]

Just let him walk, that is all:

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This drives me nuts because what he did is the worst of your three options. The best thing is try to take the charge. The next best is to just concede the bucket. The worst is a very weak foul against a strong player that's certain to lead to a three-point opportunity.

That is exactly how I play help defense in pickup games at the Y.

[GoBlue72391]

The Josh Giddey situation leads me to the 2 questions no one asks enough.

Why does every player who comes to the Bulls play worse once they are a Bull (DDR being the one exception)?

Why does every player the Bulls trade seem to thrive one they are gone (and usually in a slightly different role)?

Here is some more Trident Billy.

The answer is we're pretty much incompetent from top to bottom. FO, coaching, scouting, player development, injury prevention/recovery, etc. This issue pre-dates Billy.

[Stratmaster]

The Josh Giddey situation leads me to the 2 questions no one asks enough.

Why does every player who comes to the Bulls play worse once they are a Bull (DDR being the one exception)?

Why does every player the Bulls trade seem to thrive one they are gone (and usually in a slightly different role)?

Here is some more Trident Billy.

The answer is we're pretty much incompetent from top to bottom. FO, coaching, scouting, player development, injury prevention/recovery, etc. This issue pre-dates Billy.

Fair enough. But it's not 2019. Billy has been here 4 years. He owns the coaching and development part.

[DASMACKDOWN]

Josh is just low hanging fruit. Because its not like the moment we sits, we become some defense juggernaut. Which basically says our problems are systemic.

We talk like we are playing with 4 Carusos out there and GIddey.

Its actually closer to 4 Giddeys.

[NecessaryEvil]

It's a long season so there's plenty of time for him to turn it around, but let's say worse comes to worst, the way I look at it: if we end up having to let Giddey walk, it's really not that big of a deal. The initial asset we traded for him was Caruso, who probably was gonna walk anyway. Just don't make the situation worse by overpaying and holding on to a player you have no intention of playing and developing.

And if things really do get worse (i.e. team continues to lose), we're likely talking about keeping our pick which I'm obviously fine with.

He's a restricted FA; I hope they make him test the market and sign an offer sheet for us to match rather than extending/overpaying outright. But again, plenty of games to play and situations to monitor how he responds to adversity, they probably won't know what they're gonna do until the March/April.

Could of had two 1sts for Caruso

Another mistake by an inept front office

[DuckIII]

Josh is just low hanging fruit. Because its not like the moment we sits, we become some defense juggernaut. Which basically says our problems are systemic.

We talk like we are playing with 4 Carusos out there and GIddey.

Its actually closer to 4 Giddeys.

Agreed. Hence the premise of the thread. We have to evaluate him with a roster construction you absolutely do not want with Giddey at the point. That is the conundrum referenced in the title.

[dougthonus]

Could of had two 1sts for Caruso

Another mistake by an inept front office

The actual rumors around possible Caruso trades (and we sure canvased the market) were:

Knicks picks 24 and 25 in the past draft (this was the least confirmed rumor)
Kings pick 13 in the last draft (seemed more or less confirmed)
Giddey (which we took)

Of these 3 deals, while technically the Knicks deal is two firsts, its two firsts that project into fringe rotation / out of the league players. The Kings pick in this draft also projected into a rotation player.

[MrSparkle]

Could of had two 1sts for Caruso

Another mistake by an inept front office

The actual rumors around possible Caruso trades (and we sure canvased the market) were:

Knicks picks 24 and 25 in the past draft (this was the least confirmed rumor)
Kings pick 13 in the last draft (seemed more or less confirmed)
Giddey (which we took)

Of these 3 deals, while technically the Knicks deal is two firsts, its two firsts that project into fringe rotation / out of the league players. The Kings pick in this draft also projected into a rotation player.

Dalton Knecht at $4M sounds pretty good right now.

[Ballerkingn23]

Just remember we traded AC for him straight up no, draft picks or swaps or nothing. Just a straight swop. So this kid will be a bull for the foreseeable future. We just have to find a way to hide him on Def, which is doable but not doable with Him and Vuc arguable the wosrt Def Center in the league. At least imo he is, and to have Giddy and Vuc in the same line-up let alone team is just free cheese.

Short term though its ok because I'm pure tank for a high draft pick. Long term 1 of them will be gone so this issue might be a short 1 at best. Because any C in the nba is an upgrade Defensively over Vuc.

[dougthonus]

Could of had two 1sts for Caruso

Another mistake by an inept front office

The actual rumors around possible Caruso trades (and we sure canvased the market) were:

Knicks picks 24 and 25 in the past draft (this was the least confirmed rumor)
Kings pick 13 in the last draft (seemed more or less confirmed)
Giddey (which we took)

Of these 3 deals, while technically the Knicks deal is two firsts, its two firsts that project into fringe rotation / out of the league players. The Kings pick in this draft also projected into a rotation player.

Dalton Knecht at $4M sounds pretty good right now.

Wouldn't mind Knecht either (or Carter whom has been hurt), but I don't know that either (I believe both older than Giddey) are more than role players. They'll have lower salary numbers though. Flip side, you don't know who'd we have taken, and you'd also have a fair chance at getting a non contributor.

[HomoSapien]

I always felt like we lost the trade because we didn’t hold OKC to the fire and get them to let go of one of their 100 picks. I still feel that way. I don’t believe they would have walked away from the deal given how many picks they have.

For a minute, the deal looked pretty good because Giddey was playing well. Now there’s a chance we just lose the trade because AC is ultimately the better player. On the bright side, we might be able to sign Giddey to a pretty reasonable contract but at a center point you need to stop locking yourself into long-term deals with guys that almost no one else wants on their team.

[Indomitable]

A fundamental premise of this thread is that its hard to evaluate Giddey specifically because he's surrounded by a roster almost entirely comprised of poor defenders, denying us the ability to evaluate how me might play with a team that does not collectively suck on D.

The Thunder were a team of great shooters and defenders, theoretically, the exact guys that would complement Giddey, and they didn't view him as a starting guy.

That seems a bit harsh considering he started 80 games for them last year.

Why is it harsh?

Presti told him he was going to be a bench player going forward. Giddey wanted to be traded because he wanted to start

[dougthonus]

I always felt like we lost the trade because we didn’t hold OKC to the fire and get them to let go of one of their 100 picks. I still feel that way. I don’t believe they would have walked away from the deal given how many picks they have.

OKC has a 100 picks because they're great at negotiating and value picks. They don't have a 100 picks because they frivolously add picks to trades just because they have them when they already know they have the winning bid. The only reason people think they would give up a pick is "because they have picks" but that's not a reason. They also could have said, nah, we'll trade for Mikal Bridges whom is a better player or looked at the market. The offer they made for Caruso, they knew it was better than what the Bulls were going to do elsewhere with what our strategy was.

For a minute, the deal looked pretty good because Giddey was playing well. Now there’s a chance we just lose the trade because AC is ultimately the better player. On the bright side, we might be able to sign Giddey to a pretty reasonable contract but at a center point you need to stop locking yourself into long-term deals with guys that almost no one else wants on their team.

Have a good amount of time on the Giddey decision left, but the problem is (and always has been) that unless Giddey becomes a guy who is worth a max deal or we sign him to a good deal next year then he improves a lot in the future, it's just paying market value for a guy, and that guy also has a weird fit with tons of other players.

I liked the trade at the time as far as a swing for the fences move, and faced with a similar situation, I would probably do it over again vs the alternatives, but it's already pretty clear to me its likely not going to work. I don't think the alternatives had as good a chance at high upside though, and it's worth noting that the guys we might have considered instead of Giddey are actually older than Giddey and proven less. You'd have longer/cheaper cost control, but the upside with those guys seems very low probability.