Chicago Bulls select Noa Essengue - #12 overall

[waffle]

and he's a really good athlete which is TERRIFIC

[MGB8]

Went looking for YouTube’s. This is first I saw. Wish it made me more confident, but I just see a raw athlete. If raw athlete was the goal, I liked Beringer better. (Not uber-elite athlete, either, and very skinny - but more worryingly no notable in-game skills shown besides some good cuts; a block here or steal there, etc., isn’t necessarily notable).

Watch on YouTube

[Jcool0]

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[Senor Chang]

Watch on YouTube

At least he's shown he can do this vs. an actual NBA team. And this is last year when he was still 17.

I agree that he looks like a guy who's 6'10" with 7 foot wing span who just picks up basketball. But for that kind of player he seems to know how to make himself useful. Maybe we finally get the Chris Boucher that was popular among this board members.

I agree. People were so impressed when a 17 year old Flagg played against team USA in a scrimmage and held his own. Noa doing it against the Blazers was just as impressive IMHO.


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[MGB8]

Found a much better video - more skills flashed on offense, on the defense portion can see mobility in space and better shot blocking instincts than on first video:

Watch on YouTube

[waffle]

you don't expect a finished product at 18. He seems to have high b-ball instincts which I love. His performance at the draft combine was really encouraging....
'
Moves well without the ball. Seems to have solid positional awareness.

Can he put on enough weight to compete, can he improve on his shooting enough to be a consistent threat. Other than those 2 I'm already very encouraged

[Ben Wilson25]

An article in the Tribune this morning said the Bulls haven’t ruled out stashing him in Europe next year. Did Eversley say that in his presser?

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/06/25/chicago-bulls-draft-noa-essengue/

[WindyCityBorn]

Any time your wingspan is only 1 inch more than your height, it's not great.

it's great when you are already very tall for your position

also his wingspan is 3" longer than his height...

My bad I thought his wingspan was 7'0" but it's 7'1"

Is 6'11" considered very tall for a PF?

Yes. The average size for a PF has shrunk as team have gone for position less basketball. I think size is making a comeback though with teams like OKC and Cleveland bringing very successful with two real bigs starting.

[WindyCityBorn]

An article in the Tribune this morning said the Bulls haven’t ruled out stashing him in Europe next year. Did Eversley say that in his presser?

There is ZERO chance of that happening and Eversley definitely didn’t say it. They said they might stash whoever gets draft in the second round..

Julia Poe need to fact check before writing garbage.

[DuckIII]

Do any of oyu even know what Peter Patton did (or didn't do) or do you just know his name and hate the Bulls so decide to bash them for moving on from Patton?

His impact on players shooting seems very anecdotal. Some players shot better one year than worse the next (Ayo). Some shot worse than better (Vuc). Others stayed largely the same.

If Patton is so great - how come no other team has hired him since he left the Bulls? Is everyone else also stupid?

We have a developmental coaching staff - you (and I) just don't know their names. It doesn't mean they're not good or capable of their jobs. It actually means nothing.

Can the Bulls develop Essengue into a good player? I think that has more to do with Essengue than it does the Bulls. And I think that's true for every team.

100%. There’s posts every year around draft time saying the Bulls can’t develop prospects. There’s zero evidence or knowledge upon which to base the notion that “the organization” is poor at “developing” players. The results are all over the spectrum under different coaches and staff and none of us know anything about the particulars of what is and is not done.

Moreover it cuts against the obvious truth that the vast majority of player development is based on the player himself. Commitment. Mentality. Skill base. It’s also not quantum physics to teach basketball.

Point being, this is easy for me. I don’t and have never considered it in evaluating the draft and never will.

Its always smelled to me like when a player doesn’t develop we blame the organization (based on nothing that we would need to know to rationally form that opinion) and when players develop well we say nothing.

[CobysHairpick]

Watched more of him last night and came away encouraged if not impressed. I wanted the highest ceiling at 12 and Essengue can certainly be that. For as poor as his 3pt% is, the form looks solid much like Matas. He has a quick release and shoots with confidence. I think the possibility of improvement there is real. He also has an intriguing turn around jumper when he posts up so if he can consistently make that shot he could be very dangerous.

While I haven't seen advanced dribble moves yet like crossovers, etc., he also has intriguing handles at his size which immediately evokes Matas/Giannis/Siakam/Franz/or my personal favorite, Pippen (insanely high bars I know). He can 100% go coast to coast if needed, but he's also a wiling passer which is a great sign. He even waved off his PG a few times so he can run the fast break. He also made a nice behind the back pass that I couldn't tell was intentional or not, but if it was then his processing may be even better than I thought. He has a great base to start with and improve from regarding his handles and willingness to pass.

Defensively is where I think the Pippen comps really shine (along with his very raw, but all around offensive game). He flies into passing lanes with his length and mobility and provides some rim protection as well. He moves very well at his size defensively and could be a switch nightmare for opponents.

Overall, Essengue has some serious two way potential. It's hard not to envision a Matas/Giannis/Pippen amalgamation if he pans out. Giddey, Coby, Matas, and Essengue fast breaks may feed families for generations. Don't be afraid to play him Billy!

[MrSparkle]

Highlights make him look like a decently promising pick.

Browsed a random full game; he seems fundamentally sound. Euro cliché or not, their teens are playing sophisticated/pro system ball compared to most NCAA teams. (Ace Bailey for example is gonna have a lot of work in that dept.)

Good reads on tapping rebounds, staying on his assignments and disrupting lanes, running the break, PnR, timing blocks and defending the post. Unselfish and quick to connect the pass if an opening isn’t there. I don’t think you have to waste time teaching this guy how to be a serviceable NBA player.

He does need to gain NBA strength, shooting and find a go-to move eventually (low-post skills are lacking - that’s of course a 4-7Y project… big difference from a rookie-ready Flagg, Chet, Paolo super prospect).

The jumpshot is unreliable/bad. He made a few crazy contested long-range buckets, so the ability/confidence might be there, but when he misses, it’s ugly.

His wingspan’s been getting knocked. It’s time to read into these measurements and their true impact. First off, if it’s 6’10 and change, that’s the same as Matas. Anyone calling him undersized is a goof ball.

Wingspan can be a great asset, but a number will always be grossly overrated on defense. Jimmy T-Rex Butler was one of the most dominant defensive players, at 6’8 WS. Drummond for his gigantic wingspan was always a sieve. Obi at 7’2 WS doesn’t do all that well defensively (he’s become serviceable off the bench). Like everything, you read the data but you can’t draw conclusions.

Noa’s length (like Matas’) seems to make an impact on both ends. Maybe the standing reach compensates. I feel decent about his immediate playability.

The handles can go either way. I don’t see Giannis “glue”-hands, but I do see a guy who can drive to the rim in traffic and finish eventually. For better or worse, he hands the ball off before getting himself in trouble. Maybe Luol Deng is the ballpark comp, here. He does seem more coordinated with the ball, than Luol (who I always considered one of the most awkward offensive players, despite somehow making a good living on that end).

IMO Matas projects as the much better offensive player.

[Truebiscuit]

Very pleased, but also very tired so will read and write a lot more tomorrow. Quick hitters:

1. He was my second favorite option going into draft night, but as KJ and Noa kept both being available by the time we got to the tenth pick, I told my son I was starting to prefer Noa. Then I went back to KJ right before we picked. Point being, I wanted him badly for quite awhile now after I had time to drill down into the video of the 10-12 guys I focused on as being in our range.

2. When we picked Matas I made a big deal out of the fact that, in a way, it was damning evidence of AK's incompetence as a GM that we had gone literally years and years as what must have been the only team in the NBA that had zero players with that general profile. Well AK did take Matas and now he took another one. That's progress.

3. It matters to me what this potentially represents as an organizational shift. He's the second youngest player in the draft. He's not ready to contribute to winning at a meaningful level next year, and he's a big uspside swing. It is, I hope, a strong sign that our FO is finally starting to understand what is and what is not important.

4. It also matters that it furthers a rational team identity rooted in the complimentary strengths of personnel who also have the same unifying characteristics to play a particular way. Its logical.

5. Its also fun.

Love the pick. Thumbs up. Now lets hope it works. And give it about 3 years before deciding if it did.

Great post! I think what a lot of fans -- myself included -- forget is that AKME had a plan and it WAS WORKING until Lonzo Ball got hurt. You can't predict those kinds of things, and unfortunately, he was the straw which stirred our drink. Once that fizzled it was on management to figure out what they wanted to do.

I like Josh Giddey quite a bit (only 22 years old, had a career 3P% with us) and am of the opinion Matas Buzelis can develop into a force in this league (by all accounts he has put on muscle this off-season and has been lighting people up in LA).

I don't know what the plan is with Coby White (I'd like to keep him but at what price?) but you don't have to squint hard to see what this organization is trying to do with the youth movement and drafting Noa Essengue.

Are we flat-out tanking? No, but we are amassing young talent with upside and entrusting Billy Donovan to develop them (I think this is a strength of his, especially when they are good kids who listen to coaching).

[Ferulci]

Bienvenue à mon compatriote !
I'm obviously biased but I really like the pick, or rather the process behind it.
- It's high-risk/high-reward. He could bust, for sure, but when you are as talent-deprived as we are, you take as many bites at the apple as possible. I would much rather have him then Kon Knueppel. No one will lose sleep if we missed a Dillon Brooks-level talent at 12th.
- His learning curve has been amazing. We're talking about a kid who started playing 6 years ago. His play in 2025 vs 2024 or 2023 is night and day.
- He's ambitious. French players are often hardworking, easy to coach, but they're often too content with being a role-player. (Diaw had all-nba talent but lacked drive, Batum, Ntilikina..). Our most ambitious prospects often end up becoming our best players (Tony Parker, Rudy Gobert, Evan Fournier, VW, Killian Hay...nevermind). I couldn't be happier to hear him talk about Kawhi, Siakam or Scottie Barnes. That' who he should aim to be.
- He'll be a great fit with Buzelis and Giddey.
Noa probably won't be a creator or massive contributor in offense for the next 2 years, but sky is the limit. I can see him become a Siakam-like, bourgeois-Aaron Gordon by the time he's 25.

[kodo]

Went looking for YouTube’s. This is first I saw. Wish it made me more confident, but I just see a raw athlete. If raw athlete was the goal, I liked Beringer better. (Not uber-elite athlete, either, and very skinny - but more worryingly no notable in-game skills shown besides some good cuts; a block here or steal there, etc., isn’t necessarily notable).

Testing-wise, Noa was in another league from Beringer athletically. But tests are different than in-game as we've all seen. But if the play here is to just get the most athletic 6' 11" raw guy you can find and develop him, Noa has more athletic potential. Beringer is more of your traditional Center type, long but slow. Noa tested faster than most guards and hyped athletes like VJ & Carter Bryant while being 6' 11".

I'll repost the athletic testing #s but also include Beringer. I'll also throw in Matas from last year.

Sprint:
Fears: 3.05
Bryant: 3.07
Buzelis: 3.09
Noa: 3.10
Harper: 3.16
VJ: 3.20
Flagg: 3.30
Kalkbrenner: 3.34
Yang: 3.38
Beringer: 3.45
Maluach: 3.50
Queen: 3.52

Agility:
Flagg: 10.64
Noa: 10.70
Buzelis: 10.73
Fears: 10.95
Harper: 11.07
Bryant: 11.25
VJ: 11.27
Beringer: 11.44
Yang: 11.79
Maluach: 12.05
Queen: 12.45

Buzelis himself was at the top of his class for agility while being 6' 10", beating out guards like Castle, Bronny, Reed. If a 6' 11" guy is matching Buzelis athletically, that's incredible. I don't know that Noa will be able to practically apply his athleticism to in-game, but I think everyone agrees this is a big gamble.

In many ways this is basically doing the Buzelis gamble again. Buzelis I think will definitely be a great pick, Noa may not but I can see the line of thinking given how great Buzelis turned out.

[League Circles]

This would be a crazy good defensive lineup for islaoted late game possessions IMO:

5: Smith
4: Matas
3: Essenge
2: Terry/Williams
1: Ball

[Truebiscuit]

Do any of oyu even know what Peter Patton did (or didn't do) or do you just know his name and hate the Bulls so decide to bash them for moving on from Patton?

His impact on players shooting seems very anecdotal. Some players shot better one year than worse the next (Ayo). Some shot worse than better (Vuc). Others stayed largely the same.

If Patton is so great - how come no other team has hired him since he left the Bulls? Is everyone else also stupid?

We have a developmental coaching staff - you (and I) just don't know their names. It doesn't mean they're not good or capable of their jobs. It actually means nothing.

Can the Bulls develop Essengue into a good player? I think that has more to do with Essengue than it does the Bulls. And I think that's true for every team.

100%. There’s posts every year around draft time saying the Bulls can’t develop prospects. There’s zero evidence or knowledge upon which to base the notion that “the organization” is poor at “developing” players. The results are all over the spectrum under different coaches and staff and none of us know anything about the particulars of what is and is not done.

Moreover it cuts against the obvious truth that the vast majority of player development is based on the player himself. Commitment. Mentality. Skill base. It’s also not quantum physics to teach basketball.

Point being, this is easy for me. I don’t and have never considered it in evaluating the draft and never will.

Its always smelled to me like when a player doesn’t develop we blame the organization (based on nothing that we would need to know to rationally form that opinion) and when players develop well we say nothing.

Do any of oyu even know what Peter Patton did (or didn't do) or do you just know his name and hate the Bulls so decide to bash them for moving on from Patton?

Listening to Eversley, my interpretation was they are continuing their developmental program centered around shooting. They just don't have Patton running the show.

I could be wrong... after all, how many different ways can you coach someone to shoot / improve technique?

[nomorezorro]

i saw a post saying noa's agility numbers are the best recorded for a guy his size. not 100% confident on the veracity of the best-ever claim, but it's obviously at the least unusually good for his height

[nomorezorro]

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also good

[drosestruts]

Are all these deep analytical positives for Essengue a coincidence or are the Bulls incorporating analytics more into their evaluations?