Bulls re-sign Josh Giddey - 4/100- no options, fully guaranteed

[Indomitable]

I just rewatched that Lakers game at the UC. The last three positions by the Bulls. Lebron was the weakest link.

He was roaming on defense which is why Williams was wide open.

Lebron then threw the ball to Giddey. Then after Reed hit the shot. Lebron was chilling and let Giddey run into that half court shot.

LA played with no center so Lebron was the defensive help. On an earlier play Lebron was just parked near the rim and he forced Giddey to shoot a high floater over his contest which caused a miss, so it worked there. So it's not always bad and every team needs a rim protector even if they play small.

But I think even LA agrees this isn't ideal which is why they've been hyper focused on getting a center all off-season. Ayton isn't ideal, but I do think it's better than 41 year old Lebron playing a Ben Wallace role of an undersized center trying to cover for Luka & Reaves defense.

Then he threw him the ball
Then he was the only guy not guarding Patrick
The as everyone else is guarding a man. LeBron sits at half court watching Giddey take the shot.

LeBron has not really played defense in about 7 yrs. Still 3 crap plays in a row.

I have never seen that. He actually was just there.

What you posted has nothing to do with that game. I do not care for excuses. He did contest the one shot. Which proves he is able.

[ScrantonBulls]

I especially love that we didn't give Giddy an option. If he takes off he can't opt out. I guess that could go either way though. Maybe we'll be kicking ourselves for not including a team option.

[dougthonus]

I'm not the biggest Giddey guy, but he didn't make ESPN's top 100 players. That feels way off to me.

[sco]

I just rewatched that Lakers game at the UC. The last three positions by the Bulls. Lebron was the weakest link.

He was roaming on defense which is why Williams was wide open.

Lebron then threw the ball to Giddey. Then after Reed hit the shot. Lebron was chilling and let Giddey run into that half court shot.

LA played with no center so Lebron was the defensive help. On an earlier play Lebron was just parked near the rim and he forced Giddey to shoot a high floater over his contest which caused a miss, so it worked there. So it's not always bad and every team needs a rim protector even if they play small.

But I think even LA agrees this isn't ideal which is why they've been hyper focused on getting a center all off-season. Ayton isn't ideal, but I do think it's better than 41 year old Lebron playing a Ben Wallace role of an undersized center trying to cover for Luka & Reaves defense.

Yeah, LA needed to take a risk on a big and Ayton fell into their laps. IMO, he'll have a big offensive season, but he's close to Vuc defensively. Now LBJ raises everyone around him defensively (like when Caruso was here for us), so that may help.

[Stratmaster]

I'm not the biggest Giddey guy, but he didn't make ESPN's top 100 players. That feels way off to me.

If he plays even half way between his first and 2nd half season performance from last year, I expect he will be on it next pre-season. I just looked at the bottom end of that list and it is kind of a joke. I think they are looking to stimulate reactions.

[DuckIII]

I especially love that we didn't give Giddy an option. If he takes off he can't opt out. I guess that could go either way though. Maybe we'll be kicking ourselves for not including a team option.

Given what salaries look like these days and will increasingly look like as Giddey's deal ages, its really hard to imagine his deal becoming an albatross.

One of the "wins" of his deal, in my opinion, is that it is extremely unlikely to become a Lavine and Vuc type deal that we simply can't move. I think if, for whatever reason, the Bulls decide they want to trade Giddey there will at least be a break-even market. I think he'd have to actually get worse - or injured - for the contract to become a problem.

[nomorezorro]

it's really easy for me to imagine giddey's salary becoming an albatross. i just imagine him playing the way he did for the first couple of months of his bulls career

[MGB8]

it's really easy for me to imagine giddey's salary becoming an albatross. i just imagine him playing the way he did for the first couple of months of his bulls career

Yeah, that is fair. It is a non-zero risk that his defense sucks and the shot isn't there, even when open.

But hopefully not. Think positive thoughts, lol.

[Chi town]

it's really easy for me to imagine giddey's salary becoming an albatross. i just imagine him playing the way he did for the first couple of months of his bulls career

Those months where Zach had the keys and Vuc was the 2nd option?

I’m not worried at all. I think it’s more likely he plays even better than we saw to end the year than it is he plays as awful as he did to start with clearly no confidence. I’m buying his shooting. I believe in Giddey because of his IQ and motor.

[DuckIII]

it's really easy for me to imagine giddey's salary becoming an albatross. i just imagine him playing the way he did for the first couple of months of his bulls career

That wouldn't be a very rational approach to projecting future performance for a wide variety of reasons given his career as a whole, but sure you can always imagine it.

[DuckIII]

it's really easy for me to imagine giddey's salary becoming an albatross. i just imagine him playing the way he did for the first couple of months of his bulls career

Yeah, that is fair. It is a non-zero risk that his defense sucks and the shot isn't there, even when open.

But hopefully not. Think positive thoughts, lol.

Non-zero chance and extremely unlikely are the same thing, aren't they?

Obviously it is theoretically possible Josh Giddey replicates the worst 2 month window of his career, playing on a brand new roster horribly suited to his game, over and over and over again for the next 4 years thereby making the contract bad. Who is legitimately concerned that is a reasonably likely outcome?

[dougthonus]

Non-zero chance and extremely unlikely are the same thing, aren't they?

Obviously it is theoretically possible Josh Giddey replicates the worst 2 month window of his career, playing on a brand new roster horribly suited to his game, over and over and over again for the next 4 years thereby making the contract bad. Who is legitimately concerned that is a reasonably likely outcome?

He could also just be a high stat / negative impact guy, whom can get a lot of stats if put in position as primary ball handler, but that isn't a role anyone wants him to have, and he doesn't make the improvements necessary so suit a different role. I think that's not so hard to imagine.

That said, even that as a floor probably leaves him at 15M+ player as a guy who chews up minutes.

[Evil_Headband]

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[DuckIII]

Non-zero chance and extremely unlikely are the same thing, aren't they?

Obviously it is theoretically possible Josh Giddey replicates the worst 2 month window of his career, playing on a brand new roster horribly suited to his game, over and over and over again for the next 4 years thereby making the contract bad. Who is legitimately concerned that is a reasonably likely outcome?

He could also just be a high stat / negative impact guy, whom can get a lot of stats if put in position as primary ball handler, but that isn't a role anyone wants him to have, and he doesn't make the improvements necessary so suit a different role. I think that's not so hard to imagine.

That said, even that as a floor probably leaves him at 15M+ player as a guy who chews up minutes.

$15 million is less than next season's MLE.

Never mind. A few just need to cling to worst case outcomes as being real concerns here regardless of the likelihoods. That's fine.

[dougthonus]

$15 million is less than next season's MLE.

Never mind. A few just need to cling to worst case outcomes as being real concerns here regardless of the likelihoods. That's fine.

Yeah, I was using 15M as ~MLE player. I think his worst case scenario is he ends up as such a player. I don't think that scenario is nearly as unlikely as you, but I'm also not worried about it. Especially where the Bulls are at given they have no one else to handle the role he will handle anyway, even if they do eventually decide he won't handle it ideally and do eventually get a more ideal person to handle it.

From a practical perspective, we can almost book that we won't have someone better than Josh to fill it for two years, and if we miraculously do get someone better in two years, then we have an awkward fit for two years? That's pretty low downside IMO. Upside on the deal feels much higher to me.

[nomorezorro]

yeah i'm not really worried about it meaningfully stymying our team-building capabilities, but that's more about my expectations for how competitive this roster can be than anything else.

i do think there's a pretty reasonable chance the contract turns into a negative trade asset, though. there are a couple of reasons why: one, i think the gap between "MLE level player" and "$25m/year player" is likely to be an increasingly meaningful one to NBA teams due to the cap conditions created by the apron. even as the MLE rises, i think they will be unlikely to view an $8-10 million salary difference as something they can comfortably tolerate for someone they don't consider to be an impact player, even though that might be how they've behaved in the past. therefore, even if giddey is "alright," i think there is a good chance that teams will be uninterested in acquiring him at his salary if they don't see him as a starter or a premiere bench player. if you want him to be a neutral-to-positive asset at this price, he has to be an actively good player, not just a guy you're OK plugging into an 8-man rotation.

two: i don't think that giddey's early 2024-25 play is "the real giddey," in that i don't expect him to perform at that level for the entirety of the 4-year life of the contract. however, i do think it's entirely possible that he will once again have an extended stretch of play where he is somewhere in the neighborhood of that level of performance. we're not talking about a crazy aberration from his baseline production here; he's a guy who has been a bad shooter and a bad finisher and a bad defender for much of his career, and he was was bad over that stretch primarily because he was performing particularly — but not outlandishly — poorly in all three areas.

even if he also has solid-to-good stretches that help to balance out his overall numbers, i think another stretch like that would significantly affect his value around the league and cause other teams to perceive him as an unreliable player.

(i also think there's an unlikely-but-not-trivial possibility of him performing like a sub-mle player over the life of the contract and it turning into a true albatross! i don't think the second half was entirely a mirage, but i can't say with 95% confidence that it wasn't, and i would not be blown away if he goes back to being a guy who can't shoot and can't score at the rim and can't defend. if that's who he ends up being at age 25, who's giving him the full MLE to be their backup point guard just because he's a good passer and rebounder?)

[nomorezorro]

i also think there is a reasonable chance he outperforms the contract. i am simply open to the many possibilities the future can bring us

[DuckIII]

i also think there is a reasonable chance he outperforms the contract. i am simply open to the many possibilities the future can bring us

Pretty much every point on the spectrum is to some extent possible. Kind of pointless. He might flat out suck balls to the point he gets waived and goes back down under for the rest of his career. Ben Simmons-ish. Maybe tall point guards from Australia are destined to start well and become complete busts. Its a possibility.

[dougthonus]

i also think there is a reasonable chance he outperforms the contract. i am simply open to the many possibilities the future can bring us

Pretty much every point on the spectrum is to some extent possible. Kind of pointless. He might flat out suck balls to the point he gets waived and goes back down under for the rest of his career. Ben Simmons-ish. Maybe tall point guards from Australia are destined to start well and become complete busts. Its a possibility.

While generally true with all players, I think it's fair to say with Giddey the possibilities feel far more realistic at both ends of the spectrum than with most players. Like there is way less variance in what I think the reasonable non-injury related outcomes are with Coby White than with Josh Giddey.

[League Circles]

At 25 flat for 4 years, if Giddey surprisingly doesn't meet expectations of being able to start as our point, it won't kill us for him to be a 6th man running the point for 15-20 mpg, and I have no doubt he'd excel in that role even if he doesn't improve. That was always my goal for his deal, even though I think he will indeed be a good starter for us. The thing that made him unique is that he can only start as a point. If he can't do that he's gotta be a bench guy. Other players of his caliber (let's call it 3rd best guy on a good team type caliber), if they don't meet expectations, they can often still start in a slightly different role.