Love #5: P. 88, Bulls 'moving on' from Love

[StephenAA]

During the whole Carmelo thing, there was lots and lots of smoke that Melo was just going to take the money in NY. There was comments that he was interested in Chicago which kept the threads going but for the most part, the stuff out there was NY and it was right. Really early on Sam Smith said that the thought was that Melo was using NY to get his full max and we called him senile.

Right now, there is lots and lots of stuff out there that links Love to Cleveland. Maybe it happens and maybe it doesn't but the odds of Chicago getting him are very slim. I think its blatantly obvious that Minnesota is using Chicago as leverage. I would love Love on the Bulls but don't really see the point in arguing the benefits of bringing in a player who will not be brought in. I kind of wonder if the people downplaying the trade discussions are really doing so as a defense mechanism. When he doesn't come, it won't be sour grapes when people explain how it is better that way.

I think the majority of the talk lately is how we can be the "third" team needed to possibly facilitate the trade, and what we would be giving out and getting back (which would not be KL).

AA

[siriusjames]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/APkrawczynski/status/493032256697798657[/tweet]

Jon Krawczynski @APkrawczynski · 1m
Kevin Love is pulling out of Team USA because of uncertainty surrounding his status with Wolves.

[tweet]https://twitter.com/APkrawczynski/status/493032459261734912[/tweet]

Jon Krawczynski @APkrawczynski · 1m
League sources told AP of Love's decision to pull out of World Cup this morning. Just can't risk injury right now.

[Magilla_Gorilla]

[tweet]https://twitter.com/APkrawczynski/status/493032256697798657[/tweet]

Jon Krawczynski @APkrawczynski · 1m
Kevin Love is pulling out of Team USA because of uncertainty surrounding his status with Wolves.

[tweet]https://twitter.com/APkrawczynski/status/493032459261734912[/tweet]

Jon Krawczynski @APkrawczynski · 1m
League sources told AP of Love's decision to pull out of World Cup this morning. Just can't risk injury right now.

Team Player.

[StephenAA]

I don't think Minny is *using* the Bulls. I see them both working in tandem.

Yep !!

AA

[blumeany]

So, I take it Love is a lock to get traded now. Wonder how this all shakes out.

[coldfish]

During the whole Carmelo thing, there was lots and lots of smoke that Melo was just going to take the money in NY. There was comments that he was interested in Chicago which kept the threads going but for the most part, the stuff out there was NY and it was right. Really early on Sam Smith said that the thought was that Melo was using NY to get his full max and we called him senile.

Right now, there is lots and lots of stuff out there that links Love to Cleveland. Maybe it happens and maybe it doesn't but the odds of Chicago getting him are very slim. I think its blatantly obvious that Minnesota is using Chicago as leverage. I would love Love on the Bulls but don't really see the point in arguing the benefits of bringing in a player who will not be brought in. I kind of wonder if the people downplaying the trade discussions are really doing so as a defense mechanism. When he doesn't come, it won't be sour grapes when people explain how it is better that way.

I think the majority of the talk lately is how we can be the "third" team needed to possibly facilitate the trade, and what we would be giving out and getting back (which would not be KL).

AA

OK, I'll address that. Its basically Taj for Martin.

Let's be honest, Taj is an insurance policy against Mirotic being able to play and Noah + Gasol's health. If all three of those work out well for the Bulls, Taj is really unnecessary.

However, Martin would be an insurance policy on McDermott. If McDermott can play, then Butler / McDermott is fine and Snell / Dunleavey / Hinrich / Rose backing up the 2/3 is also fine.

I think its a "meh" discussion. Swapping insurance policies. Probably doesn't do much for the Bulls.

I have seen Waiters mentioned and I think he sucks.

[BrooklynBulls]

I mean one of the very best teams in the league, the Bulls, have gone out of their way now to not start Taj...

No we didn't. Taj would be the starter right now if our plan to get Anthony worked. It just so happened that the next best target for was clearly either Gasol or Stephenson. And it's clear we never really wanted Stephenson. So Gasol it was, unfortunately for Taj. But we paid him a contract that anticipated becoming a starter, then put a plan in place to get an SF that would use up all our capspace, force us to amnesty/S&T Boozer, and make Taj the starter. It's not like the Bulls don't show confidence in this guy. Quite the opposite. They extended him for a premium because they knew he'd perform so well he'd make the deal look good. And he has.

[StephenAA]

During the whole Carmelo thing, there was lots and lots of smoke that Melo was just going to take the money in NY. There was comments that he was interested in Chicago which kept the threads going but for the most part, the stuff out there was NY and it was right. Really early on Sam Smith said that the thought was that Melo was using NY to get his full max and we called him senile.

Right now, there is lots and lots of stuff out there that links Love to Cleveland. Maybe it happens and maybe it doesn't but the odds of Chicago getting him are very slim. I think its blatantly obvious that Minnesota is using Chicago as leverage. I would love Love on the Bulls but don't really see the point in arguing the benefits of bringing in a player who will not be brought in. I kind of wonder if the people downplaying the trade discussions are really doing so as a defense mechanism. When he doesn't come, it won't be sour grapes when people explain how it is better that way.

I think the majority of the talk lately is how we can be the "third" team needed to possibly facilitate the trade, and what we would be giving out and getting back (which would not be KL).

AA

OK, I'll address that. Its basically Taj for Martin.

Let's be honest, Taj is an insurance policy against Mirotic being able to play and Noah + Gasol's health. If all three of those work out well for the Bulls, Taj is really unnecessary.

However, Martin would be an insurance policy on McDermott. If McDermott can play, then Butler / McDermott is fine and Snell / Dunleavey / Hinrich / Rose backing up the 2/3 is also fine.

I think its a "meh" discussion. Swapping insurance policies. Probably doesn't do much for the Bulls.

I have seen Waiters mentioned and I think he sucks.

Totally agree, except for the Waiters part. If someone can get in his head and help him, he has the talent to be special. Big IF though...

I want no part of KM, not even for MDJ alone (let alone Taj) !!

AA

[johnnyvann840]

Oh come on, Taj is not a top 10 PF. He's in the 20 range. He can start for a handful a teams.

I think you have to remember that Taj struggles with consistency and at close to 30 years old, that's not changing.

If you take Taj and lets say Pau just since we have him on the squad, and I ask you to guess Pau's next statline for tomorrow's game. You could probably give me something very close to his line...16/7 or something like that. Every game, dead on.

Now with Taj, you would have a hard time with his stat line. It would depend on the kind of night Taj is having...Is he bringing energy, is he focused, is he going to pick up 2 quick ones, is he looking for his shot?

Taj plays the role he plays because it's much easier for Thibs to use him as necessary and not have to rely on him night in and night out to produce...He can just insert Taj for defense/energy and take whatever else Taj brings that night.

To me, knowing that Taj is my dad's favorite player, says something about the guy. He's not the most talented or consistent dude, but it's easy to recognize his effort, and us fans love that. But I think it's important not to lose perspective of Taj's place in the basketball world. I mean one of the very best teams in the league, the Bulls, have gone out of their way now to not start Taj...He has a place in the NBA and he is great at what he does, but I wouldn't rely on his skill set to bring consistency to the starter position.

Pretty much everything you just said is wrong.. Take a look at Taj's game log.. you see one thing that is consistent. When he plays more than 30 MPG, he becomes really efficient, he scores at a rate of about 17.5 PP36, 11 rebs (yup), he gets to the line a lot. Taj needs to be on the floor for more than 25 MPG, he just becomes a different player. Just look at his logs for the last few years. Now go look at Pau's game log. He's not as consistent as you think anymore.

Taj when playing over 30 MPG last year...

44 mins-- 26/14/5 blks .523

42 mins- 21/10/2 blks .667

36 mins- 10/9/ 2 blks .556

31 mins- 16/6/2 blks .556

31 mins 20/8/2 blks .600

39 mins 10/12/3 blks .333

41 mins 19/10/ 3 ast .563

42 mins 11/6/ .300 bad game

32 mins 12/6/2/2 .273

42 mins 26/5/3/2 .733

34 mins 10/10/3/2 .500

31 mins 17/10/3 .500

45 mins 26/13/4/3 .389

45 mins 18/6/3/2 .391

46 mins 24/12/5/1 .633

31 mins 16/5/2/2 .500

29 mins 20/10/2 .444

31 mins 20/15/1 .467

31 mins 21/5/3 .538

31 mins 7/10/4 .273

30 mins 19/13 .493

33 mins 23/8/1 .600

[StephenAA]

I mean one of the very best teams in the league, the Bulls, have gone out of their way now to not start Taj...

No we didn't. Taj would be the starter right now if our plan to get Anthony worked. It just so happened that the next best target for was clearly either Gasol or Stephenson. And it's clear we never really wanted Stephenson. So Gasol it was, unfortunately for Taj. But we paid him a contract that anticipated becoming a starter, then put a plan in place to get an SF that would use up all our capspace, force us to amnesty/S&T Boozer, and make Taj the starter. It's not like the Bulls don't show confidence in this guy. Quite the opposite. They extended him for a premium because they knew he'd perform so well he'd make the deal look good. And he has.

Ralph has stated that Gasol was really a part of plan A (S&T Boozer), even if we had gotten Carmelo. Hence, Taj was still not "in the Bulls plans" to start.

This however does not mean the Bulls don't value Taj...

AA

[Ben]

I think the majority of the talk lately is how we can be the "third" team needed to possibly facilitate the trade, and what we would be giving out and getting back (which would not be KL).

AA

OK, I'll address that. Its basically Taj for Martin.

Let's be honest, Taj is an insurance policy against Mirotic being able to play and Noah + Gasol's health. If all three of those work out well for the Bulls, Taj is really unnecessary.

However, Martin would be an insurance policy on McDermott. If McDermott can play, then Butler / McDermott is fine and Snell / Dunleavey / Hinrich / Rose backing up the 2/3 is also fine.

I think its a "meh" discussion. Swapping insurance policies. Probably doesn't do much for the Bulls.

I have seen Waiters mentioned and I think he sucks.

I agree that it's likely to be something like Taj for Martin, and I'm against that.

BTW, I wrongly posted last night about how much Martin has declined-- I was posting from my phone, which made it hard to look up the stats, and I had read an article earlier which (it turns out) erroneously cited Martin's FG% as 40.3% (rather than 43.0%, as it really was). Martin was worse on offense last year than he was with OKC, and IMO it'd be a mistake to expect him to return to the efficiency that he posted alongside Durant and Westbrook, but he might still have a couple of pretty good years in him. I still wouldn't trade Taj for him, though. At least, not right now.

I would trade Dunleavy + Snell, even though I'd feel conflicted about that. But Martin replaces Dunleavy's shooting and Snell, while he's looked good in SL, shouldn't be the guy to hold up our chances of improving our offense significantly.

bad_knees proposed a best-case situation in which we could sign several vets to unguaranteed contracts and trade them, mid-season, to Minny for Martin if he's still on their team and if they still want to dump him. I'd be just fine with taking on the extra salary that way, if it didn't mean harming our defense and leadership. We could probably sign Chris Douglas-Roberts for the vet minimum if we want one more wing who can play decent defense.

The risk, of course, is that Cleveland will acquire both Martin and Love, and that IMO will make them even stronger-- much stronger than if they simply had Waiters at SG, given that I don't think Waiters will deal well being pushed so far to the background on an Irving-Lebron-Love-led team. But whatcha gonna do. I don't want to get panicked into trading Taj just to keep Cleveland from getting an upgrade. Too many variables to plan that kind of chess game reliably.

[Chitownbulls]

Martin sucks...don't want him. Thunder didn't want him either.

[jmajew]

I've said this a few times. Only way I, and probably the Bulls, trade Taj to Minnesota is if it nets us Love or Martin and Dieng.

[RedBulls23]

How likely are the odds that this drags into the season? I REALLY REALLY hope that this doesn't drag into the season.

[Clint Eastwood]

I've said this a few times. Only way I, and probably the Bulls, trade Taj to Minnesota is if it nets us Love or Martin and Dieng.

Agree

I also think there is clearly already a deal agreed to by Cleveland for love, and it can't be announced for thirty days. We may or may not be involved as a third team, but wiggins was signed for the deal he is involved in I'm sure.

[AKfanatic]

How likely are the odds that this drags into the season? I REALLY REALLY hope that this doesn't drag into the season.

I hope if does, simply because it doesn't affect us as much as fans on realgm think it does. We have media throwing their usual amount of feces against a Chicago Bulls themed wall and "insiders" latching onto those stories to push their rumors in desperate attempts to say "I told you so", in case something extremely unlikely happens.

The end game here looks pretty obvious. Love is forcing his way to Cleveland, the King will have his court, Chicago fans will kick and scream about how the FO dropped the ball, even though the ball was never in their hands to begin with. We will have a season full of wins and full of "fans" repeating "we can't beat Cleveland" every day, every thread. Wash, rinse, repeat.

[mrlancers]

I'm sure there's probably a Knick fan somewhere complaining about having to give up both Iman and THJ.

[samwana]

Any chance Taj gets a call up to replace Kevin Love on Team USA?

[Jcool0]

Any chance Taj gets a call up to replace Kevin Love on Team USA?

[tweet]https://twitter.com/SpearsNBAYahoo/status/493047664741597185[/tweet]

[Chitownbulls]

Hopefully Taj....6th man runner up...bigtime defender

But we have Doug, Rose an Butler there right now