Wiretap: Bulls Hope To Re-Sign Zach LaVine At $14M-$16M

[TheJordanRule]

I don't see anything wrong with playing hardball to get things down into the range that they feel comfortable with. But the word is already out with regards to what they think his value is (14-16M). So to use the current circumstances to beat him down to a 4/40M dollar deal feels a bit opportunistic. Some people might not care. But it could very well matter to certain people...agents most notably.

EDIT: And remember....LOTS of teams are going to have cap space next year. Not just us. So if we are going to land somebody, chances are, it's going to be about more than just money.

Word is NOT out about what the FO thinks Lavine is worth. There were allegations that could have easily been flushed down the pipe by Zach’s agents. And just because NBA front offices blew stacks of money on FAs last time there were so many available does not mean they will come in with the same mentality again next year. People do learn and adapt from past mistakes from time to time.

So you believe that the article that this thread's title is based on was put out by Lavine's camp?

I don’t believe that nor do I take it as gospel. News reports can’t be completely discounted or completely believed in a situation where a negotiation is under way short of actual confirmation or rejection from both sides.

[madvillian]

How do you play "hardball" with a RFA? You either match or you don't. If he doesn't have any good offers there's no "hardball" to play as de facto that's his market value.

[JohnnyTapwater]

I think the draw with Lavine is he still has upside. He played well considering he came off of a devastating injury.

No he didn't. He was an inefficient gunner with a superstar level usage. And he made everybody around him worse.

Athletic shot getters will get paid. Period.

They get paid IF they have a positive impact on the court. I don't see Antonio Blakeney or Gerald Green getting big money from anyone. Hell, they're borderline NBA players as it is.

While we're discussing Green - what, other than age, makes LaVine better than him? I'd really like to hear it. Sure, Zach is a better ballhandler, but that skill doesn't seem to translate to anything useful (anymore). Before he got hurt, I confess I thought LaVine was making strides as a playmaker, but he's been such an awful facilitator on the Bulls that I don't know what to think anymore.

I say he played well purely based on my expectation. I wanted to see how his athleticism was effected...and I wanted to see a glimpse of what he can be. I saw both. So I was pleased. For the most part, I feel like a lot of his inefficient play was based on the mindset that comes with tanking. So I'm really giving a lot of what every saw a pass.

Good counter with Blakeney and Green. Age is really big when comparing Green. Work ethic. Green rubs me as a knuckle head so those factors mean something when teams are committing. For the most part you're right. Not much of a difference if you strip everything down.

[dice]

My argument is that the current version of LaVine has negative value and it’s easier to win without him. I still think he would get 8-10M per year based on perceived upside, though I disagree with that.

The market determines what’s fair, and if anything the fact that the NBA is an inefficient market due to max contracts should be pumping up his contract and not deflating it (since he can get paid money that should be going to guys who would receive larger contracts if there was no max).

I don’t get the sense that there are teams who are dying to pay LaVine more but just don’t have the cap space.

every team in the league just lowballed cousins. are future free agents going to be hesitant to play in the nba?

"hmmm...well, the bulls are offering me the best deal, but they lowballed lavine by paying market value when nobody else wanted him...i think i'm going to have to pass and take less money elsewhere"...i'm pretty confident that that line of thought will apply to exactly zero future free agents

Cousins is an unrestricted FA. Lavine is restricted. Two processes that are fundamentally different. Zach isn't getting offers at the moment because (1) it makes no sense to make an offer to a restricted FA whose clock doesn't start until 7/6. (2) very few teams have cap room to tie up into waiting on a decision from the Bulls.

both of which play into his market value. market value is lower for restricted FAs. because it's a different market. if lavine doesn't like what he's being offered he is free to take the QO and become unrestricted next season. that is leverage that the player has to force the team to make a reasonable offer

They know that even if they cleared enough space to sign him to an offer sheet, the Bulls are going to match it unless they offer way over market value.

they just have to offer more than the bulls are willing to pay. a good agent will get a good idea of the home team's best offer and go to other teams with that information ("they're not budging off of 10 mil, so if you offer 12 i'm confident it'll be enough"). and if the bulls match? oh well, spend that money elsewhere. or don't spend it at all/sign filler to 1 yr deal and save the cap space until next season. it's not like lavine will be getting good offers from contenders. these are teams that can afford to take the risk that their money will be tied up for a few days if they like him more as a long-term investment than whoever else is out there

So in this instance, you could argue that his market value is whatever the Bulls decide to pay him given the lack of offers out there. But there is also an argument to be made for the fact that the reason that he doesn't have offers at the moment are due to the constraints of the market itself and not necessarily the player's fair value. Are the Bulls well within their rights to use that against him. Sure. Does that make it the best thing to do? Not necessarily.

can you think of a single example of a player who has publicly held it against a team for paying less than "fair" value for a restricted free agent? i can't. and i can't imagine them turning down money themselves as a form of principled punishment. "oh yeah, well because you didn't pay zach lavine what he asked for then i'm not gonna take your money! even though you are paying ME what i want" and part of that is that by not paying zach lavine the bulls have more money to offer other free agents! the money gets spent one way or the other. it's just a matter of allocation. in the extraordinarily unlikely case that an unrestricted guy brings up zach lavine in his meeting(s) with the bulls, the FO simply has to say "yeah, we wanted to spend that extra money on you instead"

on top of that, a player can't possibly know what his fair value actually is if no other team so much as makes an offer. i'm sure that every player thinks he's worth more than he's just signed for. if he truly thinks that the offer is out of whack he is obligated to himself to take the QO. like ben gordon did. did ben wallace think "man, you're offering more than the team that loves me (the pistons), but you didn't give ben gordon what he was asking for, so i can't make the move"? doubt it crossed his mind. certainly his agent wouldn't bring it up. maybe he wasn't even paying attention to another team's RFA dealings. and why would he? he was never himself going to be an RFA in the future

[TheJordanRule]

I’m still trying to figure this out. I hope someone can help me. What’s the most urgent / important reason to resign Zach, even at the cost of an inflated deal? The biggest reason I can think of is that he’s a former Rising Stars MVP and players who have done that have had about a 70 percent likelihood of becoming all-stars.

I’m asking the question because I feel no sense of urgency. If we lost him, the loss would be the feeling a fan might get when an underperforming draft pick gets traded for a bag of chips.

[Betta Bulleavit]

I’m still trying to figure this out. I hope someone can help me. What’s the most urgent / important reason to resign Zach, even at the cost of an inflated deal? The biggest reason I can think of is that he’s a former Rising Stars MVP and players who have done that have had about a 70 percent likelihood of becoming all-stars.

I’m asking the question because I feel no sense of urgency. If we lost him, the loss would be the feeling a fan might get when an underperforming draft pick gets traded for a bag of chips.

Just that outside chance that Atl will offer him a deal that we wont be willing to match. And yeah, losing him for nothing without a viable replacement would suck pretty bad as far as I'm concerned. But beyond that...not much reason to be urgent.

[nomorezorro]

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yeah buddy. 4 years for the full MLE who says no

[madvillian]

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yeah buddy. 4 years for the full MLE who says no

It's the ultimate buyers' market. I doubt that he gets an offer of a) more than 3 years and b) more than 14 million annually.

The Magic resigning Gordon so soon is an epic failure and a fireable offense. Thank god the Bulls are not that stupid.

[TheJordanRule]

I’m still trying to figure this out. I hope someone can help me. What’s the most urgent / important reason to resign Zach, even at the cost of an inflated deal? The biggest reason I can think of is that he’s a former Rising Stars MVP and players who have done that have had about a 70 percent likelihood of becoming all-stars.

I’m asking the question because I feel no sense of urgency. If we lost him, the loss would be the feeling a fan might get when an underperforming draft pick gets traded for a bag of chips.

Just that outside chance that Atl will offer him a deal that we wont be willing to match. And yeah, losing him for nothing without a viable replacement would suck pretty bad as far as I'm concerned. But beyond that...not much reason to be urgent.

How about a sign and trade then to satisfy all parties? Zach gets an inflated high risk deal. Atlanta gets Zach. We get some combo of draft picks, young players and short term filler?

[dice]

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yeah buddy. 4 years for the full MLE who says no

It's the ultimate buyers' market. I doubt that he gets an offer of a) more than 3 years and b) more than 14 million annually.

The Magic resigning Gordon so soon is an epic failure and a fireable offense. Thank god the Bulls are not that stupid.

what is available to RFAs this offseason is not as important as what will be available NEXT season when they can be unrestricted. for example, let's say that zach lavine and his agent feel that they can get a 3 or 4 year deal for 20 mil per next summer. the equation then becomes very simple. the bulls would have to offer at least 4/60 right NOW in order to prevent him from taking the QO

4.4 mil QO +
20 mil unrestricted +
20 +
20 +
=64.4 mil

or

15 +
15 +
15 +
15 +
=60 mil + elimination of possibility of losing out on long-term, big money deal due to career-altering/ending injury in 2018-2019

if 20 mil per year is truly his open market value, the bulls can't just offer him 10 mil per because no other offers are coming in. he won't even consider that. given that the bulls are HOPING to get him for 14-16 mil per, i'm confident that a deal will get done...unfortunately

same goes for the aaron gordon situation. it's not a terrible deal if a) he's actually good enough to warrant it and b) they think he'll get a significantly bigger offer next offseason. both points are debatable, of course, but that's the decision making framework

[Ice Man]

The Magic resigning Gordon so soon is an epic failure and a fireable offense. Thank god the Bulls are not that stupid.

That was my immediate response. I felt as I did with Minnie extending Wiggins to the max, and Dallas paying the max for Harrison Barnes. We shall see how it works out with Gordon.

[KevinPandawong]

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yeah buddy. 4 years for the full MLE who says no

It's the ultimate buyers' market. I doubt that he gets an offer of a) more than 3 years and b) more than 14 million annually.

The Magic resigning Gordon so soon is an epic failure and a fireable offense. Thank god the Bulls are not that stupid.

To be fair to Orlando they need to retain as much young talent as possible, no one is signing with them in that market and with all of those bad contracts holding them back.

[WindyCityBorn]

The Magic resigning Gordon so soon is an epic failure and a fireable offense. Thank god the Bulls are not that stupid.

That was my immediate response. I felt as I did with Minnie extending Wiggins to the max, and Dallas paying the max for Harrison Barnes. We shall see how it works out with Gordon.

Wiggins might be the worst contract in the NBA after Conley.

[Repeat 3-peat]

Looking like a 1+1 deal for me.

[BR0D1E86]

The Magic resigning Gordon so soon is an epic failure and a fireable offense. Thank god the Bulls are not that stupid.

That was my immediate response. I felt as I did with Minnie extending Wiggins to the max, and Dallas paying the max for Harrison Barnes. We shall see how it works out with Gordon.

Wiggins might be the worst contract in the NBA after Conley.

It's worse. Both because he has more years left, and while Conley's horribly overpaid he's at least a positive impact player.

As for the subject of this thread, I've said my piece. I fully expect to be annoyed with whatever amount Lavine gets. And I expect he'll not live up to it. Nothing much I can do about it though.

[TheGOATRises007]

Let him walk.

[TankWilson]

The Magic resigning Gordon so soon is an epic failure and a fireable offense. Thank god the Bulls are not that stupid.

That was my immediate response. I felt as I did with Minnie extending Wiggins to the max, and Dallas paying the max for Harrison Barnes. We shall see how it works out with Gordon.

Wiggins might be the worst contract in the NBA after Conley.

I actually think gordon will continue to get better and earn that contract. At least earn it at an acceptable clip for today's NBA of outrageous salaries.

[TankWilson]

Let him walk.

I kind of want to as well but we're boxed in here. Dunn seems to be the better guy going forward and it seems they can't play together effectively. But hell i don't think they are even 100% sold on dunn. We just have to hope it works well enough to show we're close and maybe then AD wants to come home.

[madvillian]

Let him walk.

I kind of want to as well but we're boxed in here. Dunn seems to be the better guy going forward and it seems they can't play together effectively. But hell i don't think they are even 100% sold on dunn. We just have to hope it works well enough to show we're close and maybe then AD wants to come home.

Bulls aren't "boxed in" at all. They got good value in Dunn and Lauri out of the trade. Regardless, the costs are sunk. Zach mostly stunk. Outside of a few hardcore Lavine fans I'm not really sure who would be that upset if he didn't return.

[StunnerKO]

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