Non-sarcastic reasons to stand pat at the trade deadline Edit: And that’s what happened

[nitetrain8603]

Attendance is #1 in the league. There's an argument of not just making a change to make a change. Right now, they are exactly where the Reinsdorfs have historically loved to operate: show you're competitive in games, and that's it.

With that stated, I think this has gone on far too long. If I'm the Bulls, I still trade Zach to the Pistons. I still purge the roster. Trade DeMar and Caruso to Miami for all I care.

[League Circles]

Shouldn't be trying to "win now", but they should definitely be trying to win next year. They should stand Pat if there are no trades available that improve us for next year, which is certainly a possibility in my opinion.

[drosestruts]

I can get not trading Caruso because the future picks are likely very late firsts, and he acts so much like a coach on the Court, you want that influence on younger players. Plus, he’s under contract.

DeMar… assuming even a late first is offered, is harder. The option after this season will be to give him 30+ M per year, probably for 3 years… or let him walk. Not to mention that ISO DDR fails pretty hard most of the time, when attempted to close games, and seems to get in the way of other players.

Vuc probably has no value. Drummond probably can net you a 2nd rounder or 2… but would the Bulls go out and get another player, or risk injury (and negatively impact development) by playing, say, Phillips there? Or Pat when he comes back? Not to mention, if the Bulls can keep Andre relatively cheap long term, he is one of the best backup Cs in the league.

Sigh.

Why is the options for DeMar 3/$90m or let him walk.

We have his bird rights - who would we be competing against to sign him? What teams are projected to even have $30m in cap space?

Teams that even could have $30m in cap space if they move off all cap holds of veteran players and declined all non-guranteed deals:

1. Pistons
2. 76ers - would require renoucning a lot of veteran players
3. Magic
4. Hornets
5. Jazz
6. Raptors
7. Pacers - if they renounce Siakam
8. Spurs

Which of these teams do we think would outbid us for DeMar? Cause these are the only 8 with enough potential space to even do so.

[Salo23]

I don’t think we should stand pat, but the two reasons are:

1.) We are not being offered anything of real value towards a rebuild.

2.) We believe that we will actually be a playoff team, which we are slowly trending towards.

I hope we are talking with Drummond about his future. If he’s not signaling that he’d resign next season, we have to shop him hard. Assuming a first round pick isn’t available, my preference is to resign him to a cheap multi year deal. That said, as much as I love the guy we absolutely cannot keep him for just a half season playoff run.

I’d like to keep Drummond too, but I doubt he comes back here to play his 12-16 minutes per game behind iron man Vuc. Maybe if we attach Vuc as salary filler in a larger Caruso trade, then I could see Drummond returning.

[Charlesareed]

Does this count? Or am I still too jaded lol

Read on Twitter

I’m not surprised at all this is all an team owner would want and are about damn winning another championship or building a championship contender


This is why a boycott of the Chicago Bulls as a whole needs to be done within the next 10 years there will not be a championship trophy beyond the 6 rings Phil Michael & scottie and posthumous Jerry Krause

[ScrantonBulls]

Attendance is #1 in the league. There's an argument of not just making a change to make a change. Right now, they are exactly where the Reinsdorfs have historically loved to operate: show you're competitive in games, and that's it.

With that stated, I think this has gone on far too long. If I'm the Bulls, I still trade Zach to the Pistons. I still purge the roster. Trade DeMar and Caruso to Miami for all I care.

This is the #1 reason. The Reinsdorfs aren't running the organization to win a title. Making money is the #1 priority. Why change when attendance is #1?

[sco]

people, in my opinion incorrectly, think we have to be bad to be good.

A lot of the conversation this season has been around the development and growth we've seen from both Coby White and now Ayo Dosunmu. I'm of the opinion that some, and we can debate how much, of this development is due in part to veterans like DeRozan and Caruso being on the team and actively working with these young players.

My hypothesis is that if we trade guys like Caruso and DeRozan, we will be negatively impacting the continued development of players like Coby White and Ayo Dosunmu, but also players like Patrick Williams, Dalen Terry, and Justin Philips.

Some may not care about the development of these players, and instead prefer different hypotehtical young players for whatever reason. To me that's just resetting the clock, we have countless examples of players needing time to develop. The old thinking of "you are who you are by year 3" is outdated and clearly wrong.

If we want to see what the ceiling of players like Coby, Ayo, Williams, Terry, and Phillips are - then we need veterans like DeRozan and Caruso here guiding them and providing examples of the work it takes to actually develop.

This belief is mainly tied to guys like DeRozan and Caruso though. If the front office receives offers for Vucevic, Drummond, Craig, Carter, or LaVine - and they're good offers (or in the case of Vuc literally anything) I'd pull the trigger.

I'm much more reluctant and hesitant to trade Caruso and DeRozan.

I’m in the same mindset with this. Front office needs to move either Vuc or Drummond this deadline tho. It’s clear to me Dre won’t resign with chicago next season especially if Vuc is here.

Great points raised here. I can easily make the connection between AK saying he won't tank and the fact that the Bulls lead the league in attendance. Beyond that, it is a fair argument that building through tanking doesn't correllate to the shortest path for contending.

While the Zach situation is uncomfortable to many. I think Zach's poor play this season may very well have been impacted by him trying to play through injuries. I think he has more value on our roster next season than he would have in trade value this season.

I would love to trade Vuc, but I'm not giving up meaningful assets to be rid of him.

Caruso is still young enough to want to keep, and his leadership value is high.

DDR's leadership and young player development skills seem very apparent to me.

[jnrjr79]

Attendance is #1 in the league. There's an argument of not just making a change to make a change. Right now, they are exactly where the Reinsdorfs have historically loved to operate: show you're competitive in games, and that's it.

With that stated, I think this has gone on far too long. If I'm the Bulls, I still trade Zach to the Pistons. I still purge the roster. Trade DeMar and Caruso to Miami for all I care.

This is the #1 reason. The Reinsdorfs aren't running the organization to win a title. Making money is the #1 priority. Why change when attendance is #1?

The simple answer to this is they'd make even more money if they were better. Better tv ratings = better tv contract. More winning = more merch sales. Deeper playoff runs = more $$. Obviously, if they're going deep into the luxury tax to do it, it may negate those increased revenues, but all things being equal, being a better team would mean being a more profitable team.

Further, if making money was the only thing the Reinsdorfs cared about, they'd just sell the team. Jerry bought the franchise for about fifteen bucks and could now sell it for $4-5 billion.

[drosestruts]

Attendance is #1 in the league. There's an argument of not just making a change to make a change. Right now, they are exactly where the Reinsdorfs have historically loved to operate: show you're competitive in games, and that's it.

With that stated, I think this has gone on far too long. If I'm the Bulls, I still trade Zach to the Pistons. I still purge the roster. Trade DeMar and Caruso to Miami for all I care.

This is the #1 reason. The Reinsdorfs aren't running the organization to win a title. Making money is the #1 priority. Why change when attendance is #1?

The simple answer to this is they'd make even more money if they were better. Better tv ratings = better tv contract. More winning = more merch sales. Deeper playoff runs = more $$. Obviously, if they're going deep into the luxury tax to do it, it may negate those increased revenues, but all things being equal, being a better team would mean being a more profitable team.

Further, if making money was the only thing the Reinsdorfs cared about, they'd just sell the team. Jerry bought the franchise for about fifteen bucks and could now sell it for $4-5 billion.

All of this.

I also think, and have done past analysis to support my thinking, but in general teams enter the tax to keep a conteding/winning team together. In the majority of cases - a team is already a contender before needing to pay the tax.

The internet at large seems to be very focused on ownership's (because it is more than just one person) desire to avoid the tax.

The much bigger issue being that we haven't come close (aside from the early 2010's) of building an actual contender.

We're all mad about step 2, while overlooking our inability to achieve step 1.

I think it's also a "grass is always greener on the other side thing" to believe the majority of other franchises have been more successful than us.

If you measure success by championships, well then 11 team have won a championship since we last did, so 11 teams have been more successful - everyyone else is a loser.

19 teams have made 2 or more Conference Finals since 1999. Sometimes this is just due to seeding (aka in what round to you run into LeBron).

Getting off track - but our inability to build a contender isn't due to financial restraints. Bad team building and injuries have been far bigger issues.

[jnrjr79]

This is the #1 reason. The Reinsdorfs aren't running the organization to win a title. Making money is the #1 priority. Why change when attendance is #1?

The simple answer to this is they'd make even more money if they were better. Better tv ratings = better tv contract. More winning = more merch sales. Deeper playoff runs = more $$. Obviously, if they're going deep into the luxury tax to do it, it may negate those increased revenues, but all things being equal, being a better team would mean being a more profitable team.

Further, if making money was the only thing the Reinsdorfs cared about, they'd just sell the team. Jerry bought the franchise for about fifteen bucks and could now sell it for $4-5 billion.

All of this.

I also think, and have done past analysis to support my thinking, but in general teams enter the tax to keep a conteding/winning team together. In the majority of cases - a team is already a contender before needing to pay the tax.

The internet at large seems to be very focused on ownership's (because it is more than just one person) desire to avoid the tax.

The much bigger issue being that we haven't come close (aside from the early 2010's) of building an actual contender.

We're all mad about step 2, while overlooking our inability to achieve step 1.

I think it's also a "grass is always greener on the other side thing" to believe the majority of other franchises have been more successful than us.

If you measure success by championships, well then 11 team have won a championship since we last did, so 11 teams have been more successful - everyyone else is a loser.

19 teams have made 2 or more Conference Finals since 1999. Sometimes this is just due to seeding (aka in what round to you run into LeBron).

Getting off track - but our inability to build a contender isn't due to financial restraints. Bad team building and injuries have been far bigger issues.

Bingo. A lot of posters seem to think the Bulls are bad because they are cheap. They definitely have earned the reputation for cheapness, but the primary reason the Bulls are bad is that the front office has performed badly. I hope nobody believes that AKME would have put together a championship-contending roster if only they were permitted to pay the luxury tax. They haven't shown they can assemble a roster of players that would make you want to pay it in the first place.

[MGB8]

I can get not trading Caruso because the future picks are likely very late firsts, and he acts so much like a coach on the Court, you want that influence on younger players. Plus, he’s under contract.

DeMar… assuming even a late first is offered, is harder. The option after this season will be to give him 30+ M per year, probably for 3 years… or let him walk. Not to mention that ISO DDR fails pretty hard most of the time, when attempted to close games, and seems to get in the way of other players.

Vuc probably has no value. Drummond probably can net you a 2nd rounder or 2… but would the Bulls go out and get another player, or risk injury (and negatively impact development) by playing, say, Phillips there? Or Pat when he comes back? Not to mention, if the Bulls can keep Andre relatively cheap long term, he is one of the best backup Cs in the league.

Sigh.

Why is the options for DeMar 3/$90m or let him walk.

We have his bird rights - who would we be competing against to sign him? What teams are projected to even have $30m in cap space?

Teams that even could have $30m in cap space if they move off all cap holds of veteran players and declined all non-guranteed deals:

1. Pistons
2. 76ers - would require renoucning a lot of veteran players
3. Magic
4. Hornets
5. Jazz
6. Raptors
7. Pacers - if they renounce Siakam
8. Spurs

Which of these teams do we think would outbid us for DeMar? Cause these are the only 8 with enough potential space to even do so.

For the same reason we paid Vuc for 20+ M per season.

[sco]

I can get not trading Caruso because the future picks are likely very late firsts, and he acts so much like a coach on the Court, you want that influence on younger players. Plus, he’s under contract.

DeMar… assuming even a late first is offered, is harder. The option after this season will be to give him 30+ M per year, probably for 3 years… or let him walk. Not to mention that ISO DDR fails pretty hard most of the time, when attempted to close games, and seems to get in the way of other players.

Vuc probably has no value. Drummond probably can net you a 2nd rounder or 2… but would the Bulls go out and get another player, or risk injury (and negatively impact development) by playing, say, Phillips there? Or Pat when he comes back? Not to mention, if the Bulls can keep Andre relatively cheap long term, he is one of the best backup Cs in the league.

Sigh.

Why is the options for DeMar 3/$90m or let him walk.

We have his bird rights - who would we be competing against to sign him? What teams are projected to even have $30m in cap space?

Teams that even could have $30m in cap space if they move off all cap holds of veteran players and declined all non-guranteed deals:

1. Pistons
2. 76ers - would require renoucning a lot of veteran players
3. Magic
4. Hornets
5. Jazz
6. Raptors
7. Pacers - if they renounce Siakam
8. Spurs

Which of these teams do we think would outbid us for DeMar? Cause these are the only 8 with enough potential space to even do so.

For the same reason we paid Vuc for 20+ M per season.

Wow. Was thinking exactly the same.

[Risk Addict]

Development. I think the biggest success stories are guys on teams that are good. the higher level of competition for PT and mentorship of vets develops players better than gifting them playing time. When you have too many young guys, no one develops or it takes twice as long.

I’d hang onto Caruso for that reason alone. DeMar can go. Zach can go. You just have to get some value back.

[Dan Z]

people, in my opinion incorrectly, think we have to be bad to be good.

A lot of the conversation this season has been around the development and growth we've seen from both Coby White and now Ayo Dosunmu. I'm of the opinion that some, and we can debate how much, of this development is due in part to veterans like DeRozan and Caruso being on the team and actively working with these young players.

My hypothesis is that if we trade guys like Caruso and DeRozan, we will be negatively impacting the continued development of players like Coby White and Ayo Dosunmu, but also players like Patrick Williams, Dalen Terry, and Justin Philips.

Some may not care about the development of these players, and instead prefer different hypotehtical young players for whatever reason. To me that's just resetting the clock, we have countless examples of players needing time to develop. The old thinking of "you are who you are by year 3" is outdated and clearly wrong.

If we want to see what the ceiling of players like Coby, Ayo, Williams, Terry, and Phillips are - then we need veterans like DeRozan and Caruso here guiding them and providing examples of the work it takes to actually develop.

This belief is mainly tied to guys like DeRozan and Caruso though. If the front office receives offers for Vucevic, Drummond, Craig, Carter, or LaVine - and they're good offers (or in the case of Vuc literally anything) I'd pull the trigger.

I'm much more reluctant and hesitant to trade Caruso and DeRozan.

Coby, Ayo and Patrick Williams have played with DeRozan and Caruso for 2 and a half seasons. How many more years do they have to play under them to fully develop? At what point are they good enough to develop with or without them?

[Dan Z]

I can get not trading Caruso because the future picks are likely very late firsts, and he acts so much like a coach on the Court, you want that influence on younger players. Plus, he’s under contract.

DeMar… assuming even a late first is offered, is harder. The option after this season will be to give him 30+ M per year, probably for 3 years… or let him walk. Not to mention that ISO DDR fails pretty hard most of the time, when attempted to close games, and seems to get in the way of other players.

Vuc probably has no value. Drummond probably can net you a 2nd rounder or 2… but would the Bulls go out and get another player, or risk injury (and negatively impact development) by playing, say, Phillips there? Or Pat when he comes back? Not to mention, if the Bulls can keep Andre relatively cheap long term, he is one of the best backup Cs in the league.

Sigh.

Why is the options for DeMar 3/$90m or let him walk.

We have his bird rights - who would we be competing against to sign him? What teams are projected to even have $30m in cap space?

Teams that even could have $30m in cap space if they move off all cap holds of veteran players and declined all non-guranteed deals:

1. Pistons
2. 76ers - would require renoucning a lot of veteran players
3. Magic
4. Hornets
5. Jazz
6. Raptors
7. Pacers - if they renounce Siakam
8. Spurs

Which of these teams do we think would outbid us for DeMar? Cause these are the only 8 with enough potential space to even do so.

For the same reason we paid Vuc for 20+ M per season.

I agree. Also, DeMar makes 28 million this season. Is he going to take a pay cut? I know he's getting older, but he might say that he just had two all-star seasons with the Bulls, plus salaries have been rising across the board in the NBA.

I could be wrong and he takes a pay cut because he likes it here, but I doubt it. If he ends up signing for less it's because he had limited options.

[Dominator83]

The simple answer to this is they'd make even more money if they were better. Better tv ratings = better tv contract. More winning = more merch sales. Deeper playoff runs = more $$. Obviously, if they're going deep into the luxury tax to do it, it may negate those increased revenues, but all things being equal, being a better team would mean being a more profitable team.

Further, if making money was the only thing the Reinsdorfs cared about, they'd just sell the team. Jerry bought the franchise for about fifteen bucks and could now sell it for $4-5 billion.

All of this.

I also think, and have done past analysis to support my thinking, but in general teams enter the tax to keep a conteding/winning team together. In the majority of cases - a team is already a contender before needing to pay the tax.

The internet at large seems to be very focused on ownership's (because it is more than just one person) desire to avoid the tax.

The much bigger issue being that we haven't come close (aside from the early 2010's) of building an actual contender.

We're all mad about step 2, while overlooking our inability to achieve step 1.

I think it's also a "grass is always greener on the other side thing" to believe the majority of other franchises have been more successful than us.

If you measure success by championships, well then 11 team have won a championship since we last did, so 11 teams have been more successful - everyyone else is a loser.

19 teams have made 2 or more Conference Finals since 1999. Sometimes this is just due to seeding (aka in what round to you run into LeBron).

Getting off track - but our inability to build a contender isn't due to financial restraints. Bad team building and injuries have been far bigger issues.

Bingo. A lot of posters seem to think the Bulls are bad because they are cheap. They definitely have earned the reputation for cheapness, but the primary reason the Bulls are bad is that the front office has performed badly. I hope nobody believes that AKME would have put together a championship-contending roster if only they were permitted to pay the luxury tax. They haven't shown they can assemble a roster of players that would make you want to pay it in the first place.

Yea if AKME had an unlimited budget, we would probably just be the Isiah Thomas Knicks

[ScrantonBulls]

The simple answer to this is they'd make even more money if they were better. Better tv ratings = better tv contract. More winning = more merch sales. Deeper playoff runs = more $$. Obviously, if they're going deep into the luxury tax to do it, it may negate those increased revenues, but all things being equal, being a better team would mean being a more profitable team.

Further, if making money was the only thing the Reinsdorfs cared about, they'd just sell the team. Jerry bought the franchise for about fifteen bucks and could now sell it for $4-5 billion.

All of this.

I also think, and have done past analysis to support my thinking, but in general teams enter the tax to keep a conteding/winning team together. In the majority of cases - a team is already a contender before needing to pay the tax.

The internet at large seems to be very focused on ownership's (because it is more than just one person) desire to avoid the tax.

The much bigger issue being that we haven't come close (aside from the early 2010's) of building an actual contender.

We're all mad about step 2, while overlooking our inability to achieve step 1.

I think it's also a "grass is always greener on the other side thing" to believe the majority of other franchises have been more successful than us.

If you measure success by championships, well then 11 team have won a championship since we last did, so 11 teams have been more successful - everyyone else is a loser.

19 teams have made 2 or more Conference Finals since 1999. Sometimes this is just due to seeding (aka in what round to you run into LeBron).

Getting off track - but our inability to build a contender isn't due to financial restraints. Bad team building and injuries have been far bigger issues.

Bingo. A lot of posters seem to think the Bulls are bad because they are cheap. They definitely have earned the reputation for cheapness, but the primary reason the Bulls are bad is that the front office has performed badly. I hope nobody believes that AKME would have put together a championship-contending roster if only they were permitted to pay the luxury tax. They haven't shown they can assemble a roster of players that would make you want to pay it in the first place.

I don't think anybody here thinks that they are bad because they are cheap. It's well known that they're bad because AKME has done an abysmal job. The Reinsdorfs also happen to be cheap. Remember getting rid of Korver when we were contenders? Completely embarrassing move.

[meekrab]

I own shares in the parking lots around the United Center.

[Dan Z]

The simple answer to this is they'd make even more money if they were better. Better tv ratings = better tv contract. More winning = more merch sales. Deeper playoff runs = more $$. Obviously, if they're going deep into the luxury tax to do it, it may negate those increased revenues, but all things being equal, being a better team would mean being a more profitable team.

Further, if making money was the only thing the Reinsdorfs cared about, they'd just sell the team. Jerry bought the franchise for about fifteen bucks and could now sell it for $4-5 billion.

All of this.

I also think, and have done past analysis to support my thinking, but in general teams enter the tax to keep a conteding/winning team together. In the majority of cases - a team is already a contender before needing to pay the tax.

The internet at large seems to be very focused on ownership's (because it is more than just one person) desire to avoid the tax.

The much bigger issue being that we haven't come close (aside from the early 2010's) of building an actual contender.

We're all mad about step 2, while overlooking our inability to achieve step 1.

I think it's also a "grass is always greener on the other side thing" to believe the majority of other franchises have been more successful than us.

If you measure success by championships, well then 11 team have won a championship since we last did, so 11 teams have been more successful - everyyone else is a loser.

19 teams have made 2 or more Conference Finals since 1999. Sometimes this is just due to seeding (aka in what round to you run into LeBron).

Getting off track - but our inability to build a contender isn't due to financial restraints. Bad team building and injuries have been far bigger issues.

Bingo. A lot of posters seem to think the Bulls are bad because they are cheap. They definitely have earned the reputation for cheapness, but the primary reason the Bulls are bad is that the front office has performed badly. I hope nobody believes that AKME would have put together a championship-contending roster if only they were permitted to pay the luxury tax. They haven't shown they can assemble a roster of players that would make you want to pay it in the first place.

AKME isn't bad because the Bulls won't pay the luxury tax, but that does limit what they can do. For example, two years ago I wanted the Bulls to sign Isaiah Hartenstein, but quickly realized that doing so would put the Bulls into the tax. He signed a 2 year 16 million dollar deal with the Knicks. At the time I thought he could back up Vucevic and start from time to time. Then when Vucevic is a free agent he could walk and Hartenstein becomes the starter.

The year before that I suggested signing Jalen Smith who the Pacers got for 3 years 15 million dollar deal. He would add size to a team that needs it.

Both of them are solid role players and would make a difference on this roster.

Aside from the luxury tax the other part of the Bulls ownership being "cheap" is excepting a team that's competitive, but not a serious contender. They don't seem to be willing to take some risks and try a different direction.

If prime Michael Jordan was here then sure they'd pay him, but even when they did Reinsdorf complained about it.

[dougthonus]

Current vets are valuable for leadership.

Think this is one of those fundamental attribution error things. This just isn't valuable.

The team has played better since the terrible start.

With Zach out the rest of the year and Pat having a major injury, it seems like we are highly unlikely to get out of the play-in regardless, and even if we do the value of getting annihilated by one of the top 2 teams seems pretty low, that said, it's not completely without merit to try and chase the play-in / 1st round if the alternative trade value is low enough

Possible trade returns may not be good enough.

Good enough is always an interesting question. What is good enough? Really, you want to set a direction and start going in it, and then good enough is defined as whether it forwards the goals of that direction. There will be good enough trades if we're going to start looking to retool/rebuild around a younger roster and not go with DeMar, because even a 2nd rounder forwards that goal more than letting DeMar walk. However, if we aren't set on a goal and just trying to do whatever feels right, we're far more likely to be in paralysis mode, because there's likely nothing that _significantly_ furthers any goal, just small iterative steps. To take those small steps you need to know where you are going.

If they make the play-in, anything can happen.

If we define anything of getting to the 1st round and then losing, yes. If we define anything as something better than that, the odds are probably sub 1%.

If the team were ever healthy, they would be better.

Not a reason or meaning. We can't even afford to keep this team together as is, let alone add to it. What could have happened doesn't really matter.