Pickled Prunes wrote:You are there and I'm not, so I'll have to take your word for it on how casual fans in CHI think about the game. I can tell you that in POR and LAL (the two cities where I have lived for extended periods) the casual fans are morons.
There are certainly a lot of morons here too, but probably 50% of the tickets are season ticket holders whom are mostly pissed about the continuity, watch every game, and aren't enthralled. Even when they've been one of the worst teams in the league for 3+ years, they've still been at the top of attendance in the league (even well post Jordan) because Chicago's just a big city.
As far as how DeMar plays the game... I think he is brilliant in the mid-range so he lives there. He is smart enough to play to his strengths and more often than not he makes the right pass. He has a lot of qualities you would hope rub off on the kids. And while lottery balls can be helpful, what kind of work ethic do you think they're learning in WAS or DET?
This is a totally different debate, and I agree you don't want a culture full of jackasess and what not, but the Bulls young players are all grinders already. I don't think they need DeMar to teach them that. I think in terms of picking up moves / habits / in play thoughts, that you can get that with good coaches and film breakdown and don't think people overstate the value of a veteran to do that stuff.
What will help them more is getting way more reps, taking more shots, being in those difficult situations themselves rather than watching someone else do it (my opinion based on literally anything I've ever learned).
But yeah, they should have traded DeMar and Caruso last December... and LaVine the moment he was selected to his first all star team. That ship has sailed. I don't think the money is an issue because (hopefully) they will be trading LaVine for expiring deals and Lonzo will be coming off the books.
Money is a big issue this year, next year it should be looser, if both those things you mentioned happen.
Do you think CHI fans could deal with a year of Ben Simmons health updates? That is the only trade where I see CHI getting multiple 1sts for LaVine.
TBH, like you infer above, I think it is hard to say. The die hard fans (and those are ones I would interact with a ton more via my podcast / forum posting) are all ready for a rebuild. The casuals? who knows. They've always been able to sustain attendance in rebuilds, but I think the front office has good cover to do it if they wanted to.
From a practical perspective, they don't want to though. I think AK knows he won't survive a rebuild.