It’s around this time every year where I like to take the stock on the overall state of the White Sox organization. 2019 has had it’s promising moments, but it’s still generous to call this even a mediocre club. There are a couple of different paths the Sox could take to being a darkhorse contender starting as early as next year that would require an unexpected spike in internal development from our young players, or a willingness to spend big time money in free agency. When looking at the White Sox’s track record this means barring a completely unforeseen change in approach to Free Agency or player development it looks like 2020 will be yet another rebuilding year on the Southside. 2021 is the most realistic time to expect the White Sox to be able to compete for a playoff spot. With that in mind I am going to go through the Sox position by position and see how the individual players are projected to perform come ’21.

For the first part of this project I am going to start with the position players and then I’ll work my way to the pitchers.

5 WAR Tier

3B:Yoan Moncada

The 70 grade, top prospect in baseball, who’s tools were begging for a breakout made his appearance this year. Moncada is on pace for a 5 WAR season and should have been an All-Star this year. It’s more likely than not his BABIP will probably regress in the future, but there is a solid chance that will be more than canceled out by improvement in defense and his right-handed swing. He’s the most important player for at least the three years before he hits free agency. The Red Sox will never regret the Chris Sale trade after he corkscrewed Manny Machado into the ground to win the World Series. That being said Moncada is showing flashes that could easily make this trade a win for our Sox as well.

4 WAR Tier

(intentionally left blank)

This is the part where things start to get scary. While the Sox have plenty of guys who should be league average regulars or a little more, they don’t have anyone who projects particularly close to being that second star to compliment Moncada.

3 WAR Tier

SS: Tim Anderson

I expect Timmy to continue to be the above average player who tantalizes us with potential for stardom that he never quite reaches. Looking at it on a more macro level he’s the perfect continuation from the Alexei Ramirez experience and even Jose Valentin experience if you go a little further back.

Defensively, he’ll boot more balls than he should, but also make some outstanding plays that make up for it. He’s going to post laughably bad walk rates, but make up for it on the bases. The power and batting average will come and go. He might have a season or 2 where everything clicks and he’s an all star and he might have others where it doesn’t and he’ll hover around 1 WAR.

RF: Eloy Jiminez

Eloy has started to find his groove after a rough start to his big league career. He has some of the easiest power you’ll find in the sport and a solid feel for hitting. I expect him to grow into an offensive firepower starting next year.

Still, he is already is a below average glove in the outfield corners and doesn’t have the kind of frame where you can expect his athleticism to age gracefully. Ultimately, he should become one of the better hitters in the American League, yet not quite a star due to having no value outside of the bat.

CF: Luis Robert

Robert is enjoying the healthy breakout season the Sox have been waiting for ever since signing him to a record breaking contract out of Cuba two years ago. The talent was always obvious. He is the proverbial 5 tool prospect, who is putting them all together and become a top 10 prospect.

I toyed with the thought of putting him higher, but there is too much injury risk and swing and miss against top competition for me to project him as anything more than just above average starter going forward.

1B: Andrew Vaughn

Some folks scoffed at the Sox taking a 1^st basemen with the third overall pick after the relative struggles of Collins, Burger, Sheets and others.

I was not a member of this choir. Vaughn is not just some college first baseman, he was a historically great offensive producer at Cal with plus power, hitting, and strike zone judgment. Like Eloy above he has virtually no value outside of his hitting so he won’t become a superstar, however, a guy with this kind of hitting pedigree should at the very least become an above average big league hitter. He could be our new Paul Konerko.

2B: Nick Madrigal

If nothing else I’m cheering for Madrigal for his unorthodox/throw back style. His strike out rate is outlandishly low, and it should be fun to watch him put the ball in play. His ability to make contact means he might be able to hit .300 at least somewhat consistently. Combine that with good defense at a key position, and he ought to be a 3 WAR guy even if he only clubs 5 homers a year.

2 WAR

Probably not a good thing that this is area is left blank either

1 WAR

LF: Luis Basabe/Steele Walker/Blake Rutherford/Luis Gonzalez

All of these guys project as something like 4 outfielders or AAAA players. With that caveat, just one of them needs to overachieve a little bit to become a solid, second rate starter on the southside. Given the Sox’ track record cultivating talent it would be silly to hope for unexpected positive development, but even then the sheer quantity that makes up this list means the math says one should do it.

I have them listed in order of likelihood of becoming perennial 1.5-2 WAR players. Basabe (somewhat surprisingly) is the youngest and regarded as the best defensive player of the bunch. I think his power will come back as he gets further away from his most recent injury. It’s also worth noting that in general it takes switch hitters more time to develop their hitting ability. Gonzalez, Rutherford and Walker all more fall into the category of corner outfielders too old to have not hit well at AA to get excited about. All pretty much have to perform next year or it will be time to think about writing them off.

0 WAR

C: ?

While James McCann’s season has been a pleasant surprise I’m not sure how much of it is sustainable, nor is he under contract for the 2021 season. Looking into the minors doesn’t provide much hope either. Seby Zavala isn’t putting up big numbers in AAA which is worrisome. When guys like Charlie Tilson and Adam Engel hit the cover off the ball in Charlotte, then look completely over-matched when they get to the show, it’s hard to see Zavala being able to make it in the majors.

This is probably the position most likely the White Sox are going to have to acquire talent from outside the organization for their next competitive run.

DH: Micker Adolfo/Zach Collins

I’m not sure if you can find two prospects that personify the White Sox’s inability to identify and cultivate young talent like this duo. Between the former top 10 pick and famous international signing we’ve got a long list of injuries, mis-evaluated defensive ability that led to a slide down the defensive spectrum (that other organizations saw coming), complete with the inability to compensate for the loss with the glove at the plate due to too many strikeouts.

I hold out a little hope that it will click for one of the two of them, but we are very close to reaching the point where we have to add them to the list of disappointments during the Hahn era.

As for the pitching

SP:

5 WAR

Lucas Giolito: I had him at a 4 WAR when I first started working on this project a couple weeks ago as means of protecting myself from regression next year. But even if regression hit, he could still hit 5 WAR with the pace he’s on this year. Giolito has been so legitimately good he deserves some Cy Young votes this year. I think the mechanical changes and confidence in his ability are here to stay, and will make him one of the best starters in baseball going forward.

4 WAR

(see comment from earlier about the position player side 4 war category)

3 WAR

Michael Kopech: It’s hard to project him going forward without seeing how he will from Tommy John surgery. That being said his stuff was as good as anyone’s before the injury and the command was improving as well. If he comes back strong and becomes a borderline ace come 2021 I wouldn’t be surprised. If the TJ is just a sign of things to come and he’s injured again come 2021 I wouldn’t be surprised. The 3 WAR tier is the safe spot between those two zones.

Dylan Cease: 2019 hasn’t been an amazing year for Cease, but his outlook going forward looks about the same. The upper echelon velocity and power curveball mean he shouldn’t have much trouble putting up big strikeout numbers. Still, when you combine that he walks too many guys and the smaller frame you can see why some wonder if he wouldn’t be better off as a power arm coming out of the bullpen. The consensus seems to lean more towards mid rotation arm, and that’s where I’ve got him.

2 WAR

Reynaldo Lopez

This appears to be what Lopez is. A solid #4 or 5 starter who’s value is going to fluctuate a lot depending on if the flyballs he’s giving up leave the park or not. In a perfect world the rest of the more interesting arms develop well so that the Sox can move him to the bullpen and see if he can dominate when he doesn’t have to go through the order a second time. Alas, I wanted to keep expectations as reasonable as possible for this exercise, and Reylo looks like one of the best 5 going forward.

Carlos Rodon or Dane Dunning: More TJ guys with uncertainty. Rodon has pitched a little above this level when he’s been healthy, but as stated above projecting guys coming off that injury can be difficult. If he’s not ready Dunning looked like a future #4 guy before his own elbow gave out. If his stuff comes back he might be ready to hold down the back end of the rotation by 2021.

Bullpen:

I don’t really believe in using WAR to evaluate bullpen pieces going forward, but with the sheer number of live arms the Sox have this projects as a strong unit going forward. Fry and Bummer already make a strong 1/2 coming from the left side and the Sox should turn out at least 1 or 2 good arms between Fulmer, Burdi, Hansen, Lambert, Covey, Cordero, Frare, etc. There’s a decent chance one of the guys currently in the rotation (most likely Cease or Lopez) turn into a weapon out of the bullpen if they get bumped by free agent or trade addition. They can also turn to Free Agency and see if they can do better than Kelvin Herrera this time.

Conclusion:

This core looks decent, but by itself looks like nothing more than just a .500 team. The Sox need to use the next two off-seasons to target the right talent to fill some of these projected holes and get to the next level. It’d be great if the Sox acquired Gerrit Cole, Marcell Ozuna and Yasmani Grandal this offseaon. I want to live in a world where Jerry realizes he doesn’t get to keep his money when he croaks. History says that is not in the cards though. I think it’s not an unreasonable midpoint to think the Sox will make a move for somebody like Grandal who won’t cost a tun, but is a clear plus player moving forward at a position of need. Using 2020 as the final year of evaluating where everyone is at before starting to become buyers on the trade market is not the worst move. If things go to plan the Sox can use 2021 to sign the biggest Free Agent in team history to plug another hole, trade some prospects for another big time player, finally get it right on a relief arm, and we might have ourselves the 2021 AL Central Division Champs.

If the Sox aren’t competitive by that point though, then everyone needs to go. Renteria, Hahn, Kenny, Chris Getz, Steve Stone, South Paw, and have someone from the outside start the rebuild by seeing if they can get even more for Moncada and Giolito than Hahn did for Sale and Eaton.

This next two off-seasons are crucial. Get it right and these 3 or 4 years will be worth it. Get it wrong and we should all think about becoming Padres fans.

For millions of centuries scientists, researches, philosophers, religious prophets and scholars from all over the world have been seeking the answer to one simple question: Which part of America constitutes the Midwest?

I got a team together and made it my life’s mission one simple afternoon in rural Colombia to figure out this question. This team (Editors note: The team consisted of myself, and what I think my cat Chance would think if he were a person instead of a cat) developed a point based system based on several criteria to get to the bottom of this. After thoroughly analyzing each state’s geography, population breakdown, farming trends, political leans, and Big 10 Sports teams the committee came up with a list of the most Midwest places in the world.

The results may surprise you in some cases. This just means you’re wrong. This is pure science. I’m sorry about your invalid opinions.

The core of the Midwest

1(tie). Wisconsin-18 pts

1(tie). Michigan- 18 pts

3. Illinois 17 pts

4(tie). Indiana 16 pts

4(tie) Ohio 16 pts

The ultimate Midwest states wound up being a tie between Michigan and Wisconsin. Both received extra points for being states that touch multiple great lakes. Michigan briefly pulled ahead for a second on the strength of having multiple big 10 Teams, but Wisconsin made up for it with an ever harsher winter and it’s distinctive farming culture.

Despite holding the Midwest’s capital Chicago within it’s borders, Illinois wasn’t able to grab the top spot. The main issue being how noticeably more progressive the state is than it’s more purple brethren.

Indiana and Ohio are boring.

Definite, yet not Core Midwest

6. Minnesota 15 pts

7 (tie). Iowa 13 pts

Parts are definitely Midwest

7 (tie). Pennsylvania 13 pts

9. Missouri 10 pts

Minnesota was the most surprisingly low state on the list. I thought it would’ve made top 5 before doing the exercise. For those wondering why the committee decided to draw the line between core Midwest, and not quite core Midwest at 15.5 points leaving Minnesota on the outside looking in?

Simple. To troll Connor. Chance’s decision not mine.

I thought Iowa would be higher as well, but the Hawkeye State starts to get a ways out west and don’t come particularly close to even touching a Great Lake.

Pennsylvania and Missouri and were the first 2 states where you can start splitting the state into different geographic areas. The Philly area isn’t midwest, but Pittsburgh and the surrounding area serves as a textbook example. Same with Saint Louis. Extremely Midwest. By the time you hit, the Ozarks though the southern draws are strong and Waffle Houses are everywhere. Mizzou doesn’t even play in the Big 10, but the SEC.

Others Receiving Votes

Nebraska 6 pts

The Dakota’s 5 pts

Kansas 4 pts

Kentucky 3 pts

Eastern Nebraska, namely Omaha and Lincoln probably belong in the Midwest. That being said the more extreme rural parts west of Lincoln starts to get into something completely different.

Nebraska, and really all of these other states until Kentucky are examples of why I think there ought to be a clear distinction between Midwest states and Great Plain’s states. A Midwest is a moderate state with a marquee urban center close to or on a Great Lake that serves as the economic hub for the more rural parts of the rest of the state. Great Plain states are noticeably more rural and conservative. Don’t even think of putting Oklahoma in the Midwest.

The Grand Exception

New York 10 pts

This was the biggest surprise from the exercise, but upon further examination it makes sense. Start with Buffalo. Buffalo fits the classic mold of a rustbelt Midwest city. It’s population has dropped post World War II and with the rise of suburbinization. It is on a great lake, has a really harsh winter, and is apparently a great place to be in the summer. It’s also known for it’s segregation. Nothing quite says Midwest quite like like a noticeable economic gap being white and black people!

New York was also the third state to touch more than one great lake (geography is crazy!) other than Michigan and Wisconsin.

Finally, if you remove New York City, the rest of the state would have gone +1 for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election making it about a purple of state as you can find. Just let NYC and the rest of Long Island loose, add Syracuse in the Big 10, and you’ve got a state that’s at least as Midwest as Iowa.

Ultimately we decided just can’t remove a place as grand as New York City when in a situation like this. New York belongs in it’s own category. Let the scholars decide this one.

After the other day’s brief review of some of the biggest moves in the off-season, today I’m diving into a complete breakdown of the biggest moves made by the Bulls since the end of last season.

As always, I will go through and give a grade to each transaction made during this time frame. B-/C+ is the cutoff between a good move and a bad move. In the end I bring it all together with a complete off-season grade.

While this off-season may be the most successful I’ve evaluated since I first took on this exercise a couple years ago, ultimately GarPax yet again failed to earn an even average off-season grade for the first time.

Coaching moves: F+

When it comes to Bulls’ coaching searches I don’t know what’s worse: the process to find one the or the selection itself?

Starting with the obvious: Jim Boylen should not be an NBA coach. Not only is his style is clearly outdated, there is no logical manner to seeing how he is qualified for the job. It’s probably the worst resume of any current coach in the League. He demonstrated no success during his time in college at Utah, and wasn’t under consideration for any other head coaching positions within the Association. He was the top assistant for Fred Hoiberg, who apparently was doing such a poor job that the Bulls had to fire him. If Fred was so bad, why would anyone think his right hand man would be the one to step in and save the day?

Giving Boylen the reigns to the team post Hoiberg made some sense, but nothing during that stretch proved the prior evidence invalid. Under his watch the Bulls had the worst loss in franchise history. For most that would probably be rock bottom, but Boylen managed to one up himself by almost causing a mutiny by having a group of professionals do High School Style toughness drills in the middle of season. Not only has this “old school” approach been phased out by 29 other teams who like using science when making decisions, but shouldn’t we be wondering why $78 million investment Zach Lavine started to have his knee flare up a couple months later? Just wait as John Paxson will continue to blame luck for his team’s injury problems again. Every well run team (and probably most of the other crappy ones) understand the importance of rest, but Boylen is stuck in 1970 trying to be Bobby Knight or something.

To be fair, over the course of the year he developed from easily the worst coach in the NBA, to probably a half step above Mark Jackson and Jason Kidd class. Then again if you let an 8 year old start driving a car, they’d probably be better at it after a month, but does that make it a good idea to start with? Seriously, go through every other head coach in the NBA and let me know which one you think Boylen is better than. Fizdale, maybe? Altman or one of the new guys? The Athletic did a poll asking various questions to 52 current NBA players including “Which coach would least like to play for. Guess who led the pack with 21% of the pack? Our Jimmy Boy! I wonder why Anthony Davis says he would love to play for his hometown team one day, just not now.

It’s not just they went with Boylen though. It’s the process they went through to select him. Why not interview other coaches and see if somebody blows you away? Why not be open to somebody blowing you away with an interview? What exactly did you see in his half year at the helm that made the thought of simply granting an interview to literally anyone else a waste of time? Nobody else does a less thorough job search than GarPax. It should come as no surprise the results always wind up so poorly.

It’s really hard to see the Bulls not giving some games away due to poor coaching. I really think I could’ve given them an F for this. There are two reasons I didn’t. The lesser one being that Boylen did in fact show some improvement, and Zach Lavine offering to pay his fine towards the end of the season showed that at least some of the initial damage he did had been wiped clean.

The more important one, however, was the hiring of Chris Flemming and Roy Rodgers as assistants. Both are really well respected within the league. If the plan is to let Boylen be the “Ra Ra” guy while giving the keys to his more intelligent assistants then there’s at least a path I can see the Bulls having an average coaching staff.

Welcome to being a Bulls fan. No way is this the best decision, but if you squint and bend your head a little bit you can see it working out OK.

Overall Draft Grade: C

John Paxson seemed to think Bulls are set 2-5 long term, and are now in a position in the rebuild to start filling needs instead of choosing the best player available in the draft. I……..don’t agree. This team won 22 games last year. Acting like any of these guys are sure things is nonsense.

I’m lower on Coby White than most. While most have him pegged as our long term answer at the 1, he showed no NBA level Point Guard skills during his time at North Carolina. If his PG skills hover around the Kris Dunn zone of, only passable enough to play the position and nothing more, he then will have to be able to really score efficiently to make it as a starter in the league. I’m not sold on this as he was only average 3 point shooter during his time in college. His funky shooting motion and results in the Summer League don’t offer much reason to think improvement is imminent either. The size and speed is obviously there. The makeup seems like it is as well, so by no means do I think this a guaranteed bust. It’s just there was way more value in potentially trading down to grab a Nickeil Alexander-Walker with another asset or something of that nature. Even if you’re higher on White than I am, you have to admit losing 60 games to get a guy who probably wouldn’t even have been a lottery pick in the draft the year before absolutely stings. Only Zion and maybe Morant could have justified that debacle.

Daniel Gafford was fine in the second round. However, even if he does turn into a rotation worthy player, his skill set is the easiest to find in the league right now. It would be a success if Gafford can become something like Willey Cauley-Stein, but lob men who protect the paint like that are dime a dozen. There is a reason why WCS barely got more than the league minimum in Free Agency this off-season. I would have preferred to see the Bulls take a more calculated roll of the dice on a guy like Bol Bol. Sure the injury history is scary, but to pass on that upside in a weak draft class at the point in the second round was wrong. At 38 the expected Return on Investment is a guy who will be out of the league in 2 or 3 years. Losing Bol to injury was worth the risk.

Free Agency:

Signing Thad Young: C

Signing Thad Young to a 3 year/ $41 million dollar contract makes sense in abstract. Before the off-season began, I would have pegged his true value at something like $40-45 million over the next 3 years. In that sense this is a completely fair deal.

So why the C?

1. By giving him and Satoransky 3 years, the Bulls took themselves out of the 2021 Free Agency game. Even though that third year isn’t fully guaranteed the Bulls will have no meaningful cap space to make any plays on that years Free Agency class.

2. He plays same position as the best long term prospect on our team Lauri Markannan. Lauri at the 5 has been a mess defensively, and neither really plays the 3. So a lot of value will be given away by having him sit on the bench or playing out of position.

3 Doing this deal took away cap flexibility to absorb an Andre Iguodala or Josh Jackson contract later that netted potentially valuable draft picks and young pieces. Those lottery tickets wouldn’t have won more games for the Bulls this year, but could’ve become assets come 2021.

When you factor all those other things in, giving Young a decent contract came at the expense of opportunities elsewhere.

Tomas Satoransky Sign and Trade: B

At 3 years/$31 million this is a pretty solid value for that a guy that fits both perfectly not only a Point Guard, but the kind of point guard you would want next to the young guys already on this team. Satoransky can space the floor, doesn’t need the ball in his hands to be effective, and has the size to take pressure of Lavine defensively in certain match-ups.

This still is not a great deal as the 2^nd round picks going back to Washington take away some of the surplus value. It’s also interesting to note that Tyus Jones and Delon Wright, both of whom I view as better players as Resticted Free Agents at the same position, got less money than Sato.

Signing Luke Kornet: B+

To get a guy who hits 3’s at 36% and blocks shots at above average rate for the Bi-Annual Exception is good value no matter what. Granted other Centers like Kevon Looney, Ed Davis and Richaun Holmes all went for pretty much the same price as it has become super easy to find acceptable bigs in the League on the cheap right now.

Re-sigining Ryan Arcidiacono: A-

The best move of the offseason! Archy can defend both guard positions, splash three’s at an above average rate, and handle the point guard position. I would’ve been fine with doubling his salary.

Overall Grade: C

The Bulls did fine in Free Agency, an OK job in the draft, and continued down the road with their horrible coach. Maybe in a vacuum they deserve a higher grade than this, but when factoring the decisions made the past couple of off-seasons this just makes the GarPax regime look like what it is: directionless.

Working back, it starts with the questionable, yet not unjustifiable decision to move on from Jimmy Butler two off-seasons ago. It was easy to argue the realistic ceiling of the JB/Mirotic Bulls wasn’t championship level. The time had struck to rebuild. Even if you agree with that decision, do you honestly think this team has any kind of realistic championship ceiling now?

Reviewing the roster finds that Zach Lavine is an empty calories scorer. Lauri Markkanen is promising, but still well short of being a star. Kris Dunn is a hair above nothing. Otto Porter Jr. is solid, but not worth more than his contract. Wendell Carter Jr. will be a beast defensively, but was one of the worst offensive players in basketball last year. This “core” is textbook mediocre. If they hit their 60^th percentile projections going forward Porter, Lauri, Lavine, Carter, and White can be the 3rd-7^th best players on a championship team two or three years from now.

That’s semi-exciting I guess, but when there is no realistic path to add stars either via Free Agency or the draft going forward, it begs the question: Why did they decide to rebuild in the first place? So that they can be a 45 win team four years down the road instead of in the present?

As soon as they dumped Butler management should’ve been ready to buckle down and get ready for a bumpy several year ride. Instead it looks like they started to feel their seats get hot, and instead of figuring out how to use cap space to acquire more long-term assets, they instead pivoted to try plug holes and make the team as good as possible for the next season or two. All of that solely to justify their poor decisions from earlier, decreasing their long term ceiling with one low upside move after another.

The silver lining may be that with yet another off-season chasing average in the books GarPax will put themselves in such a bad position that not even Jerry Reinsdorf can go through another rebuild with these two leading the charge. It may be the only hope we have as fans.

Birthday wishes tend to get less flashy as you get older, but wanting a new General Manger for my favorite team sometime within 3 years is my new low. Here’s to the Bulls rebounding like Rodman in my 30’s!

Here are some brief thoughts on some specific teams and trends we saw in this explosive NBA off-season:

With all eyes on Paul George and Kawhi Leonard vs. Lebron James and Anthony Davis in LA the team with the best duo in the state of California still resides in the Bay Area.

The four superstars playing at Staples Center this year make for historically strong 1-2 punches. That being said, both duos possess flaws that make their respective sums less than the Steph Curry-Draymond Green tandem.

With the Lakers it’s 2 main issues. One, Lebron is 35. Even though he might be the best ever to lace them up, last year already started to show that even he won’t be breaking Father Time’s unbeaten record. While there is nobody I would take over him in a Game 7 right now, the mileage he’s accumulated over the years is starting to show. The defensive effort just is not there anymore, and he’s graduated from the Russell Westbrook School of just kind of stand there at the 3 point line with your hands on your knees when you don’t have the ball.

The other problem is that as good as Anthony Davis is, he’s not a true fulcrum offensively. This will be particularly apparent since it looks like the Lakers plan on playing him out of position as a Power Forward. Everyone knows AD is awesome, but he doesn’t go one on one and get his own shot. He’s at his best as rim rolling big man with as much spacing as possible around him. Starting him at the 4 next to Javale McGee takes him away from his greatest strengths as a rim protector and lob man. Lebron and AD are too elite as a duo to truly struggle, but it would not come as any kind of shock if they failed to make it to round 2 of the playoffs.

As for the team they share Staples Center with, it seems like the Clippers are the current title favorites in the eyes of most. Now that I’ve come down after my initial enthusiasm about there two huge moves, I’m not quite sure I see it. Again, Paul George and Kawhi Leonard are great, but like the Lakers’ duo I’m not sure if there won’t be some diminishing returns by having them team up.

I have seen it argued that when you when you combine these two with Patrick Beverly you may get as good of a defensive perimeter as any team in history. That may be true, but there are ways around that. Look at what Lebron’s Cavs and especially what Houston has done the past couple of postseasons against Golden State. They put Lebron, Kyrie, or James Harden in as many picks as possible to get Steph Curry isolated one on one and let him go to work. You don’t think teams will try this strategy with Montrez Harrell, Landry Shamet, and especially Lou Williams? Where are they hiding Lou when Houston comes to town with Westbrook and Harden?

And while both George and Leonard are clear pluses offensively neither really succeeds as a super high usage, ball dominant superstar. Maybe having each other helps in that regard, but neither is known as a plus passer who gets good looks for his teammates. Look at the teams year in and year out that put up the best offensive ratings in the league and it reads like a list of teams with the best point guard play. I’m not sure the Clips aren’t a Kyle Lowry sort of player short of being clear favorites.

You know what team you don’t have to worry about in regards as to how their two best players compliment each other? That’s right, the Warriors. You have a pretty big head start on the rest of the league when you have one guy who is either the first or second best offensive player in the league and you have another that’s the first or second best defensive player in the league. That they’ve got as much experience playing together as anyone in the league with styles that compliment one another to a tee makes that head start even larger. On top of that, I’m expecting more Playoff Draymond Green in the regular season as he chases his super max contract while attempting to prove that they really didn’t need Kevin Durant after all. Remember these guys went 33-4 without KD and with Curry until running into a truly great (and underrated) Toronto Raptors juggernaut in the finals.

True, those teams weren’t also down Klay Thompson, but they didn’t have DeAngelo Russell either. Even without Klay I still think these guys will be a top 5 team. Keep in mind the third best players on the Clippers and Lakers right now are probably Danny Green and Patrick Beverly. I love those two, but they might be all time lows for third wheels on championship teams. Russell has plenty of flaws, but he’s a max contract guy who went to an All Star game last year.

And are we sure Klay isn’t playing next year? I don’t know enough about ACL injuries to comment, but there are guys in the NFL coming back from tears in 8 months now. Can Klay do it in 10? If there were a basketball player I was betting on to do it, it would be him. A starting 5 of Curry, Russell, rusty Klay, Draymond and Looney come playoff time would be the best in the association. Even that team would probably be an Andre Iguodala short of a “true” title team, but with parity at the level it is right now in the league there are no real super teams you have to get past.

Check out the Warriors championship odds and tell me it doesn’t feel just a bit low right now.

Brooklyn is obviously a big winner, but are they as big of a winner as they look? Diving in deeper shows the route they took is not the best way to build a championship roster.

No one in their right mind could state the Nets didn’t have a really strong offseason. However, count me as a skeptic of people claiming that this team projects as some kind of new super team.

It starts with Kyrie Irving. He’s obviously a really good player, but up to this point in his career he’s proven to be more of a championship level #2 option than an alpha offensively, while being a complete liability defensively. When you’re giving a guy a max contract worth 30% of your available cap space you need that player to provide roughly 9 Wins Above Replacement to just break even on that contract (assuming your level for a full replacement level team is roughly 9 wins).

According to Real Plus Minus, probably the best publicly available, all-encompassing player stat available, Irving had his best season ever last year and put up 10.34 wins. Even if you think RPM does a poor job of dispersing fair value for high usage guards (which it might), you also have to keep in mind that it isn’t accounting for his substantial injury history and how his poor leadership made life at his first two stops difficult.  If you look at Irving as a top 20ish player, an all-star but not a superstar projected to produce at a 9-10 WAR/year rate there is virtually no surplus value in his contract. Dedicating 30% of your payroll to him more or less both guarantees that you won’t have Knicks level disaster, but makes constructing a championship level team really difficult around him.

The counter argument used to be Kyrie is just saving himself for the playoffs and that his true value shines in the League’s second season. This past season shows that probably is not the case. Instead, there is more evidence that his postseason success with the Cavaliers stemmed from getting to play Robin to Lebron’s Batman.

Kyrie is just the start though. Kevin Durant has been an awesome player for a long time, but not the second best hooper on the planet the last five years or so as many have claimed. It’s been a half-decade since he’s even the featured player on his own team’s offense! His defense hovers closer to average than All defense contrary to what most people believe (box out JR Smith please!!!!).

Even with that being said KD was worth an easy 35% of the cap if everything had gone to plan. It didn’t though.  It’s shocking how many people act as though this Achilles tear is just a 1 year thing and he’ll be back to normal. It’s maybe the toughest injury in the sport.  He’s going to come back as a 32 year old who has to adjust to a new team.  Time is on neither his nor the team’s side.   If you assume KD was $50 million player in his prime, and comes back at 85%, which I would argue is a pretty rosy projection, he’ll barely have any surplus value on his contract as well.

If there were not enough the Nets also had to play the “sign our friend and overpay him game” with Deandre Jordan. DJ has been a solid center in this league for a while, but if there were a type of player that does not age gracefully it would be the athletically gifted Big Man who has very little basketball skills to fall back on when the athleticism deteriorates (Don’t believe me? Google the recently released Dwight Howard, or check out Ben Wallace’s Bulls numbers).  

To give him $40 million over the next four years gives back a good chunk of the surplus value created by the other two.

The conclusion I draw from Brooklyn’s off-season is that the save a bunch of cap room and recruit free agents to come play for you is an inherently flawed strategy.  Lebron James has warped everyone’s mind that it’s the way to build a championship roster, but it’s not the case.  Lebron was so much better when he went to Miami and came back to Cleveland than all of these guys now. By signing Lebron the team was more or less getting two max players for one when you look at the value he created. By going after the top of this class (with a decent sized asterik for Kawhi Leonard) teams are committing so much to guys who are worth their contracts, but use up so much space that it’s hard to construct a supporting cast to put you into a championship echelon.

The way championship teams really get built is by getting real good players at good prices. Look at the top 3 teams in the East this year, and the best players on their respective teams.  Giannis was the 27^thhighest paid player in the league last year, Kawhi was 34^th, Jimmy Butler was 41^st.  You can afford much stronger supporting casts at the price.  The best recent example would be Steph Curry making $11million/year the first 3 times the Warriors went to the Finals. 

The best way to build a true championship team is to acquire as many draft picks as you can, sign the best of those players to team friendly deals, and fill in any gaps with Iguodala types who are drawn to your teams culture and potential.

The Brooklyn model is more likely to bring you an Westbrook/George version of Oklahoma City kind of team. That style of team has a super high floor with a questionable ceiling. That’s better than most, but it’s not the best way to win a title unless you can convince prime Lebron to join you.

The Celtics have been made out as big losers, but they’re fine.

Trust me when I say nobody would love to pile on the Celtics having a bad off-season more than me, but the truth is they’re not in a worse long term position than in April.

Kemba Walker isn’t quite on the level of Kyrie Irving like some Celtics fans have claimed, but when you factor in they saved some money on the switch it’s pretty close to a wash. 

I also think they got a little lucky with Al Horford.   I love the guy, but there is no way I want to give $27 million a year to a guy who scores so little and will be 37 at the end of his contract. This becomes even more true when you take a look at the contracts other Centers like Kevon Looney and Ed Davis got. Sure, Al is better than those guys, but they are capable starters who make 5 times less money. I’d rather take one of them and spread the $20 million I saved for some difference makers on the wing.

They had a pretty solid draft as well. I like how they traded down to get more bites at the apple, and Langford, Williams and Edwards were all good values relative to where I had them on my draft board.

Boston will probably lose a couple more games this year than they otherwise would have, but their long term outlook is just as rosy as it was before it was clear Kyrie was gone.

Letting the market play out proves to be a better strategy than targeting “Your Guy” Day 1

This point is the number one thing I took away from Free Agency this year. Generally speaking, patience wound up being a virtue for teams that that gave things a day or two rather compared to teams that tried to jump the market.

No team exemplified this phenomenon quite like the New York Knicks:

Within hours they signed 34 year old Taj Gibson to a 2 year/$20 million deal, when instead they could have waited a couple days and topped the 3 years/$15 million pact the Warriors gave 24 year old Taj Gibson (Kevon Looney).

They wasted no time giving Julius Randle 3 years/$63 million when waiting could’ve yielded Delon Wright at 3 years/$29 million and the opportunity to absorb Andre Iguodala’s contract as part of the Kevin Durant-DeAngelo Russell sign and trade deal. This would have plugged more serious holes on the roster, netted a first round pick, and not made any kind of serious difference on the competitiveness of this years team.

Within 24 hours of the opening bell they again splurged, this time on Bobby Portis handing out 2 year/$31 million deal. Had they waited another day they could’ve signed Richaun Holmes for a third of the price. A similar 3 point shooter who actually protects the paint.

It wasn’t just the Knicks though. If I had to analyze NBA Free Agency 2019 in 10 words or less it would be: Deals day one were bad, deals after were good.

Unlike just about every other analytic geek, I didn’t like what Utah did.

I was surprised the reaction to the Mike Conley deal was overwhelmingly positive. Sure, he’s an upgrade over Ricky Rubio, but at what cost? In terms of raw production, I think Utah gave most of the gain back by also including strong role players Jae Crowder and Kyle Korver. In terms of money being paid, is Conley definitely $13-14 million better than Rubio?

The trade is justifiable to that point, but when you include that they had to add 2 first round draft picks to the deal (and Grayson Allen, but he’s a 0 to me) it becomes pretty hard to justify what amounts to a slight upgrade.

That was just the start though. Going from Derrick Favors to Bogan Bogdonavic hurts more than it helps. Having Favors next to Rudy Gobert was always going to be a little redundant, but Favors is still a clearly superior player. Giving Niko Mirotic the 4 year/$73 million dollar contract and moving on from Favors would make sense, but Bogdonavic just is not on that level. Even though there are benefits to having players in roles that more suit their skills, it hurts to take a pretty sizable step back in talent just to transition to a new playing style.

Utah should not be written off as a title contender. It’s just that if they get to that level it will be more a result of the Warriors coming back to earth combined with a larger than expected leap from a player they currently have, in all likelihood Donovan Mitchell.

Trading first round draft picks is back and back with vengeance!!!

Two summers ago it was jarring to see two star players, Paul George and Jimmy Butler, both traded without the team trading away the star getting back more first round picks than they gave up in the deal. First round draft picks were hoarded to an almost unhealthy degree, as teams valued there team friendly contracts at the expense of paying market rates for true stars.

Even last year the only pick the Spurs got back for NBA Finals MVP Kawhi Leonard was the #29 pick in this years draft.

Flash forward to this summer and the difference is stark. Paul George, now two years older (albeit with less fear of him being a rental), gets FIVE first round draft picks with two pick swaps! Even if you want to say the difference in situations make it difficult to compare the two trades, then look at the situation with Anthony Davis. Once again a superstar says he’s going to the Lakers in a year when he reaches free agency. Instead of waiting him out, LA decides to bid against itself and sends out 3 first round picks and 2 more pick swaps (and some interesting young players to boot).

And it’s not just upper echelon stars that are getting multiple first round draft picks. It’s really good Point Guards on the wrong side of 30 with fair contracts are fetching two as well. I mentioned earlier how two 1’s for Conley felt extreme, but the two 1’s and two swaps Houston gave up in their exchange for Westbrook is huge even if you factor in the some of that is offset by getting off of Chris Paul’s contract.

There are two factors that appear to be pushing this drive. One is welcome to a world without the spirit crushing Warriors. As their super team crumbled in the finals, other franchises who had been waiting out that dynasty decided this was the time to move. The door has been as open as its been in at least 3 years.

Another factor I think played a role in this was the success of Brooklyn this past season. After only missing the playoffs for only three seasons following their infamous, terrible trade for Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce in exchange for all of those unprotected draft picks, selling out your future for now seems more palatable. Flags fly forever as they say, and if you’re seen as place that gets the most out of its talent, knows how to treat stars, and plays in a premier market then all you’ll need is cap space and a little luck in order to attract the league’s top players.

Even understanding that call me Goldilocks. There has to be a sweet spot between these two worlds. After a couple years of GM’s being overly concerned about coming ahead on the long term Expected Value of trades instead of pushing the pedal to the metal on championship drives, now it seems like teams are tossing on at least one more lightly protected first round draft pick than they have to. You mean to tell me New Orleans is holding onto AD if Pelinka holds the line at 2 unprotected first rounders? Who did Utah outbid by giving up the second first rounder? OKC wouldn’t have been fine with Shai Gilarious-Alexander, Gallinari and just 3 first round draft picks?

Memphis very quietly had a great off-season.

I touched on it a little bit earlier, but the biggest winners of the off-season weren’t Brooklyn and the 2 LA teams, although they did really well obviously. The biggest winners of the off-season were:

1. The Pelicans for landing Zion, and getting maybe the biggest haul in the history of any trade ever for one year of AD,
2. Oklahoma City for pivoting from a team that looks like it had a low 50 win ceiling and was way over the luxury tax to a team with as much draft capital as we’ve ever seen.
3. Memphis

The job their new management did this off-season was incredible. It started with a little luck, but moving up to #2 in the lottery and getting the opportunity to strike on Ja Morant was just the beginning.

They got a great haul for Mike Conley and with the first of the draft picks they got in that deal got an absolute steal at #21 with Brandon Clarke. He was five on my board and then he went out and may have been the best player in the Summer League this year. He also is a perfect compliment to both Morant and Justin Jackson Junior. Great value.

Where they did their best work was with their cap space though. Andre Iguodala does not have the most egregious of contracts, but they somehow were able to land a future number one for absorbing his deal. Not only did they land a one, but they got Golden State to kick it far enough down the road that it may wind up being a valuable number as Steph Curry will be 36 years old when it’s due up.

That would’ve been more than enough to make it a Grade A off-season, but they topped it off by being able to capitalize on the rampant incompetence taking place in Phoenix. Just taking a roll of the dice on Josh Jackson for Kyle Korver was a sufficient price. That they were able to somehow squeeze 2 second round picks as well as an interesting piece in DeAnthony Melton makes that an awesome trade. They get 4 long shot roll of the dices for a guy they probably would have bought out anyways. None of those moves may pan out, but this is the kind of move smart front offices try.

I went back through my predictions from the beginning of last season to see how my 10 big predicitions from last year came out. So how did I do?

1. Kawaii Leonard stays with the Raptors- Close, but no cigar

2. Kevin Durant will switch teams- Check mark

3. One of Anthony Davis, Russell Westbrook or Giannis will too- 2 out of 3 in fact.

4. Either Danzan Musa or Mitchell Robinson make an all rookie team- Robinson shouldve made first team instead of second. And I still have faith in Musa long term

5. And at least one will have a better career than #2 overall pick Marvin Bagley-I dont think everyone would agree with me on this , but I still think Mitch Rob is a noticably better prospect than Bagley.

6. We get a surprise four seed in the East: The Washington Wizards- Whoooops!!! Skip this one please

7. Someone other than Houston will be the 2 seed out west- Bingo!

8. For only the second time in the last 10 years the finals will be a matchup of #1 seeds- I think this would’ve happened had Fred Van Vleet not shot approximately 96% from the 3 point land against Milwaukee. The Cavs make the playoffs while Lebron and the Lakers watch from home- All credit I built up from saying the Lakers wouldn’t make the playoffs gets washed away by saying Cleveland might.

9. The Cavs make the playoffs while Lebron and the Lakers watch from home- All credit I built up from saying the Lakers wouldn’t make the playoffs gets washed away by saying Cleveland might.

10. The final one was about Jimmy Butler finishing first or second in MVP voting. Let’s just say his situation is a little too fluid to proceed with that one. That being said if there were ever a year for a dark horse MVP to emerge out of relative nowhere this would be it- Nope.

Overall, I was happy with these predictions. I went out on some limbs and feel like I hit at a higher rate than a typical Vegas style sportsbook would’ve predicted.

I also put in my prediction about Leonard staying that Boston and the Lakers would regret not including Jaylen Brown and Brandon Ingram in trade packages for Kawhi. I feel very safe saying that’s the case today!

I’m looking forward to running it back next year.

Below you’ll find my 2019 NBA draft board. Like I normally say, the tier is more important than the actual ranking itself.

Here’s a quick breakdown of each tier:

Super star tiers- Guys who project as top 10, 12-plus WAR producers during their primes. They come around ever 7 years or so.

All-star tier- Guys who project as 9-win, top 25 WAR guys. There is normally 2 or 3 in each class.

Above average starters- 7 or 8 win guys who probably have at least one year where they are viewed as top 50 players in the league. This is what you’re hoping for until about picks 5 or 6 in an average draft.

Average starters- This is what you’re hoping for until about pick 10. Guys who will be in the neighborhood of 50-100 best players in the NBA during their peaks.

Second rate starters- Guys who you probably don’t want starting if your a championship level team, but are content with if you’re not. These are guys who project to be somewhere between 20th-35^th best players at their respective positions. This is what you’re looking for until around pick 20 in the draft.

Bench pieces- A list of the guys who I think can stick in the league for at least 5 years and produce at a level somewhat comfortably above replacement level. This would be picks ~21-35 in a normal draft.

Super star tier:

1. Zion Williamson

All-star tier:

(space intentionally left blank)

Above average Starters

1. Ja Morant.

Average Starters

1. RJ Barrett
2. Sekou Doumbouya***
3. Jarrett Culver
4. Bol Bol
5. Brandon Clarke

Second Rate Starters

1. Deandre Hunter
2. Darius Garland
3. Cam Reddish
4. Romeo Langford
5. Nickeil Alexander-Walker
6. Coby White ***
7. Jackson Hayes
8. Talen Horton-Tucker
9. Keldon Johnson
10. Goga Bitadze
11. Matisse Thybulle
12. Chuma Okeke

Bench Pieces

1. Nassir Little
2. Jontay Porter
3. Grant Williamson
4. KZ Okapala
5. Darius Bazley
6. Darius Washington
7. Dyland Windler
8. Bruno Fernando
9. Tyler Hero
10. Kevin Porter
11. Rui Hachimura
12. Cameron Johnson
13. Ty Jerome
14. Dedric Lawson
15. Nic Claxton

**** I wrote about a lot of these guys in my Bulls off-season preview, but there are 2 guys that I didn’t go into any detail at all that I have ranked considerably higher or lower than most and wanted to take a second on them.

Sekou Doumbouya- He’s the youngest player in this draft and has clear plus tools. The combo of time being on his side with such raw talent means he’s more exciting than a lot of the more heard college names. If he puts on some muscle and fine tunes his shooting stroke, he should be that super versatile forward who can switch across all positions make open shots, kill it in transition and even occasionally go and get his own bucket.

Coby White- Please be gone before the Bulls pick. He’s fast and he can score, but he’s shown very little point guard skills and the jump shot has a low release with just an average % in college. This guy very much looks like a more of a strong guy off the bench than a long term answer at the PG position.

Let me know who you think I’ve got too high or low, either here or on twitter!

So what I would do?

Today is my final installment in my four part series on what I would do if I were running the Bulls this offseason. Please note that I wrote this before the Anthony Davis trade, but the general feeling still applies.

Let’s get started:

I’d start with that Morant trade with Memphis I referenced in my second post. He’s the only guy in this draft I trust to be a long term starter at the point guard position in this draft. The only problem is it’s hard to see exactly how this would line up. I’d imagine they’d ask for Lauri. That’s pretty fair value for both sides, but that’d be just opening up one hole to plug another. Plus, Memphis is at year 1 in a 4 year rebuild, while the Bulls are at year 3 in their 4 year rebuild. Lauri makes more sense on our timeline than theirs.

I would try and turn their attention towards Wendell Carter. He had a rookie year in line with what was expected of him until he got hurt. If he were available in this draft, he would certainly go higher that 7 , but no way would he be enough for the #2 pick by himself. I wouldn’t package him with the 7 pick, but I’d try an offer of Carter, Lavine or Dunn (or both), the 22 pick in a potential trade from Boston, and their 2 2^nd rounders from the Justin Holiday deal back. In the end though, I just see too many moving parts to make this work.

Move # 1- After that failed, I’d trade the 7 pick for Ball. I think Anthony Davis is still getting traded and I find the Lakers to be the most logical trade destination. If Kyrie joins Durant in New York, or leaves for somewhere else it’d be crazy for Boston to include Jayson Tatum in a deal for AD. The Lakers are thirsty for star talent to surround Lebron while he’s still a top 5 player in the world and might not even have to top their offer from the trade deadline now that they lucked into the #4 pick. I think that pick with Ball, Ingram and Kuzma is an overpay for a guy who might join you anyways in 12 months.

Regardless, it’s hard to see Ball playing in New Orleans. I think he would come to Chicago though. The Bulls should squeeze their way into this and make it a 3 way deal. The catch is that Phoenix has the pick just before the Bulls and make a lot of sense as a Ball destination as well. However, not everyone is as high on Ball as I am, so I’m not sure they’d trade the 6 for them especially if Garland falls that far I’ll include sending Kris Dunn to New Orleans in this deal to get it done. With Ball in the fold, Dunn becomes redundant and even more expendable while he still should have some value on a one year flier for the rebuilding Pelicans.

If Ball were in this draft he’d be somewhere between 4 and 7 on my board. When you factor in he plugs the Bulls biggest long term need and that his contract expires in 2 years it makes him a near perfect fit with this roster.

Move #2- I wouldn’t stop my wheeling and dealing on draft day though. After landing Ball I would try and find a way to sneak back into the late lottery so that I could grab either of the guys who I had at 5 and 6 (Clarke and Bol) on my draft board. I wound up combining my salary dump and target a poorly run organization to trade Zach Lavine to ideas.

The projected deal: Lavine to Charlotte for Biyombo and the 12 pick overall.

This would get Charlotte out of Biyombo’s contract and allow them to replace Jeremy Lamb without hardly adding any salary. Charlotte might be the ideal bad organization for targeting a Lavine overpay. They are run by Mitch Kupchack who gave Timofey Mozgov and Luol Deng $138 million dollars three summers ago. He was also the guy who made Kobe Bryant the highest player in the league coming off his Achilles injury. If there was anyone in the league excited to trade for Zach outside of Sacramento this would be my pick.

And with the 12 pick the Bulls select: Brandon Clarke

Move # 3 Now by getting rid of Lavine, the Bulls still have room to take on another bad contract even after taking on Biyombo. So, I’m going to well one more time and this time send Denzel Valentine to Portland for Evan Turner and the 25 pick. I went back and forth on this several times when deciding between what would make more sense from the Trail Blazers perspective: Valentine or a semi protected second rounder.

Ultimately, I went with Valentine for two reasons. One, he has he’s the kind of “second draft” talent their player development staff seems to know how develop as well as anyone else. Whether it was Jusuf Nurkic, Al Faruq-Aminu, or Mo Harkless players tend to make larger than normal jumps when joining Portland. I could see them doing similar work with Denzel. Two, even after trading Turner, re-signing Rodney Hood and Seth Curry will be tough as they don’t have full Bird rights on either. Instead of just hoping Anfernee Simmons is ready to step up and fill their shoes it would be nice to have a guy who when healthy has proven to be an at least average back up. Valentine is only making $3.4 million this year and decent backups get more than that even if Portland’s coaching staff gets nothing more out of him than what the Bulls got.

Getting deeper into the financial breakdown of this, the expected surplus value of the #25 pick in the draft check comes in around 8-9 million dollars according to research done by Nate Silver in this article https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-much-is-winning-the-nba-draft-lottery-really-worth/

However, it is super important to note this piece is five years old and before the cap boom so the surplus value is roughly 80% higher. That being said this draft is seen as especially weak so a solid chunk of that 80% is given back. All in all, $12-13 million sounds about right for expected surplus value on this deal. When you factor in Evan Turner’s contract comes in it 18.5 million it might seem like a net loss for the Bulls especially when you factor in there’ some value with Valentine as well.

This still makes sense for the Bulls though. Turner isn’t a complete 0. He’s an Ok backup. His contract probably overpays him by about the same amount of the expected value of the pick., and the Bulls have to use that cap space somehow. Nobody is going to sign-up to play on this team for less than market value, so if you’re going to have to use it overpay someone might as well get a draft pick with it. I don’t mind overpaying a guy for a year now when we are not expected to be competitive, when there is a good chance it gives us a potentially cheap rotation piece for a team that projects to be much better a few years down the road.

Really though, the ultimate reason why I chose Turner for this trade though is I want to see the GarPax tradition of wildly overpaying for a hometown kid hit year 8 (4 years of Rose, 2 for Wade, 1 for Jabari).

And with the 25 pick the Bulls select: Talen Horton Tucker

A kid with Chicago and Iowa State routes? Is there any chance he goes his entire career without being on the bulls?

Move #4- With the 38^th pick overall the Bulls select Chuma Okeke

It would be awesome to get this much defensive upside with a second round pick. Let’s hope this comes to fruition.

Move # 5- Sign the best shooting guard that I can find with biannual exception. This would be more along the lines of just waiting out the market and see who slipped through the crack and would prioritize playing time over winning. I think a good case scenario would be Wayne Ellingoton, a bad one would be Vince Carter. I’m signing Ellington.

Move #6- Re-sign Ryan Arciodanico for 2 years 10 million dollars total.

He’s shown enough grit, intelligence and shooting ability to comfortably project as a backup at either guard position for the rest of the prime of his career. Again just a 2 year contract though.

Really Rough Projected lineup and minutes per game:

Starters:

PG: Lonzo Ball-28 mins

SG: Wayne Ellington-24 mins

SF: Otto Porter-35 mins

PF: Lauri Markannan-33 mins

C: Wendell Carter-23 mins

Bench:

Evan Turner-20 mins

Ryan Arciodanico-24 mins

Talen Horton Tucker-15 mins

Chandler Hutchinson-15 mins

Brandon Clarke-23 mins

Deep Bench:

Shaquille Harrison

Chuma Okeke

Cristiano Feliciao

Bismack Biyombo

?????Christian Wood/Dragan Bender?????

In all I think it’s clear that I made the team younger, better defensively, and in a position cap wise to be power players two summers from now. True, that this team will in all likelihood struggle to get buckets, even more so than coming into the offseason, but I’d consider it a wash with the defense. Finally, by getting two bites of the apple in the draft, and especially adding Ball there are even more young guys with the potential to breakout. Embrace the strength in numbers.

As for the upcoming season, I’d bet on this team (barely) crawling over the 30 win barrier for the first time post rebuild. The win total will be secondary though. The focus will instead be more on seeing how the young guys develop; both through the expanding of their own skills, as well as how their games mesh with each other.

Two more years until greatness my friends!!!

What do you think?

I expect the Bulls to be at least somewhat active here, but I wouldn’t. Shopping for a nice stopgap options is pretty much putting lipstick on a pig at this point. I could very easily see the Bulls using their cap space on a couple of serviceable veterans to help push the Bulls from a bad 29 win team to a below average 34 one.

If the Bulls do play the Free Agent game the big thing to keep in mind is since there is no real rational way of looking at the current squad and seeing them as a good team the next two years the focus should be on the summer of 2021. NO CONTRACT SHOULD HAVE MORE THAN 2 YEARS GUARANTEED!

That’s also the time that Porter can opt out of his contract and Lauri will be coming off his rookie contract. Just lay in the weeds until then as that will be the summer to make moves in free agency in what should be a fairly star studded class. The theme of the summer should be accumulate enough assets that project to help in 2021 and beyond ,while not doing anything to make the product better now at the expense of that time-frame. Free Agency is inherently a market where generally you hope to get enough surplus value in the first part of a contract to make up for the overpay on the second part of the contract……the exact opposite attitude the Bulls should have when approaching their roster this summer.

All in all, I’d try to use any cap space to absorb bad contracts that have draft picks attached to them. There is a greater chance a draft pick, even one in the 20’s or an early second rounder ultimately makes the Bulls more competitive in the first half of the next decade than any Free Agent would.

That being said there are a handful of guys I wouldn’t mind seeing the Bulls target. Here they are by group they belong in

Stop Gap Point Guards:

Kris Dunn is already 25 and is a Free Agent after next season. He offers virtually nothing when he doesn’t have the ball in his hands, and isn’t nearly efficient or creative enough to be given the keys to the offense. His defense is terrific, but it’s hard to look at him and see anything more than a backup who doesn’t really fit with the other pieces on the team. I think he is the Bull most likely to be traded, and even if he isn’t it wouldn’t be a bad idea to search for an upgrade if it came at the right price.

When it comes to Point Guards there are a couple of things I’m looking for. (other than willingness to only take a 2 year contract)

In order they are:

1. 3 point shooting
2. Ability to setup and help develop big men
3. Defensive ability
4. Create buckets
5. Veteran leadership. A good presence in the locker room.

With Lavine, Porter and Lauri, we have a stable of somewhat young guys who are capable of making plays for themselves. Let’s see what these guys look like when we expand this role more, and figure out if they can do even more when provided with a little more spacing. I want a Point Guard who doesn’t need the ball in his hands to be a plus player. Spacing and defense is key.

At the same time, the Bulls were one of the worst passing teams in the league last year. This hurts the development of the young big’s. If we want to get the most out of Lauri and Carter we should get a point guard who is a half step ahead and puts them in the best position to succeed.

The Bulls were also one of the worst defensive teams in basketball last year. By taking Dunn’s minutes away we project even worse on that end. It would be nice to have a defensive strategy that wasn’t too reliant on a 20 year old to always be in the right position to make up for other player’s mistakes.

Of course any player that checks all of these boxes would be at least a borderline star and probably out of the Bulls pay range. That being said there are a couple of good options that check most of the boxes and might even prove to be bargins. My favorites would be 1 and 3 on this list:

Ricky Rubio: As a 28 year old point guard he’s a little old for the Bulls timeline, but for 2 years he’d be a real good fit. He’s one of the best defensive point guards in the league (he’s rated in the top 12 every year in Defensive RPM for the last 5 years) and is the kind of creator that will set up Markkanen and Carter to aid their development. I’ve read in a coupe spots online that his next contract might come in south of 15 million dollars/year. In this market that should be about the floor of what a league average starter should net. I think Rubio is at least an average starter and probably more. If you could get him for 2/$32 million there might actually be some surplus value in that contract and could potentially make him valuable during a trade next year.

Darren Collison: He’s simple. A true stopgap option who has proven he can play next to a ball dominant 2 guard (although Lavine is no Oladipo). He’s already probably a negative defensively, and projects as worse than that going forward as a guy who relies a tun on speed who’s already on the wrong side of 30. Still his 3 point shooting should makes him reliable enough that 2 years at 20-25 million wouldn’t hurt.

Patrick Beverly: I don’t know what kind of salary he is searching for, but Beverly may be the perfect combo of first 2 players on this list. He’s every bit the defender Rubio is and probably a little more, while bringing similar spacing to Collison. I think he might be as good as Rubio, but guys who play point guard and average 9 points per game tend not to make big bucks. If the market doesnt pay him what he’s truly worth, I say bring the hometown kid home to help with the youth movement.

Tomas Staroansky- A Restricted Free Agent who I have some interest in. With the Wizards probably wanting to keep salary low I could see him being let free. He at least moderately checks all of the boxes that I’m looking for, but I just don’t know at what price. As a rule RFA’s tend to have to get paid too much in order for their original teams not to match the offer though. It’s a situation I would keep my mind on as the offseason progressed.

Guys I don’t want:

Derrick Rose- It’s a cute thought, but he’s the exact kind of PG I want the Bulls ignoring.

Terry Rozier- I’ve seen in some places that he might get all the way up to the 15 million dollars per season range. That’s crazy to me for a guy I’m not even sure would be an upgrade over Dunn in the first place. Other than his fun playoff run replacing Kyrie Irving last year, he’s been about as average as it gets. I wouldn’t mind rolling the dice on him on a 1 year 10 million dollar kind of deal, but he’s no kind of long term answer at the position and overlaps with a lot of the guys we already have on the roster.

Wings that could provide some depth:

Justin Holiday, Kentavious Calwell-Pope or Wayne Ellington

I stated in my piece the other day how one of my goals was to sell high on Zach Lavine to the least analytical team that I could find. If the Bulls were to move on from him, however, that would leave a lot of minutes at the 2 wide open without any strong in house replacements. Again the qualities I’m l targeting would be guys who could space the floor to let the younger guys go to work, and if they provided a little defense on top of that without getting into 8 figures, perfect! I feel like all 3 of the guys listed above at least semi fit that description

Versitile Forwards:

Jake Layman or Jared Dudley:

One thing I’d like to see the Bulls do more of is put Lauri at the five and a interchangeable floor stretching forward next to Otto Porter. Both of these guys would fit that bill and should not come at too high of a cost.

Semi interesting young bigs:

Kevon Looney, Khem Birch and Christian Wood

The Bulls currently don’t have an even replacement level backup at the 4 nor 5 on their roster. All of these guys showed flashes of being potentially being serviceable starters for various stretches last season. Looney is clear role player who played an important role for the Warriors. Birch taking Mo Bamba’s backup center minutes in Orlando was one of the keys that spurred their late season playoff run. Wood put up some huge numbers in some of the most tanktastic games this March and April for the Pelicans. None of these guys will probably run even 10 million total for over 2 years, and there is a chance one of the last 2 will be available for the minimum.

Again though, we are not in any kind of position to be taking big swings in free agency. Hopefully, it gets used as nothing more than a tool for filling a hole or 2 in the rotation to plug holes that might otherwise go to Antonio Blakeney level awful players.

Trade targets:

This is the second part in a series of what I would do if I were in charge of the Bulls. We’ll dive into some potential draft day deals, bad contracts we could potentially take on with draft picks, some buy low targets on other teams, and the guy on the Bulls I’d try to sell high on.

Trades based on the #7 pick:

Normally with where Bulls are in rebuild there is more value in holding on to this pick and swinging for fences. However, with it being hard to find a good fit at 7 there are a couple of guys I’d make phone calls on involving first round picks. The one thing that I’m looking for is youth/and a contract that ends in 2 plus years (More of this later).

This list includes-

Lonzo Ball:

The last time the Lakers dumped a #2 pick point guard after two disappointing years it worked out pretty well for the big market team that got him. Lonzo has a lot of the things I’m looking for in a change of scene prospect. He does everything at least pretty well except shoot, which is the skill most likely to develop over time. After the Lakers’ semi regime change, he may be even more available than he was before. And if the Lakers are as much of dumpster fire as they appear, this would be a great time to buy low.

Count me in Lonzo. He’s a truly great defensive point guard already and the passing skills are elite. He has terrific size for the position and he’s a better athlete than given credit for. The one weakness is huge and very noticeable, but if that jump shot ever comes around I think he could still develop into an all-star. I referenced him earlier, but again look at D’Angelo Russell. It’s hard playing point guard at the NBA level, and the time it takes longer to develop there is longer than any other position. If LA loses patience we should swoop in.

Mikal Evans:

I had him 7 on my board last year in a much stronger draft. Then he went out and had the exact kind of year I expected him to have. The Suns may be down to explore a trade involving him as they too have remade their front office since he was drafted and have a glut of players on the wing.

Robert Covington (maybe):

If the T’Wolves decide to rebuild all the way around Karl Anthony Towns I’d make a play at Covington. Age wise he doesnt make the most sense, but I think he might be best regular season perimeter defender in basketball as well as being a plus 3 point shooter. His contract pays him like like a low end starter/ good backup, but I think he could be the 3^rd or 4^th best player on a championship team. I would not trade him straight up for the 7 pick, but if the knee checks out I’d try and see how many 2^nd round picks it would take to set him free

Memphis’s 1^st round draft pick to select Ja Morant:

The Bulls should at least inquire about what it would take to acquire the #2 pick. It’s no big secret that the Bulls have a gaping long term hole at the Point Guard position, and I have no confidence in anyone else being able to fill it from this draft other than Morant. I’ll get into what I think it would take to get him in a post coming soon, but there is some potential here.

Michael Porter and Mohammed Bamba:

These two guys were higher than seven on my draft board last year in much stronger drafts and then had disappointing rookie campaigns filled with injuries and now the #7 pick seems like it might be a little high for both of them. That being said I still see (albeit small) all-star potential in both of them. I think they’d be worth a phone call to gauge if there were any opportunity to buy low.

Guys who might be worth a second round pick or a quick flier on:

Dragan Bender:

While there is probably nothing here, I wouldn’t mind seeing if his poor play was more a function of the abysmal environment he’s been in his entire career. This is still a 7 footer who at times has shown the ability to block shots and shoot 3’s and is young enough that he has time to put it together.

Dznan Musa:

He was one of my sleepers in last years draft. He would up getting picked at 29 by the Nets and barely played. If Brooklyn needed a little cap space or have decided he’s too far buried on their depth chart and were ready to move on I’d throw the lesser of our 2 second round picks in the 2020 draft on him.

Salary Dump targets.

This is a list of a couple of guys other teams might attach draft picks with either to avoid the luxury tax, or create cap room to sign free agents:

Dennis Schroeder, Bismack Biyombo and Evan Turner:

Are Oklahoma City and Portland going to continue to pay the luxury tax in small markets when it looks like they might be behind Utah and Denver, probably behind Houston and almost assuredly behind Golden State with both LA teams potentially adding superstars to already decent cores? I wouldn’t say certainly one way or the other, but the Bulls should jump if either team offers a #1 for either of these guys.

As for Biyombo, if Kemba Walker goes back to Charlotte that would likely put them in the luxury tax. Michael Jordan has never paid the luxury tax. I’d help him avoid it again by taking on Biyombo’s contract if he put enough of sweetener on top of it.

Alan Crabbe and Dion Waiters:

If Dragic and Whiteside opt out of their deals the Heat could get into a point where they’d just have to dump a Waiters or Johnson to be in range for elite free agents.

It’s a similar story with Crabbe. He’d probably come with a first round draft pick if his salary was all that was getting in the way from Brooklyn adding a player like Jimmy Butler.

You can also put Dalino Gallinari in this group. However, he’s on a pretty fair contract. I’ll include him on the off chance the Clips would attach anything of value with him to sign a second max free agent this summer.

The trade I would definitely make, but the Bulls won’t:

Zach Lavine for anything more than a second round pick:

Zach had a better year than I expected, but he’s still pretty much just an empty calories scorer. Even with his improved ability getting to the rim and free throw line, most advanced metrics only had him as a 3-5 win player. Guys like that get 10 to 15 million dollars a year not the $19.5 Lavine gets. Now with that being said, he’s still young, has gotten better every year, has tantalizing physical gifts, will be another year removed from a major knee injury, and might be more productive in a role where he’s not asked to do so much offensively. His biggest weakness is off the ball defense, but that might be one of the things that’s most likely to improve with further experience. Add it all up and I’d say there is something like a 30-40% chance he actually winds up being worth his contract, which is double I would’ve said a year ago. Still I think there are enough poorly run teams that get too excited by big scoring numbers from shooting guards that you might get something fun for him. Unfortunately, the Bulls are one of those poorly run teams that are too excited about big scoring numbers from shooting guards.

If it were up to me, I’d trade him to the least data driven team you can find.

A good example being: Lavine and the #7 for Bradley Beal.

Trades I wouldn’t make, but Bulls might:

Mike Conley and Jrue Holiday

Both of these guys are good and would help the Bulls win next year, but chasing the 8 seed at the expense of potential surplus value a couple years down the road is the exact kind of move I want the Bulls to be avoiding. I think even GarPax realizes this, but if they feel like their seats are getting hot enough, a Conley for the #7 pick and Felicao is the desperate, win now trade this duo could make. It’s not that it’s bad value as much as not understanding where we are at on the win curve.

Whether it comes via a trade or free agency I expect the front office to add at least one veteran for the sake of making the team more competitive next year. The team has stated so, and with season ticket sales and viewership plummeting making a team that is at least somewhat interesting will probably be a priority. Making moves to make your team more popular with the fan base isn’t how smart organizations function, but if being more competitive does not come at the expense of cap room for 2021 or getting rid of anymore draft picks it’s at least a defensible move.

I’ll get into free agency more in my next piece.

With this exercise I intend to go through the offseason as if I were the one guiding the ship for our Chicago Bulls. Along the journey, I’ll try to point out what I expect management to do as well. Keep in mind these are two very different approaches. For example, John Paxson is on record as saying he believes the Bulls are more or less set at the 2-5 long term, and appears to think the Bulls are in a position to start focusing on positional need in the draft instead of best player available…….I don’t.

Let’s get started with the draft.:

And yeah it’s not pretty. My top 3 is pretty chalk so I won’t go into much detail about them, but:

I’ve got Zion as my easy number 1. He’s a clear top choice in most drafts and I project him to be a top 10 player in the league within 5 years. Ja Morant is an easy #2 in this draft. However, he wouldn’t have made my top 5 last year and is probably more of a true #3/4 most years. I believe in the D’Aron Fox comps he draws. RJ Barrett is a tier below. Some say he’s overrated, but give me a guy who scored like he did in the ACC playing as an 18 year old the entire season. If he can improve his shooting and play less hero ball he should be a clear plus starter.

There are 3 more players who I think are acceptable value and would be worth a roll of the dice at 7 even in a stronger draft :

4. Jarret Culver- He comes from the Jimmy Butler/Kawhi Leonard mold of guys I like targeting. All were lightly recruited out of high school, have clear plus physical tools, and are seen more as defense first prospects who struggle with shooting. I think the improvement shown in their games during their time in college stems at least in part from a strong work ethic, and it makes taking the leap as a pro that much more likely. And if there is one particular skill of a player’s game I think he’s likely to get better at as he ages it’s jump shooting. He was still too inefficient in college for me to fall in love with, but I can easily see him starting in the league for a decade.

5. Brandon Clarke- One of the most confusing prospects I’ve come across evaluating. On one hand he’s a 6’8” center with a tiny wingspan and is one of the oldest players in the draft coming in at 23 years old. On the other hand he just put up the second best Box Score Plus Minus in college basketball the last seven years. Only Zion’s was better. Anthony Davis and Karl Anthony Towns check in at 3 and 4. That’s some truly elite company. I think there’s enough potential as a guy who can protect the rim, switch on to anyone and be a strong roll-man in the P&R to provide value at 7.

6. Bol Bol- Kristaps Porzingas. That’s the only other player I can think of with his size, speed, shot blocking ability and ability to shoot from 3. The comp gets even more real when you factor in the injury risk involved with the players. While I don’t think he projects quite as well as KP even if he weren’t injured, taking stabs at players who have medical red flags is a market inefficiency. Joel Embiid went 3 instead of 1 purely because teams were scared to roll the dice on someone who was such an injury risk (and it’s hard to fault them when they I’m not the one making the multi million dollar investment). I think Bol is a fine pick at 4, but he’s way more likely to get taken around 14 from mock drafts I’ve seen.

As for the other names you hear around 7. Darius Garland is an undersized point guard coming off a serious knee injury and a negative Assist to Turnover ratio in 5 college games. Looks more like a future backup than guy I’d take at 4. Deandre Hunter is already 21 and is overrated defensively. More of a late lottery guy for me. Little, Langford and Reddish clearly have the physical tools to play on the wings, but struggled mightily with consistency and no proof of a reliable enough jump shot. All of them are more or less mid 1^st round type of talents to me (except I might have Reddish a little higher). Coby White hasn’t shown any point guard skills and Jaxson Hayes is just a project. Some of these guys will go in the top 10 justifiably in this draft cause it is so weak, but none of these guys listed would’ve sniffed my top 10 list last year.

Other ideas:

My favorite move would probably be to trade down and get two bites at the apple. The Celtics are the team that would probably make the most sense if this were to happen. They’ve got the 14^th and 22^nd (not to mention the 18^th ) picks in the draft. Depending on the draft chart you’re using that would be viewed as an equal trade or close to it.

Not only do you get two bites at the apple, but there is a real good chance that at least one of Bol and Clarke, guys I might’ve taken at 7, are available at 14. I did a quick composite draft board of these guys and both were projected to go right at #14. If Boston has someone they love fall to #7 I’d do that deal in a heartbeat.

If the Bulls do trade down either with Boston or pick up another late first round draft pick in a salary dump (more on this on my next piece) here are the guys I’d give long looks at.

Matisse Thybulle- Unreal defensive presence. Put up some of the most dominant steal and block shot numbers in college basketball history this year. That being said the zone defense he plays in tends to not translate as well to the pros, and his offensive game is borderline nonexistent especially for a prospect his age. Still, I think there is a pretty strong chance he can become an Andre Roberson like asset to the team that drafts him.

Talen Horton Tucker- Youngest player in the draft who has a real unique game. I think sometimes organizations struggle with taking talented players with unorthodox playing styles and builds like this, because they don’t see how they fit into a traditional system. I say take a shot on the PJ Tucker, Marcus Smart kind of player. He’s a Chicago kid too.

Keldon Johnson- I have seen him all over draft boards from potential lottery pick, to early 2^nd rounder. The eye test probably says more of the former, while the numbers probably say more than the latter. Normally I lean towards what the analytics say, but there is nothing I love more than targeting Jon Callipari guys. I don’t think there is a coach in America that gets less out of elite talent year in and year out than him. With the energy he plays with and 3 point touch demonstrated he’d be somewhere around 15 of my draft board this year.

2^nd round plays

Finally we have a second round draft pick from Memphis, coming in at #38, that we got in the Justin Holiday deal. There are 2 guys I’m really looking at here:

Chuma Okeke- His block and steal numbers portray a more dominant college defender than the much more highly regarded DeAndre Hunter. He’s a little younger too. Plus, as I said earlier I find their to be a lot of value in targeting guys who some teams may shy away from due to injury concerns. If Hunter goes top five it’d be crazy if Okeke got to the second round. Kevin Pelton’s stat only projections has him as the third ranked player in this class.

Johntay Porter- Another guy fear of injuries may be creating value. Porter would’ve been a mid first round pick last year (he was my dream at 22, that tuned into Chandler Hutchinson), and came into the year as a top 10 prospect. However, he blew out his knee twice. While that obviously hurts his development, and it’s hard to have faith in him being healthy going forward, that he projected as a long term starter a year ago means he’s still a first round talent in this draft class for me. He’d be terrific value at 38.

I’ll be following up in a couple days with a post on some trade targets I’d like to see the Bulls pursue. I’m thinking this will be a 4 part series, but we’ll see how it goes.