Chicago Bulls: Challenging for the playoffs a realistic expectation?

Can the Chicago Bulls do enough with an upgraded roster and another year of growth to make a true playoff run in the Eastern Conference?

Making a big enough leap up the Eastern Conference standings for the Chicago Bulls means likely getting around 15 more wins that this team had last season. While the Bulls did improve the rotation up and down a lot this offseason, that is still going to be a really hard jump to make.

Staying healthy would be a great start for the Bulls, albeit one that is mostly out of the control of head coach Jim Boylen and his players. Staving off the injury bug is more a good bit of luck than anything else. Granted, the Bulls were wise to rest a lot of their better players, like power forward Lauri Markkanen and shooting guard Zach LaVine, down the stretch last season.

A general over/under for win totals for the Bulls for this coming regular season is around 31-33. The latter is more on the high side. But that does seem to slight the Bulls since the roster did improve up and down and the front office just gave G-League level players more exposure in the final month of the 2018-19 campaign.

Just keeping the same team that the Bulls had last season healthy for 2019-20 might’ve been enough to make an eight or 10 win leap. The real question is whether the difference of adding talents like rookie point guard Coby White, veteran forward Thaddeus Young, 6-foot-7 combo guard Tomas Satoransky, etc. will make enough of a difference to get those extra five or six wins at least to vault the Bulls into firm playoff contention.

If the Bulls do get at least three of the key pieces of their young core to play at a minimum of 60-70 games this season, surpassing the 30-win mark should be no problem. The Bulls won 22 games last season with Lauri, Zach, and center Wendell Carter Jr. all missing at least the final month roughly of the regular season.

A much weaker East this season than last should also play to the Bulls benefit in terms of easily surpassing that 30-win mark. The Central Division is much more difficult than the Southeast with the Milwaukee Bucks potentially running the entire conference this season, but the Bulls could make a run past the Detroit Pistons.

According to the 538 NBA Predictions for the 2019-20 regular season, the Bulls do have a 55 percent chance to making the playoffs. Although the 538 predictions did only give the Bulls a projected win total of 38.

With all these pieces of information in mind, the Chicago Bulls should find themselves in a good position to win at least 36-38 games this coming season. If 38 wins is all it takes for the Bulls to claim an eight seed in the East, then there’s a better shot than not that this team is in the playoffs by season’s end. That is if the core is able to mostly stay healthy (more so than last season at least).