NBA Free Agency: Raptors guard Kyle Lowry would bring better Bulls basketball

Coming off of his third straight appearance as an Eastern Conference All-Star, Toronto Raptors guard Kyle Lowry will hit the unrestricted free agency market for the first time.

If you spent any stretch of time watching Kyle Lowry and the Toronto Raptors play basketball last season, you saw the good and the sloppy.

Their style of play acted as pendulum, whose axis swung fully based on the health of their starting point guard. While the Raptors weren’t that bad record-wise without Lowry, they ended up much harder on the eyes.

Following his 11th season of professional basketball this past year, Lowry is set for the biggest payday of his career.

After averaging 10.4 points and 4.8 assists in his first six seasons with the Memphis Grizzlies and Houston Rockets, the guard found good company in Toronto. Averaging 18.2 points and 5.7 assists during his five-year stay with the Raptors has proven fruitful for Lowry. The last two may even be his best, as he’s averaged greater than 20 points per game in the pair.

The Raptors, who have mingled with their own mediocrity, have flourished with the guard. Since joining Toronto, Lowry has missed the playoffs just once and that was during his first season with the team during the 2012-13 campaign.

In terms of a “safe bet” at point guard, Lowry was about as good as it gets last season. He was responsible for only 29 errant passes during the season, while averaging 2.9 turnovers a night. Lowry shoots a sturdy 46.4 percent from the field, while Bulls point guards shot 39.7 percent last season.

Evident by their 14th-ranked assists per game last season, the Bulls lacked offensive creativity on offense. Lowry’s ability to create points would be a welcome sight for Fred Hoidberg’s team scoring efforts.

Additionally, for fellow basketball nerds, Lowry was at the epicenter of a Toronto offense that averaged 1.077 points per possession last season, seventh-best in the league. By that same metric, the Bulls came in 21st with 1.038, the second-worst of any playoff team.

As she goes, it’s a matter of money, more or less

Despite his success as a Raptor and the love from the franchise’s fans, Lowry may cost the league’s lone Canadian club a pretty penny.

Lowry will likely seek max-deal money as perhaps one of the top three point guards hitting the market. Stephen Curry is all but a lock to return to Golden State, making Lowry and Los Angeles Clippers’ defector Chris Paul the hottest names on the free agent point guard network.

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Paul and Lowry are eligible for the same money, so it’s their suitors that will make the difference. For now, Paul is less likely to sign with Chicago. CP3 will likely chase a team on the verge or at the apex of title contention. Lowry, on the other hand, seems to be more likely available to a team a few steps away, like the Bulls.

Lowry declining his $12 million player option for 2017-18 was inevitable. His departure from Toronto? Perhaps, not so inevitable. However, in order to to sign Lowry, the Raptors will have to give a 31-year-old guard a five-year/$205 million contract, which seems hard to stomach. Lowry would likely sign that deal today, but it’s doubtful Toronto will give him that money.

Instead, it could very well be the the guard’s fourth team in twelve years. The max contract that Lowry would see in a different city would surmount to about four years and $152 million.

Next: 2017 NBA Draft: How the Bulls can attack their needs through the draft

Kyle Lowry is an All-Star-level guard when healthy and he would be a huge boost to the Bulls if he were to ink a deal. The availability of Lowry, among others, would be scrapped by the pesky $23.8 million player option of Dwyane Wade.