3 reasons Arturas Karnisovas is exactly what the Chicago Bulls need

3. Roster construction from the bottom-up is what he does

International scouting is something that Karnisovas does very well. He was the director of the Adidas Eurocamp in 2011 and 2012. And he was an international scout from 2008-2013 with the Houston Rockets. During that time, the Rockets were able to select players like eventual Bulls floor spacing forward Nikola Mirotic. And the Rockets picked up center Clint Capela in the draft one year after Karnisovas left.

During that time they also took a flier out on the likes of forward Donatas Motiejunas and big man Omer Asik. Neither Motiejunas nor Asik were stars in the NBA, but they were quality contributors that the Rockets didn’t have to invest much in to get a lot of value out of. That is the type of scouting and roster building that Karnisovas, Daryl Morey and the Rockets could do in the early 2010’s.

After his time with the Rockets scouting department was over, Karnisovas would become the Nuggets assistant general manager in 2013. He’s held a similar position since then, and steadily found more success as time moved along. Karnisovas was officially promoted to become the full general manager during the 2017 offseason.

The Nuggets were in the process of building a five-season streak where they would win more games than the last.