Chicago Bulls: 3 players with a lot to prove in group workouts

3) Chicago Bulls players with a lot to prove in group workouts: Chandler Hutchison

The Bulls don’t have any spot in the rotation that presents more of a position of need than on the wing. They don’t have much depth to rely on a consistent basis with any of their wings on the current roster. The two true small forwards, Otto Porter Jr. and former Boise State Bronco Chandler Hutchison, haven’t stayed healthy on a reliable basis at all over the course of the last two seasons or so.

The 24-year-old 6-foot-7 and 210 pound Mission Viejo, CA, native Hutchison has a lot of parts of his game that can give the idea of a lot of promise as he enters the prime years of his career. But Hutch should’ve had a shorter learning curve in the early portion of his NBA career since he was a four-year player with the Boise State hoops program.

There’s also the concern of the track record of injuries that Hutch had since landing with the Bulls as the 22nd overall pick in the first round of the 2018 NBA Draft. He missed much of the 2019-20 season with the same upper-body ailments that largely plagued him over the course of the last two years. Hutch only played in 28 games during the 2019-20 season (10 of which he started).

He averaged 7.8 points per game, 3.9 rebounds, 0.9 assists, 1.0 steals, and 0.3 blocks. Hutch shot 45.7 percent from the field, 31.6 percent from beyond the arc, and 59.0 percent from the free-throw line. He’ll need to show that he can stay healthy, and just that his game is improving heading into the third year of his rookie contract, for Hutch to stick around with the 15-man roster for all that much longer.