Three teams appear to be in the running at the moment to trade up to the No. 2 slot in the draft lottery, including the Chicago Bulls.
The discussions surrounding who the Chicago Bulls could take in the fourth slot in the 2020 NBA Draft Lottery gets a bit murky when you add in the possibility of newly hired executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas trading up or down. No concrete reports have really ruled out the possibility that Karnisovas and the Bulls will move out of the four slot in this draft.
Quite the opposite actually.
in the latest edition of Jonathan Givony’s 2020 mock draft from ESPN (paid content) this week, he mentioned the Bulls and their divisional foe Detroit Pistons (along with the New York Knicks) as three potential contenders to move up into the top two in the lottery. Givony specifically cited the Bulls, Pistons, and Knicks as teams that are “among the candidates” to trade with the Golden State Warriors to snag the second overall pick in this draft lottery.
It is pretty clear that the Knicks would be looking to get the former Illawarra Hawks point guard LaMelo Ball (at least as it stands now), if they were to move into the two spot for the Warriors. The Pistons could take LaMelo, or start rebuilding around the likes of former Georgia shooting guard Anthony Edwards or Memphis center James Wiseman.
The Bulls have a less clear set of draft targets in mind than a team like the Knicks does if they were to move into the top three. Really the only bit of clarity was the report that the Bulls have had no contact with Edwards up to this point. Wiseman and Ball could very well still be in play for the Bulls.
Sticking in their original four slot in the draft lottery, the Bulls are projected to pick the former Maccabi Tel Aviv shooting guard/wing Deni Avdija. There’s a lot of mock drafts at this point of the offseason that have the Bulls taking Avdija if they don’t trade up or down.
The Bulls hold the fourth overall pick in the lottery and the original Memphis Grizzlies 44th overall pick in the second round. Last year, they picked former North Carolina Tar Heels point guard Coby White seventh overall and former Arkansas Razorbacks center Daniel Gafford 38th overall in the second round.