On the night of May 6, first-year head coach Billy Donovan and the Chicago Bulls might get their final chance to make a push for a spot in the NBA’s play-in tournament later this month. Donovan and the Bulls will hit the road to travel to North Carolina to face the Charlotte Hornets on May 6, to try and take the season series.
But it won’t come easy for the Bulls as they’ve built up a four-game losing streak at one of the key points of the regular season schedule. This was a bad time for the Bulls to start collapsing down the stretch. Granted, part of that was anticipated given the recent absences of their star duo of shooting guard Zach LaVine and center Nikola Vucevic.
Vooch has missed the last two games for the Bulls, and LaVine was up to roughly a dozen due to a violation of the league’s health and safety protocols a few weeks back. But LaVine is set to make his return to the starting five for Donovan and the Bulls as they try and stay alive in the race to land that final spot for the play-in tournament in the Eastern Conference against the Hornets on May 6.
Billy Donovan and the Chicago Bulls now building for the offseason
While it might be nice to see the Bulls in a spot in the play-in tournament, it’s not very likely at this point. What might make more sense for Donovan and the Bulls is trying to position themselves in the best way possible in the draft lottery odds this year.
Moreover, this just wasn’t the way that a lot of Bulls fans envisioned this team finishing out the season with all of the front office and coaching staff changes that were enacted last offseason. And with all of the moves made at the trade deadline, there was a lot of confidence in the direction of this team heading into the final stretch run. But nothing of the sort has materialized in terms of success in the win column of late.
Here’s a look into three players that are poor fits with Donovan that could be done with the team after this season.
Tomas Satoransky, G
The name that was the most difficult to put on this list as far as the fit between him and Donovan goes was the 29-year-old guard Tomas Satoransky. The value that Sato contributes to the Bulls is clear, but his impact was inconsistent throughout much of the regular season thus far. The same could be said for what Sato did for the Bulls last season under former head coach Jim Boylen.
Donovan and the Bulls clearly need to find a solution in their starting five at the point guard position. But that will have to wait until the offseason. And the long-term solve to the point guard position in the starting five doesn’t have a clear path as of yet. If the Bulls luck out and get their lottery pick back this year, then drafting a point guard makes sense.
However, turning to the free agent market to find help might have the be the solution in line for the Bulls this offseason. Brooklyn Nets point guard Spencer Dinwiddie and Lonzo Ball of the New Orleans Pelicans are two names that stick out that could be options.
Sato is on a team-friendly contract heading into next season, which is only partially guaranteed. He won’t become an unrestricted free agent this offseason, but he could be a trade chip that offers a good amount of value on the open market.
The counting stats, shooting percentages, and advanced metrics, have all dropped for Sato in the last five weeks. He got a spot in the starting five back in March, only to see second-year point guard Coby White take it back last month. There doesn’t really look to be a long-term fit for Sato in the Windy City.
Denzel Valentine, SG/SF
I’ve talked a lot about how the Bulls should explore their options this coming offseason to find a potential replacement for the 27-year-old former Michigan State Spartans shooting guard/wing Denzel Valentine. The Bulls did hand a one-year contract to Valentine last offseason to re-sign him off of the restricted free agent market.
Since that time, the contributions that Valentine gave the Bulls were mixed at best. His play really didn’t contribute much value to the Bulls over the course of the last two months.
Donovan does value the presence of guards and wings that can space the floor, especially given the amount of time he’s had to run three-guard lineups with the Bulls and Oklahoma City Thunder in the last two seasons. But Valentine is a ball-dominant guard/wing that isn’t playing at a very efficient level this season.
In fact, Valentine has never registered more than .060 win shares per 48 minutes or a box plus/minus rating above zero in his NBA career to date. The Bulls need to at least get an average producer in the shooting guard/wing rotation to upgrade the resources that Donovan has to work with off of the bench.
This coming offseason will be the first time in Valentine’s career that he is set to hit the unrestricted free agent market. That is if the Bulls don’t plan on re-signing him for the second offseason in a row. It wouldn’t make much sense for the Bulls to at least not explore their options among potential Valentine replacements in free agency and/or the draft this offseason.
Lauri Markkanen, PF
Speaking of inconsistency among younger Bulls players, all eyes are on what fourth-year power forward Lauri Markkanen does down the stretch. Markkanen is set to hit restricted free agency this offseason since the Bulls didn’t hand him a contract extension last fall when he was eligible. Granted, it didn’t make much sense for the Bulls to invest heavily in an inconsistent and injury-prone Markkanen at the time.
Out of the gates this season, it looked like Markkanen might be a good long-term piece for Donovan. But an upper-body injury a couple of months ago took a lot of the wind out of Markkanen’s sails this season. He just hasn’t looked the same post-All-Star Break.
Just in the last eight weeks alone, Markkanen has lost his spot in the starting five, sat in the midst of a plethora of trade rumors, and saw most of his stats drop. His player efficiency on the season is now down below the league average (sitting at 14.8 as of May 5), box plus/minus rating is firmly in the negative, and value over replacement player rating is at the lowest point of his career.
This is just not the way you wanted to see Markkanen show out down the stretch in a contract year. He’s not doing a whole lot of late to prove that he deserves a sizable contract off of the restricted free agent market this offseason. The chances that the Bulls bring him back heading into next season are also looking slimmer as the season moves along.