3 trades Bulls can make with the Raptors for Pascal Siakam

Chicago Bulls trades with the Raptors for Pascal Siakam: Give up Nikola Vucevic

The main difference for Karnisovas and the Bulls in trading for Grant or Barnes compared to Siakam from the Raptors is the size of the contract. Grant and Barnes aren’t paid much more than $20 million in average annual value through the end of either of their current contracts. Meanwhile, Siakam is getting nearly max money through the three years remaining on his current contract.

Siakam will be paid around $34 million in average annual value through the end of his contract.

That means the Bulls will have to shed more salary to be able to make any trade like this work. And it’s hard to make this happen without the Bulls getting a third team involved or giving up two-time All-Star center Nikola Vucevic.

At the moment, it probably wouldn’t be all that difficult to convince a lot of Bulls fans that it would be worth dishing out Vucevic for a star forward like Siakam. Vucevic is having one of the least efficient seasons of his career through a little more than the first half of the 2021-22 campaign.

But getting rid of Vucevic does come with certain risks. First and foremost, Vucevic has a cleaner track record in terms of his injury history than Siakam. There are even roughly a dozen games that Siakam missed for the Raptors so far this season.

It’s also risky to give up on Vucevic this early considering the idea of him and star shooting guard Zach LaVine playing together is a really good fit on paper. Giving up on Vucevic now could hurt the momentum and locker room chemistry for the Bulls. That is something that management and the coaching staff would have to feel out.

Moreover, this trade deal hypothetically sees the Bulls ship off Vucevic, Williams, and DJJ for a return of big man Chris Boucher and Siakam. This would help bring in some true forward depth to the Bulls to give a jolt of energy to the entire frontcourt unit.