3 Bulls most likely to be traded by end of 2022-23 season

1. Coby White

In three seasons with the Chicago Bulls, Coby White has been stuck in a constant state of being too good to be a role player, but not quite good enough to be a starter for a playoff-caliber team. The Bulls have given him a fair shot as both the team’s starting point guard and sixth man off the bench, but as long as Zach LaVine is holding down the starting shooting guard slot, Coby will never get to show his true worth.

Coby does a lot of things very well that would make him highly desirable on the trade market. Already a dynamic scoring threat coming out of college, White has adjusted and improved each year he’s been in the league to become a more efficient and deadly offensive weapon — and the analytics back that up.

• 2019-20: 50.6 true shooting %, -0.5 offensive win shares
• 2020-21: 54.0 true shooting %, 0.7 offensive win shares
• 2021-22: 56.4 true shooting %, 1.6 offensive win shares

This is exactly why White would make for a good fit on several teams around the league. For instance, a contending team like the Phoenix Suns are desperately lacking any guard play behind Devin Booker and Chris Paul. They’d be thrilled to have Coby around as the third guard in the rotation and alleviate the regular season workload off of CP3’s shoulders.

Coby would also make sense as a trade target for several of the league’s tanking teams. As I mentioned earlier, White has never received a fair shot buried behind LaVine. I could absolutely see another team being interested in making a move to acquire Coby for pennies on the dollar, in hopes that he could outperform his contract and become a true starting-worthy talent.

All that being said, Coby’s porous defense and lack of another elite skill make it hard for the Bulls to justify paying him big money past this season to be a less effective version of other sixth-man greats like Jamal Crawford, Lou Williams, and Jordan Clarkson. If he was a great playmaker or had the size to rebound the ball well, it would be a different story; but for the Chicago Bulls, there’s already enough talent in the backcourt to compensate for Coby’s absence.

If the Bulls could bring in a power forward capable of making Patrick Williams sweat for his starting position, or perhaps a center worth building around in a post-Vucevic world, I think that’s a deal too good for Chicago to pass up.