The Chicago Bulls are in an interesting place, sitting in a tower watching the rest of the NBA around them. They saw the Orlando Magic draft Jett Howard with the No. 11 pick in the NBA Draft, a pick the Bulls handed them — and the second lottery pick the Magic earned from the Nikola Vucevic deal. They watched the Washington Wizards declare they were done with purgatory and tear down their team. They watched the Toronto Raptors insist nothing was wrong and watch Fred VanVleet walk out the door and lock them in NBA purgatory.
The Bulls were themselves at a crossroads this summer, with no draft picks and a number of rotation players hitting free agency. Would they find landing spots for Zach LaVine and DeMar DeRozan and enter a rebuild? Or would they bring everyone back and make another run at the bottom half of the playoff bracket?
Perhaps fans of the Bulls hoped they would tear things down and follow the Wizards’ model. Perhaps they hoped that this team could finally draft and develop elite talent as they hadn’t done in 15 years. Instead, the Bulls reached out and locked the door out of NBA purgatory themselves, trapping themselves in the middle of the league once again.
How did the Bulls do this offseason?
Let’s walk through each of the moves the Bulls made this offseason and hand out letter grades. They’ll receive an “A” for an excellent move, a “B” for a move worth making, a “C” for a questionable move, and down from there. In the end, we’ll hand out an overall grade that will take the greater context of the team into account.
We start with the best move of the offseason, which also may be the most inconsequential.