The start of the regular season is only days away for the Chicago Bulls, and as time goes on, we can see more and more that this team executed a perfect instance of buying low when they picked up Tre Jones.
Of course, Jones was part of the three-team trade Chicago made back in February that sent Zach LaVine to Sacramento. It was the right time for the Bulls to move on from LaVine, and getting Jones back was one of the highlights of the deal.
In 18 regular season games at the end of last season, Tre showed his value in a hurry. He averaged 11.5 points and 4.9 assists. This was of course a pretty sharp elevation in level of play from what he had been doing prior to this. Through 28 games in San Antonio last season, Jones was only putting up 4.4 points and and 3.7 assists. His playing time had been cut and he was getting on the floor for the Spurs for only 16.1 minutes per night, the lowest mark since his rookie season back in 2020-21.
Chicago executed the buy-low strategy perfectly with Tre Jones
It was looking more like Tre's value was going to continue decreasing rather than taking a sharp uptick. But the latter is exactly what ended up happening after he made the move to Chicago and then consecutively re-signed. San Antonio was clearly intent on handing the keys to Stephon Castle, and Jones became less of a priority. That gave the Bulls the perfect opportunity to capitalize on getting a guy who still had room to grow.
Since arriving in the Windy City, you can argue that Tre's role is aligning with his strengths now more than ever. With the Spurs, Jones was often asked to run pick-and-roll with lineups non-shooters, which ultimately limited his efficiency. Playing within the Bulls' offense and having guys like Coby White and Matas Buzelis to space the floor, Jones has a lot more chances for drive-and-kick opportunities.
Pushing the tempo and playing within a system that allows him to operate as a more free-flowing kind of old school point guard is exactly where Tre thrives, and that's precisely the situation he finds himself in with the Bulls. If you can pull off buying low at just the right time, it's always going to have the chance to really pay dividends in a big way. It's clear that's what Chicago did with Jones.