When Arturas Karnisovas and Marc Eversley were brought in to replace the old regime, fans held high hopes that these two would be the ones to finally turn the Chicago Bulls around and help the team return to relevance. After all, they couldn't be any worse than John Paxson and Gar Forman, could they?
Karnisovas and Eversley kicked their tenure off in a big way by landing DeMar DeRozan, Alex Caruso, and Lonzo Ball in their first offseason with the team. Eversley in particular is credited with the DeRozan signing, which ended up being a big steal for the team, as he reportedly hopped on an overnight plane to get the deal done and prevent the All-Star from joining the Clippers or Lakers instead.
Source said the Lakers and the Clippers were also open to meeting with DeRozan although the trip to visit him wasn’t as far as it was for Chicago, well, depending on LA traffic.
— Marc J. Spears (@MarcJSpears) August 4, 2021
The Bulls raced out to a strong start with their new head honchos in charge, grabbing the Eastern Conference's top seed entering the start of 2021 and eventually breaking a four-year playoff drought. Unfortunately, injuries dragged this team back to mediocrity and Eversley's vision for this team was never fulfilled.
And now it seems as though we may never see what that vision entailed. Although he joined the Bulls just a few short years ago, Eversley may bolt for greener pastures as the Charlotte Hornets consider him for their newly vacated top executive role.
The Bulls are in very real danger of losing general manager Marc Eversley to the Hornets.
Mitch Kupchak will be stepping down into an advisory role in Charlotte as the team looks to break the trend of horrendous basketball and not only return to the playoffs, but also hopefully win their first playoff series since 2002. With a team loaded up with as much young talent as the Hornets,
Eversley previously interviewed for this job in 2018 but ultimately lost out to Kupchak. Now that he has the successful recruitment of DeRozan and genuine GM experience under his belt with the Bulls, he may have better luck this time around.
"League sources have mentioned Philadelphia 76ers general manager Elton Brand, Chicago Bulls general manager Marc Eversley, and New Orleans Pelicans general manager Trajan Langdon as the three leading candidates for the top position with the Hornets," reports John Hollinger of The Athletic.
Charlotte is expected to interview many candidates for the role, but the fact Eversley is being booked as a "leading candidate" makes this a story one worth watching closely. Just a week after taking the full blame for not rebuilding, Karnisovas could find himself in a whole lot of trouble if Eversley goes on to find success elsewhere.
If Eversley can make even the Hornets of all teams look like a competent franchise, then we'll have no choice but to lay the full blame for Chicago's struggles on his shoulders. Based on what we've seen from his hands-off approach to running the Bulls so far, I'm not sure Karnisovas is a man well-equipped to handle that type of pressure.