Why the Bulls' wins predictions are too high, too low or just right

Why is 29 wins too low

Billy Donovan is an experienced coach that will try to put his team in the best position to win. Donovan knows that part of his gig this year is to develop his young core, but Donovan's competitive spirit will be to try to win as many games as he can while trying to do that. In his nine seasons in the NBA, he has beat the Vegas win totals six times with surpassing win totals in three out of four years in Chicago.

Along with Donovan, Karnisovas does not appear ready to throw in the towel. He has retooled with experienced, but young NBA players to hedge his bet. He has filled most of the needs for the team to try to make them competitive, but not mortgage future financial flexibility or draft capital. Since Karnisovas has taken over the front office duties, he has tried to field the most competitive team on a daily basis to a fault. I do not expect mindset to change this season.

Zach LaVine is still pretty good and an all star level talent when healthy. Before Karnisovas made the Nikola Vucevic trade, Zach LaVine was the lead dog in the 2020-21 season. Up to the point of the trade, LaVine had led the Bulls to a 19-24 record in the Covid shortened season. Not great, but either was the roster around LaVine.

That roster had inexperienced players such as White, Williams, Lauri Markkanen and Wendall Carter sprinkled with veterans who were on their last legs in Garrett Temple, Thaddeus Young and Tomas Satoransky. The 2024-25 Chicago Bulls have a better roster on paper. The young players have NBA experience and they much deeper than in that season. If LaVine comes in with the right mindset, his fit alongside Giddey and White should be better than with DeRozan.

With the roster uncertainties and the unclear path in the East, the Bulls reaching the 29-win plateau will be challenging. There is just more of a chance that would could go wrong will.