The Chicago Bulls just can't seem to figure out how to get out of their own way when it comes to building a contending roster. Or even tearing down a non-contending one.
The franchise has won one playoff game since 2018. The last time the Bulls won a first-round series was 2015.
The Arturas Karnisovas era began prior to the 2020-21 season and has produced that one aforementioned playoff victory, which came in his debut season.
His tenure hasn't been without highlights. Ayo Dosunmu continues to be a high-level role player Karnisovas plucked out of the second round. Coby White and Matas Buzelis are turning out to be smart selections.
Signing Alex Caruso in free agency was a shrewd move for a team that hoped to contend in the postseason. The DeMar DeRozan trade was a clear success.
And in all fairness, had Lonzo Ball not hurt his knee, the core of him, DeRozan, Zach LaVine and Nikola Vucevic proved that it could carry a contending team, at least for a period.
But Ball did hurt his knee, and the Bulls struggled down the stretch that year to finish 46-36 before losing 4-1 to the Milwaukee Bucks in the first round of the playoffs.
The next season, they finished 40-42 and made the Play-In Tournament but couldn't get past the Miami Heat.
Last year, Chicago was a sub-.500 team at the trade deadline and had the opportunity to reset by moving on from veterans like DeRozan, Vucevic and Caruso.
Instead, Karnisovas decided to do nothing, the team limped to a 39-43 record, the No. 9 seed and another loss in the play-in.
Then DeRozan walked for essentially nothing, Caruso was traded to Oklahoma City in a 1-for-1 swap for Josh Giddey and LaVine and Vucevic are still in Chicago as the Bulls keep struggling in NBA purgatory.
The path forward couldn't be more clear, at least to those outside the organization. Inside, according to recent reports, Chicago appears to still be stuck in 2022.
Bulls asking for first-round pick in Nikola Vucevic trade
Earlier this season, Vucevic's value on the market was a pair of second-round picks at best. Even though he's continued to have the best shooting season of his career, that likely hasn't changed.
But according to Marc Stein and Jake Fischer of The Stein Line, Karnisovas and the Bulls are holding out for more.
Chicago wants a first-round pick in exchange for the big man, but the going rate for a 34-year-old center who can't play any kind of defense is not a first-round pick. Those two second-round selections should be just fine for the Bulls if they can find a taker for Vucevic.
What's most concerning is how Stein and Fischer preface this news:
"After failing to extract any draft compensation from Oklahoma City in its Alex Caruso-for-Josh Giddey swap in June..."
So Karnisovas and Co. are holding out for a larger return in one trade because they finally realized they whiffed on a separate one they made six months ago? This is a perfect example of this regime's ineptitude.
Giddey wasn't returning to Oklahoma City after last season. He fell out of the playoff rotation entirely, and it was public knowledge that he and the Thunder would part ways.
OKC has 15 first-round draft picks between now and 2031. They also have 17 second-round picks.
Trading Caruso, one of the best perimeter defenders in the NBA, to a contending team that so obviously wanted to get rid of Giddey and not getting any of those picks included in the return, is a fireable offense on its own.
No one in the Bulls' front office could talk the Thunder into parting with one of those first-round picks, even if it were heavily protected, in the deal? Not even a pair of second-round selections? Not even one second-rounder?
Chicago's front office is trying to make up for a mistake it made last summer by asking an unbelievable (literally) price for Vucevic, who clearly is not worth a first-round pick. The franchise is somehow doubling down on its incompetence.