Searching for the Bulls' shakeup
The problem for the Bulls, and new GM Bryson Graham, are numbers. Growing numbers, shrinking numbers, low numbers, high numbers, The Who, Small Faces, Kinks, whole scene.
The team is fourth on Chicago's depth chart, behind football and baseball and Blackhawks. The internet takes stronger issue with Chicago Sky slipups than it does Bulls transactions, because the internet long ago learned to stop caring about the Bulls, stop showing so much heart.
Well, my heart bleeds black and red. And I can't help but be big hurt when the stupid Sox gain on the Bulls. Cubs' wine and cheese party carrying on all afternoon until everyone is snoring in the backseat of an taxi on the way home from a Blackhawks game they don't even remember getting tickets to, let alone attending. The only thing that reminds Chicagoans of Bulls games are the bus advertisements, always featuring some veteran that no fan wanted on the Bulls, dribbling next to a rookie who won't be enough.
Knicks got a title. Knicks didn't rebuild from Patrick Ewing until 2021 and won a championship five years later.
Bulls pointed to their own head and mouthed "smart" while dangling Scottie Pippen in 1997. Mentioned the Celtics' downfall by name before trying to trade Pippen to Boston, blowing the Bulls up in 1998. Ruined the whole ending along the way and, 28 growing years later, the black and red still rebuilds.
Pacers went to the Finals twice since the Bulls won a title, Cavs got 11 seasons of this century's best player and one title out of it, five Finals appearances for Cleveland. Remember what the Finals were like in June, but in Chicago? It was a little chilly last time.
Pistons got two titles since the Bulls' last, and led the East in wins last season. Unacceptable.
Last week I stopped my wife as she pored over important medical notes pertaining to a loved one to explain why Led Zeppelin spelled the band name the way it is spelled on the t-shirt she was wearing. She said "oh, OK" and "thanks."
Chicago led the world in cap space in the first offseason after Jordan's retirement and again topped the NBA in cap space 29 years later. After Jordan split, the Bulls went after the Class of 1996 as it entered free agency: Kobe, Allen, Marbury, Walker, whomever wanted to be paid $20 million a year. Ended up punting the cap space after the NBA changed free agent rules and every available free agent inked the same six-year, $70.9 million contract. Chicago signed Brent Barry instead, eventually trading Brent for Hersey Hawkins' expiring deal, using that space on Ron Mercer.
This time, they ended up with Mercer and Hawkins-types, but on purpose.
The Bulls re-signed Zach Collins and signed Norman Powell and traded for Nic Claxton and yep that's the end of cap space. Not because the Allens and Antoines of this era turned Chicago down, but because Chicago's new GM wanted those guys.
The Knicks hired a cigar humidor in humanish form to be GM, won a title. The Bulls hired a tracksuit, telling the divers he inherited not to make a splash.
Of course, the last GM made a splash. Traded it all for a 30-year old center.
