The Bulls hope that Lauri Markkanen can be the face of the franchise and Mark Strotman of NBC Sports Chicago believes the big man has the potential to be just that. Strotman chronicles Markkanen’s first two seasons in the league and examines the moves Chicago has made to build a team around its power forward.
Here’s more from the Central Division:
- Zach LaVine should benefit from a new and healthy Bulls rotation, Strotman writes (in a separate piece). LaVine carried the team for parts of last season, as only James Harden had a higher usage rate in October and November. Starting the season with Markkanen healthy and new talent on board should help ease LaVine’s burden and allow him to be more efficient in his game.
- Malcolm Brogdon is the Pacers‘ X-Factor, Chad Smith of Basketball Insiders contends. Indiana should be a solid playoff team next season, though the club’s ceiling may be determined by what they get out of Brogdon.
- Keith Langlois of NBA.com examines what goals Svi Mykhailiuk should strive for this upcoming season. Decision-making was among the areas Langlois pinpoints for the Pistons‘ wing.
Unless Brogdon or Oladipo or some other key player can’t play, Indiana seems like a sure bet to make the playoffs. 538 has Indiana as the 8th seed, but they’re estimating Brogdon plays bench minutes, and that doesn’t make much sense to me. Brogdon seems like he should start and play 30+ minutes a night. Likewise, Warren shouldn’t get much more than 20 minutes, and 538 has him getting 30.
At full strength, Indiana is a 45+ win team. In the East, that might be good enough for the 4th seed.
538 must not believe in the no-forward alighnment. Their 5 best are what, 3 guards and 2 centers. So I can see fulltime minutes for #6 Warren.
Maybe 538 is allowing for some load management for Brogdon’s ankles?– yes he should get 30′ otherwise.
Probably a big reason why the Bucks didn’t resign him as it seemed too risky. If he can give Indy the minutes they will be higher than an 8th seed barring other injuries.
Oladipo missed 46 games last year and they were still the 5th seed. There’s no way they finish as low as #8 in the top-heavy east. Brooklyn is ridiculously overrated, they’re not even close to Indiana IMO.
This year they miss Thaddeus for 82 games.
The Bulls will be a bottom 5 team. Management is delusional if they think there’s any talent on this team.
I think management is greedy rather than delusional.
They can sell season tickets before the season starts talking about Markkanen and stability and a bright future. Then, once the season is underway, they’ll make a high cost trade for a player that doesn’t really help them long term, but sells seats.
Then, to top it all off, they’ll work a deal to get $5 million in cash (just like they do every year). It won’t make any basketball sense, but old man Reinsdorf will love the money.
The Bulls are the epitome of greedy, short-sighted ownership. GarPax are doing exactly what the old man wants them to do – sell tickets.
As long as Bulls fans keep selling out the stadium, nothing will change. No elite free agents will ever sign with the Bulls as long as the current regime is running the team. And they’ll never tank enough to get a lottery pick. Welcome to NBA hell.
There are so many bad teams in the east. Cleveland, Washington, NY, Charlotte, Chicago should all finish in the bottom 5 but there are also other teams like Atlanta, Orlando, and perhaps even Brooklyn that could end up there as well. Replacing D’Angelo Russell with Kyrie Irving isn’t going to make them a better team, like so many people erroneously think.
Replacing Russell with Irving isn’t going to turn a #6 seed into a bottom 5 team either. Orlando is also a likely playoff team. For that matter, Atlanta might sneak in as well.
Irving’s not a huge upgrade but he is a better basketball player than Russell is at this stage of their careers, LaVert missed a lot of games last year and guys like Allen have had another year to develop. All that and good coaching should make Brooklyn better than last year.
We loved Brogdon in Milwaukee but let’s not act like he was anything more then a good roleplayer. He does nothing great but everything well. He’s injury prone and is a poor mans oladipo. Not sure they’ll mesh well together. We shall see