Central Notes: Donovan, Bulls, Cavs, Bucks, Gores
Before the Bulls fired top executives Arturas Karnisovas and Marc Eversley last week, it felt like there was a 90% chance that head coach Billy Donovan would be leaving the team, according to Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times, who suggests that the former front office didn’t seem to have a plan that would make Donovan optimistic about the team’s future.
However, with Karnisovas and Eversley no longer in the picture, Donovan’s decision feels more like a coin flip, Cowley writes, speculating that there’s now a “49%” chance of the head coach departing.
Within his story, Cowley writes that Karnisovas’ and Eversley’s talent evaluation had long been considered questionable, dating back to the 2020 draft, when Karnisovas “fixated” on Patrick Williams with the No. 4 overall pick. According to one of Cowley’s sources, there were scouts and executives within the organization who preferred Tyrese Haliburton, but Karnisovas didn’t view the point guard as a “serious prospect.” Haliburton has since made two All-NBA teams and gotten within one win of a championship.
We have more from around the Central:
- In a separate story for the Chicago Sun-Times, Cowley considers a few potential targets for the Bulls with their newly secured second first-round pick, courtesy of Portland. Cowley identifies UConn’s Braylon Mullins, Michigan’s Aday Mara, and Kentucky’s Jayden Quaintance as prospects who Chicago may consider drafting using that pick, which will be either 15th or 16th overall.
- What’s at stake for the Cavaliers during this year’s playoffs? “Everything,” according to Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com (subscription required), who believes that any number of organizational and roster changes could be on the table if Cleveland fails to advance to at least the conference finals this spring after spending more than any other team on its roster in 2025/26.
- Jim Owczarski of The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (subscription required) poses some of the most pressing questions facing the Bucks this summer, including whether ownership wants to keep Giannis Antetokounmpo long-term, who will be the next head coach, and whether they can nail their first lottery pick since 2016.
- Pistons owner Tom Gores published a letter on Tuesday thanking fans for sticking with the team through a challenging rebuild that included five straight years between 14 and 23 wins, including a franchise-worst 14-68 mark in 2023/24. “What we’re building here is a story for the ages,” Gores wrote. “One of the great comeback stories in sports, and not just because of where we are today but because of how we got here.”
Bulls Notes: Giddey, Donovan, Buzelis, Miller, Dillingham
Bulls guard Josh Giddey had been away from the team over the past week and didn’t have an opportunity to weigh in on the recent firings of Arturas Karnisovas and Marc Eversley until Friday, per Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times. Giddey, who will end up missing the final five games of 2025/26 due to a nagging hamstring injury, gave a diplomatic response, saying he understood it was a business but appreciated what the two front office executives had done for him the past couple years.
Giddey also discussed the future of head coach Billy Donovan, and he made it clear he’s a big fan of the 60-year-old. Donovan will meet with the team’s ownership after the regular season ends.
“He’s been awesome,” Giddey said. “I’ve loved him ever since I got here. He’s been very straightforward, and I think all the guys would say the same thing. He’s very direct. He tells you what you need to hear and not what you want to hear, and he gives it to you straight. He coaches hard; he wants to win every game. You see how competitive he is on the sidelines. I couldn’t speak highly enough about him. I hope he’s here for a long time.”
As for his own performance this season, Giddey said it was, “OK, up and down” on an individual level but he hopes to have more team success going forward.
“I’ve got to find ways to impact winning, and that’s probably the next step for me as a player,” he said.
Here’s more on the Bulls:
- Second-year forward Matas Buzelis, another perceived member of Chicago’s core, reiterated his support for Donovan on Friday, tweets Joel Lorenzi of The Athletic. Buzelis, who was away from the team at the time due to an illness, said he called Donovan on the phone when he learned Karnisovas and Eversley were being dismissed. “I told him, ‘I hope you don’t leave. I’m riding with you forever. You’re a cornerstone for my career,'” Buzelis said.
- Scoop Jackson of The Chicago Sun-Times argues Donovan should walk away from his contract and reject any overtures from ownership to remain with the organization in a different role, writing that the veteran coach will likely have better coaching offers in the future and won’t be under the constraints of the Reindsorfs, who have done a miserable job operating the franchise over the years.
- Leonard Miller seemed like a throw-in as part of the trade that sent Ayo Dosunmu to Minnesota, but he has continued to impress the Bulls over the past several weeks and is making a strong case to stick around beyond 2025/26, Cowley writes for The Sun-Times. While Donovan admitted he wasn’t familiar with the Canadian’s game before the trade because he had played so little at the NBA level, he’s quickly grown to appreciate Miller’s play. “He’s a live body, he competes [and] he’s really long,” Donovan said. “He kind of has this instinctive way about him on the glass and chasing balls. Even defensively, he’s multidimensional. I think the biggest thing with him is he plays so instinctively that he catches up to the league and really understands digging in on film and personnel, guarding, game plans. I think he’s only going to get better because he’s got a really good motor.” The Bulls hold a $2.4MM option for next season on Miller, who is averaging 14.6 points and 7.3 rebounds on .538/.358/.743 shooting splits in his last 17 games (28.0 minutes per contest).
- The other player the Bulls received in that deal, Rob Dillingham, acknowledged he needs to add more strength to his lean frame this summer, according to Cowley. The former Kentucky guard also said he wants to make better in-game decisions and plans to watch a lot of film ahead of his third season.
Bulls Rumors: Donovan, Front Office, Ownership, Ivey, More
The Bulls fired executive VP of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley on Monday, but Marc Stein reported on Sunday that the team hopes to retain head coach Billy Donovan and Shams Charania of ESPN has heard the same (Twitter video link).
“My understanding is the Bulls want to keep [Donovan] as long as he wants to be there, in Chicago,” Charania said on NBA Today.
Donovan, who signed a multiyear extension with the Bulls last summer, is expected to draw interest from rival NBA teams with head coaching vacancies this offseason, according to Jake Fischer of The Stein Line (Twitter link), who confirms Chicago would like to keep the 60-year-old.
As for potential front office replacements, Jon Krawczynski of The Athletic suggests Timberwolves GM Matt Lloyd could be a name to watch (Twitter link). Lloyd is well regarded around the league and began his NBA career in Chicago, Krawczynski notes.
Here are some more rumors and notes on the Bulls:
- Team sources tell Jamal Collier of ESPN that ownership had been considering a front office overhaul “for weeks,” and the urgency to do so increased after the team traded for — and then waived — Jaden Ivey. While the front office defended the homework it did prior to acquiring Ivey, ownership had questions about the process involved and Karnisovas and Eversley had a “credibility problem” around the league and with the team’s fans, according to Collier.
- Collier hears there was a “growing disconnect” between the front office and several areas of the organization, not just ownership. Bulls employees were reportedly unsure of the team’s direction after it traded away several veterans ahead of the February deadline to add seven second-round picks. “People didn’t know the plan,” one team source told ESPN on Monday. “They didn’t know the process. We needed to move on — with a clean slate and start this thing over.”
- According to Collier’s sources, Karnisovas and Eversley long maintained they were “working under the constraints of ownership,” which was reluctant to embark on a rebuild. Donovan also isn’t a fan of rebuilds, Collier writes, even though the team was stuck in mediocrity for years.
- Collier suggests the front office’s relatively underwhelming trade returns also factored into the decision to let Karnisovas and Eversley go, pointing out that the team waited too long to break up the previous core roster of Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, Nikola Vucevic, Alex Caruso, Coby White and Lonzo Ball. “We took too long to pick a lane,” the team source told ESPN. “The Lonzo thing just really messed them up. We saw that success early on, and didn’t have the foresight to pivot early.” Ball missed two-plus years due to a knee injury which required multiple surgeries.
- While the Bulls want to retain Donovan, Collier hears it may not be as head coach, depending on what Donovan wants to do in the future. As Collier writes, Donovan’s father and mother-in-law both passed away within eight days of each other in February, and there has been previous speculation that the veteran coach might take a year off to reevaluate his options moving forward.
Bulls Fire Top Execs Arturas Karnisovas, Marc Eversley
The Bulls have fired Arturas Karnisovas, the team’s executive vice president of basketball operations, and Marc Eversley, their general manager, according to a press release.
“Arturas and Marc have led with a deep commitment to the Chicago Bulls. These decisions are never easy, especially when they involve people we respect both personally and professionally,” Bulls CEO and president Michael Reinsdorf said in a statement. “We are grateful for their dedication and the work they’ve put in over the past six years.
“At the same time, we have not had the success our fans deserve, and it’s my responsibility to go in a new direction. This move is about positioning our team for sustained success moving ahead. I want our fans to know that I hear you and understand the frustration. I feel it as well. I know this will take time, and I am fully committed to getting this right. At the Chicago Bulls, our focus remains on building a team that can compete at the highest level and ultimately contend for championships. We are committed to taking the necessary steps to move the Bulls forward in a way that makes our fans proud.”
The Bulls have gone through several roster upheavals since hiring Karnisovas and Eversley, yet the team has been stuck in an endless cycle of mediocrity. Both men arrived in Chicago in 2020 to revive a franchise that dominated the NBA landscape in the 1990s. The club improved its record from 31-41 in 2020/21 to 46-36 the following season but the franchise has been spinning its wheels since that point.
The Bulls have posted losing records ever since, with win totals of 40, 39 and 39 over the past three seasons. Chicago is 29-49 after the front office made several moves during the trade deadline that once again put the franchise in rebuild mode. The Bulls haven’t won a playoff series in 11 consecutive seasons, counting this lottery-bound campaign.
As ESPN’s Bobby Marks points out (Twitter link), the replacements for Karnisovas and Eversley will have plenty of work to do this offseason. Chicago can be aggressive with $65MM of cap space, along with its lottery pick.
This also increases the uncertainty regarding the status of head coach Billy Donovan. Donovan was reportedly a candidate for the North Carolina head coaching job, but the Tar Heels on Monday chose to hire former Nuggets coach Michael Malone.
Reinsdorf is expected to address the media at some point on Tuesday. Reinsdorf, along with senior advisor John Paxson, Brian Hagen, Pat Connelly and JJ Polk, will collectively lead the basketball operations department during the executive search, according to Chicago Sports Network’s K.C. Johnson (Twitter link).
Central Notes: Giannis, Bucks, Trade Market, Bulls Shakeup, Pistons
The NBA weighed in with a statement on Saturday as it continues the investigation of a disagreement between Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bucks, writes Eric Nehm of The Athletic. Antetokounmpo, who has been sidelined since March 15 with a left knee hyperextension and a bone bruise, contends that he’s healthy enough to return to action, but the team won’t give him medical clearance. The Bucks say he hasn’t fully healed and isn’t sincere about wanting to play.
“The investigation has found that the Bucks scheduled Giannis to work out last week in three-on-three scrimmages as part of his return-to-play process, but he declined to participate,” the NBA said on Saturday. “There is a disagreement as to whether the team requested that Giannis participate in a group workout earlier this week, and the league is continuing to monitor the situation.”
The NBA has held conversations with Bucks officials as part of the probe, a source told Nehm. Antetokounmpo emphatically expressed his desire to return to action during an interview after Milwaukee’s loss to Boston on Friday, but with only five games remaining, it may be too late even if the dispute is resolved in his favor.
There’s more from the Central Division:
- Trading Antetokounmpo this summer could be the first step in a massive roster overhaul for the Bucks, suggests Michael Scotto of HoopsHype (Twitter video link). He points to Bobby Portis, Myles Turner and Kyle Kuzma as other veteran players who might be moved and says coach Doc Rivers’ future with the team is also uncertain. Scotto expects the Heat, Warriors, Knicks, Cavaliers and others to approach Milwaukee with offers.
- Major changes could be coming to the Bulls over the next 10 days, a source tells Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times (subscription required). Executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley could both be held accountable for the disappointing season, and a coaching move is possible as well. Cowley notes that Billy Donovan is one of the main targets for the vacant North Carolina job, and there are also suggestions that he could stay and help revamp the front office or move into the top management role himself.
- If there’s a bright side to Cade Cunningham‘s injury, it’s that his teammates are learning how to succeed without him as the playoffs approach, notes Hunter Patterson of The Athletic. Isaiah Stewart is also out indefinitely with a left calf strain, but the Pistons keep winning and look ready to be a force in the playoffs if the roster gets healthy again. “Obviously, we’re better with (Cade), Stew and today Tobias (Harris) on the floor,” Jalen Duren said. “But I think having guys come in and get reps in, get shots up, see the ball go through (the rim) — the type of offense we’re playing with everybody being involved — it gets everybody’s confidence up. It gets everybody’s juices flowing going into that postseason.”
Bulls Notes: Front Office, Rose, Buzelis, Williams
The Bulls have been mired in mediocrity for the past three seasons, finishing with middling records a shade below .500 and failing to advance out of the play-in tournament each year.
With that in mind, Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times (subscriber link) takes stock of whether or not Chicago has an actionable strategy for lifting the club out of its plight long-term. Cowley calls out president Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley for having “no real plan” for bringing in an All-Star-caliber player this summer, either through free agency or a trade.
There’s more out of the Windy City:
- On January 24 this season, the Bulls will retire the No. 1 jersey of former 2011 MVP guard Derrick Rose, who called it a career last summer. Joel Lorenzi of The Athletic asserts that Rose is worthy of such an honor despite only spending eight seasons — including two years almost entirely lost due to injury from 2012-14 — in Chicago. Lorenzi observes that Rose, a Chicago native and former MVP, will be just the fifth Bulls player to have his jersey retired, along with Michael Jordan‘s No. 23, Scottie Pippen‘s No. 33, Jerry Sloan‘s No. 4, and Bob Love‘s No. 10.
- In lieu of landing an established star, the Bulls are counting on 2025 All-Rookie Second Team forward Matas Buzelis to emerge as their star of the future, Lorenzi observes in the same story.
- Just a year after being signed to a five-year, $90MM deal, Bulls forward Patrick Williams finds himself in a tenuous standing with Chicago, Lorenzi writes as he considers what the next step is for the Bulls and the former No. 4 overall pick. The club’s lone trade this summer, for another defense-first young forward in Isaac Okoro, could make Williams somewhat expendable if he doesn’t take a step forward this fall.
Raptors Notes: Webster, Pritchard, Roster Moves, Rotation
The Raptors announced on Monday that they’ve decided not to fill the president role formerly held by Masai Ujiri, with Bobby Webster hanging onto his title of general manager as he takes over as the team’s permanent head of basketball operations. That’s fine with Webster, as Michael Grange of Sportsnet.ca relays.
“On the title, what’s the best way to put it? The title, to me, probably isn’t as important as the responsibilities,” Webster said. “I’m really thankful for this opportunity. I’ll make the most of it and that (not getting the president title) is not something that concerns me.”
While Webster seems unfazed by not being named the Raptors’ president, he’s still expected to have a chance to earn a promotion to that position based on how he handles his new responsibilities, Grange adds.
“This is his chance,” a source close to the hiring process told Sportsnet. “Show (us) he’s the president. It’s a process. It’s all about the rebuild, it’s all about the strategy going forward. Can Brandon Ingram and Scottie Barnes become an incredible duo? How do you manage the tax situation we’re currently in?
“At the end of the day, it will be about Bobby making the right decisions moving forward. He’s (40 years old) and he’s got every quality that you want representing your organization. Now, it comes down to wins and losses, building the reputation of the brand and dealing with the salary cap.”
Here’s more on the Raptors:
- Grange hears from sources that Toronto formally interviewed Pacers president Kevin Pritchard, former Kings general manager Monte McNair, and former Raptors coach Dwane Casey for its president role, while Josh Lewenberg of TSN.ca reports that Pacers GM Chad Buchanan and Bulls GM Marc Eversley also interviewed for the job. Pritchard was believed to be the candidate that intrigued the Raptors the most, but “prying him away from the Pacers proved difficult,” Grange writes.
- While Webster believes the roster the Raptors have put together is ready to “make the next step” in 2025/26, there’s skepticism around the NBA about some of the moves the team has made in recent years. According to Grange, one Eastern Conference executive questioned the team’s investments in Immanuel Quickley (five years, $162.5MM), Ingram (three years, $120MM), and Jakob Poeltl (three years, $84MM): “I know sometimes you have to pay a premium for players in Canada, but that much?” Another rival executive, per Grange, suggested there’s an excess of wings on the roster and a lack of depth at point guard and center. “They have a lot of nice pieces,” that executive said. “It’s just not clear how they all fit.”
- Some of the executives who interviewed for the Raptors’ president job were among those questioning the club’s recent personnel decisions, according to Lewenberg, who says one of those external candidates referred to the Ingram trade as a “desperate Hail Mary.”
- Eric Koreen of The Athletic previews what the Raptors’ rotation might look like this fall, projecting Gradey Dick, Ochai Agbaji, Sandro Mamukelashvili, Jamal Shead, and Collin Murray-Boyles to be the top options off the bench behind a starting lineup of Barnes, Ingram, Quickley, Poeltl, and RJ Barrett.
Latest On Raptors’ Search For New Head Of Basketball Ops
General manager Bobby Webster is running the Raptors‘ front office for now following the abrupt dismissal of Masai Ujiri at the end of June.
According to Michael Grange of Sportsnet.ca, Webster is interested in becoming Toronto’s new head of basketball operations on a permanent basis and seems to be the frontrunner to land the position, but there are a number of other candidates to monitor as well.
A source tells Grange that most of the names that have come up in the search process are “lower-tier executives” who would make sense as complementary additions working under Webster.
However, there are some veteran executives who appear to be in the mix, including Brampton native Marc Eversley, who is currently GM of the Bulls. As Grange writes, Eversley is a board member of Canada Basketball, was previously an assistant GM in Toronto, and has a solid relationship with Webster.
Pacers GM Chad Buchanan is another name on the Raptors’ radar, Grange reports.
According to Grange, Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment president Keith Pelley has met with both Dwane Casey and Monte McNair about the position.
Casey is the Raptors’ former head coach and is currently an executive with the Pistons, while McNair was Sacramento’s GM for five years prior to parting ways with the organization after the 2024/25 season.
One league insider who spoke to Grange suggested that Pacers president of basketball operations Kevin Pritchard is MLSE’s top choice for the job, though Grange points out that lateral moves for executives under contract with other teams are difficult to pull off.
As for Ujiri, Grange says he would be “very surprised” if Toronto’s longtime former president accepted another NBA job for the upcoming season. In the future, Ujiri could be a candidate to lead an expansion team or run the NBA’s proposed European league, Grange writes.
That said, Ujiri will certainly be linked to any top executive roles that pop up in the coming months, according to Grange, who has heard speculation that the Heat could be a team to monitor, as Pat Riley recently turned 80 years old.
Bulls Have Likely Given Extensions To Karnisovas, Eversley
The Bulls apparently won’t be making any major front office moves.
Executive vice president of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas and general manager Marc Eversley are believed to have signed contract extensions, according to Joe Cowley of the Chicago Sun-Times.
Cowley notes that Bulls chairman Jerry Reinsdorf never makes front office extensions public but a source told the Sun-Times beat writer that the front office duo needed to be extended first before a new agreement could be reached with coach Billy Donovan.
Drew Stevens of The Bigs (Bluesky link) first broke the news of the extensions for Karnisovas and Eversley.
Karnisovas commented shortly after the regular season that he felt his job was safe due to his strong relationships with both Jerry Reinsdorf and Michael Reinsdorf.
“We take pride, especially in this building, in everybody being on the same page,” Karnisovas said. “It’s very hard to accomplish, but that’s how it is in this building between the ownership, front office, coaching staff, performance staff, so they have always been very supportive of my decisions, my thoughts, about this direction.”
Marc Stein reported on Sunday that the Bulls and Donovan were working on an extension. According to Cowley, the Bulls are close to finalizing that deal and have been in discussions with the head coach since the season ended.
The Knicks were denied permission to speak with Donovan regarding their head coaching position but that had no impact on the Donovan extension talks, according to Cowley, who hears from multiple sources that Donovan had no interest in leaving the Bulls, “especially for the Knicks position under the current regime.” Donovan values the way the Bulls front office operates, as Karnisovas listens to his input on team matters and roster decisions. That likely would not have been the case in New York.
This will be the second time the Bulls have extended Donovan, who has one year left on his current deal.
No Front Office Changes Planned For Bulls
The Bulls have no plans to replace executive VP of basketball operations Arturas Karnisovas as their lead front office executive, a team source tells Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times, who says general manager Marc Eversley and head coach Billy Donovan are likely just as safe as Karnisovas.
According to Cowley, there has been a “reoccurring edict” from team ownership to the front office to fix a roster that has finished in the middle of the pack for several years running. However, the Reinsdorfs (chairman Jerry Reinsdorf and president Michael Reinsdorf) still believe that Karnisovas is the right man for that job.
As for Donovan, he’s well-liked by both the front office and Bulls ownership, Cowley writes, noting that the organization’s top decision-makers have been impressed by the way the veteran coach transformed the club’s offense this season — Chicago ranks third in the NBA in pace in 2024/25 after placing 28th last season. Bulls management has also taken note of the strong relationships Donovan has developed in the locker room, Cowley adds.
Karnisovas, who was hired by the Bulls in 2020, made an in-season trade this month for the first time since an eventful 2021 deadline that saw Chicago land Nikola Vucevic. After spending more than a year on the trade block, Zach LaVine was sent from Chicago to Sacramento last week in a deal that saw Chicago reacquire control of its 2025 first-round pick.
Of course, as Cowley observes, there’s a case to be made that the LaVine trade was more about undoing previous moves, including LaVine’s maximum-salary contract and the 2022 acquisition of DeMar DeRozan in which the Bulls gave up that ’25 first-rounder. The Bulls also ended up hanging onto the rest of their trade candidates, including Vucevic, at last Thursday’s deadline.
Still, now that they’ve regained control of their 2025 first-rounder, the Bulls are well positioned to add another young player this June to a core that includes rookie forward Matas Buzelis. While Karnisovas told reporters last week that he’d like to see his team make a playoff push, Cowley says the front office wants to maximize its draft odds but can’t say so publicly.
If moving up the lottery order is the Bulls’ goal, they’ve been going in the “right” direction as of late, having lost their last four games by an average of 24.5 points per contest. Chicago’s 22-33 record is the eighth-worst mark in the league and the team is currently just 1.5 games ahead of the 20-34 Sixers and Nets.