Bulls offseason Thread

Noah though.

I think he is untouchable. Everyone but him and Rose should be up for trade for that 3rd piece.
 
Last edited:
yeah, need to keep a good big man and Rose obviously will never leave hopefully
nthat.gif
 
nate needed another step & that dunk would have tore the roof off the UC

Bro with the triple dub :pimp:
 
Speaking of Nate...:smh:

Bulls Could Consider Waiving Nate Robinson Very Soon
Dec 19th, 2012 at 2:30 am by Josh Hill

When Marquis Teague was drafted, many people took a step back. It was expected that the Bulls would use the draft to try and find a shooting guard to run along side Derrick Rose at some point in the next few years, or at the very least take a combo-guard to fill in for Rose while he’s out, then take a bench role as the heir-apparent to the shooting guard position.

But ever since being drafted, he’s been growing on Bulls fans and Bulls brass alike, just like all other players to stroll through the Windy City that possess a considerable amount of talent.

Teague wasn’t drafted to be a lights out superstar that will threaten Rose’s rule as the face of the franchise, but he was drafted to be a key part of this team. That’s extremely good news for Teague, and based on his recent play it’s looking like a great move by the Bulls front office.

However, it’s not so good news for Nate Robinson.

This isn’t to say Robinson isn’t playing well. But when Derrick Rose comes back, the Bulls won’t be hot on the idea of carrying four point guards on roster when one is too short to be involved in any defensive rotations as a shooting guard. Robinson does give the Bulls rotational depth in terms of offense, but it makes too much sense to keep him. Remember the front office we’re dealing with here, a front office that didn’t earn a lot of faith this offseason.

When the Bulls signed Robinson near the end of the summer (a story that was buried by the Olympics), they signed him to a deal that didn’t kick in as fully guaranteed until January 10th. This wasn’t a coincidence, it was actually a calculated move by Gar Forman and John Paxson — are you surprised?

The idea was that if the Bulls are impressed with Nate Robinson, or in other words if they needed Robinson, they would keep him on board for the rest of the season. If Robinson slumped, or someone stepped up, the Bulls could cut Robinson loose and not have to pay a penalty for doing so.

This isn’t a basketball decision though, so don’t be fooled. Chicago is $3 million into the red, aka the Luxury Tax. The Bulls have never in the history of their existence paid a luxury tax and they’re really not tickled by the idea of spoiling that streak this year. Robinson signed a $1.14 million contract in August and his total cap hit is $854,389.

There’s no question that the Bulls would love to get that off the books.

If they can shed the $3 million before the end of the season, the Bulls will not have to pay the luxury tax. The rise of Marquis Teague is not only good news for Bulls fans, but it’s a lovely smoke screen for the front office to continue making “basketball decisions”.
 
I guess i can live without Nate, but I still love his energy. Great win last night. Jo is def. an All- Star this season.
14-10 isnt so bad.
 
Nate's scoring has saved us from a few games, and he's helped lose some games too. He's inconsistent the team needs his scoring ability.

Of course they won't waive Hinrich, even though he's been consistently terrible thus far. I'm thinking Rip is gone around the Feb trade deadline.
 
More on the possibility of waiving Nate:
Bulls might waive Nate Robinson to save money (and possibly for another reason, one for which I have no evidence)
-Mark Deeks (http://www.shamsports.com/2012/12/bulls-might-waive-nate-robinson-to-save.html)

K.C. Johnson reports that the Bulls, despite being a number four seed without having their MVP on the court, are sorely tempted to waive Nate Robinson.

In one of the most unheralded high quality moves of the summer - unheralded because the dominant Bullsean narrative of the summer was rightly one of cost-cutting and player-dumping - the Bulls were able to sign Robinson to not only a minimum salary contract, but a partially guaranteed one at that. Of the $1,146,337 Nate is owed - an amount which, if he's kept for the full season, the Bulls will owe only $854,389 of - only $400,000 is guaranteed, becoming fully guaranteed if not waived on or before January 1st [not the 10th, as reported elsewhere]. In an industry where the permanent goal is to sign as good as quality of player as is possible for as cheap of a price as is possible, this is an incredibly good contract. The institutional maligning of Nate as a player that dates back years cannot (or should not) ignore the fact that he's a hugely talented player who can single handedly turn the outcome of NBA games. And the Bulls should know this, because he's done that more than once for them this season.

The move would be, of course, patently ridiculous. Even if the season was a wash, you don't waive a most vital contributor to save on what, by NBA standards, is a nominal fee, and by no standard is the season proving to be a wash in the first place. Nate is third on the Bulls in PER, the only man who can consistently create a shot off the dribble in Rose's absence, arguably the team's best ball handler, its only creative backcourt player, and one of its best shooters. He's even being masked defensively by the Bulls's meticulous defensive system, and is thus a hugely important player to a team whose season is still important. There are absolutely no basketball reasons why Nate should be cut on the basis of his performance thus far, and the justification offered - that Marquis Teague is showing "signs" - is an unbelievably tepid excuse. Teague has not yet even had the Bulls career of Acie Law, who at least managed three good games to Teague's two. Excited by his future as the may be, there is absolutely no reason why Teague should play ahead of Nate if the Bulls want to win games.

The move, then, would be financial. In a best-case scenario for them, cutting Nate on New Year's Eve will save the Bulls about $900,000 after tax calculations, if they are not able to get under the luxury tax threshold by season's end. However, in light of the concurrent rumblings about the desire to move Rip Hamilton, which wasn't difficult to predict, they likely will do so, therefore they'll only be saving about $450,000 on Nate, an even smaller amount. It's also an amount that much of which would more than likely have to be spent again anyway. Chicago only has 13 players on the roster on the moment, and although the NBA allows for 12 for two weeks at a time, 13 is the mandated minimum roster size. Someone will have to be signed - or a succession of people on 10 day contracts - to meet that requirement. And that would demand spending the saved money again. In short, then, the Bulls should suck it up and pay.

If the Bulls decide they absolutely cannot afford to spend an extra $400,000 on a projected backup, there are many other ways to go about it. The obvious candidate to go is Vladimir Radmanovic, signed to a guaranteed deal and completely unused on the court, the sixth player on a six man forward depth chart. Vlad is also signed to the minimum of $854,389, and, come trade deadline day of February 21st, two thirds will already have been billed to the Bulls. There are many teams out there with open roster spots and no luxury tax concerns who would happily take him and a $375,000 check - $100,000 more than will be outstanding on Radmanovic's salary - just to take the cap hit. To the recipient team, it's a free $100k. If the Bulls would rather not sign that check, a second round pick would be equally well received.

There is no reason to believe this kind of deal is not available to them, considering the amount of precedence that exists for it across the league in reason seasons. Failing that, though, he might take a buyout. Or they could perhaps make the increasingly inevitable Rip-Hamilton-and-a-pick-to-Cleveland deal happen, whilst adding Vlad and Omri Casspi to it. There are always, ALWAYS ways around this that don't involve cutting a bargain of a player just to save on a trivial amount.

As this is the same team that squeezed Teague of of $170,000 for no justifiable reason, it is entirely possible that this supposedly negligible amount is nevertheless deemed sufficient to merit losing one of their best players. That, however, would be unpalatable. So would be the grim but plausible reality that Bulls brass have sullied on Nate simply because they don't like his style of play, a reality which would involve prioritising aesthetics and perceived importance of fundamentals over actual positive impact. Flawed as Nate is, he's still incredibly useful. It would be depressing for that to be overlooked in deference to stylistic reasons.

Perhaps, then, there is another justification. In the search for a palatable reason for this rumour to exist, perhaps there exists something off the court. It is demonstrably proven to all Bulls observers that Robinson has been better for them this season than the starter ahead of him, Kirk Hinrich, whose perceived defensive value just does not offset the incontrovertible fact that he just can't play the other end any more. Indeed, it's been so apparent at times that it's painful. We should not, therefore, assume that the players don't know this either. Nor should we assume that a basketball locker room is unlike any other workplace in the world. And people in workplaces *****.

When a backup is wildly outplaying a starter on a nightly basis, but the team is more emotionally and financially invested in the starter, they have two options; they can divorce themselves from that investment and maximise their incumbent assets on the court, or they can get rid of the thing that's making their investment look worse. In doing so, they reaffirm their investment, and, they hope, help it realise its potential. The investment then has every opportunity to succeed, without being able to feel superior breath down its neck all the time. It's asset management, or at least, it pertains to be. And so perhaps that is why we have arrived at this point.

As the title suggest, I have no evidence that this is what is indeed happening. I merely posit the theory that it might, on account of the fact that it has happened sufficiently often elsewhere. [Find a team with a struggling starter and a worse backup, and ask yourself why they won't at least upgrade the backup.] And I posit it mostly in the vain hope that there's a reason that this course of action is being discussed, other than the overarching and unavoidable "Bulls are spendthrifts" narrative. It is, however, merely my own whimsy. And I'm not sure I even want it to be true.

All this cost cutting is the direct result of signing Hinrich to the oversized and unnecessarily ambitious contract that they did. His underperformance, predictable as it was, should have meant a greater reliance upon his superior backup. As it is, it might cost him his job.

Something's not right there.



(NB - The above is all contigent on the Bulls actually considering this as an option, rather than just is being an option available to them. The two are very different.)
 
Sure get rid of the PG who's actually producing and keep the one who had the same stats in 23 mins as the 3rd string PG did while only playing 3 mins.

that's make's a gang of sense. :smh:
 
As the second article states, I too can see the possibility of the org considering getting rid of the guy who's making their golden boy (Hinrich) look bad. It saves them from admitting it was an awful signing.
 
SMH gonna be pissed if that happens. Derrick isnt going to come back playing 30 mins a game. Those shots Nate hit last night, Kirk hast hit since preseason.

I cant even begin to explain my hate for Reinsdorf
 
If that happens, ill lose a lot of respect for the organization. What kind of message does that send to Derrick? Sure they want to win, but money's more important.
 
hopefully they can find a way to package nate and rip in a package for a better player and get themselves into the luxury tax for a good reason.

i hear gerald henderson in Charlotte is on the move for a price. Rip and Nate are expiring contracts.

Nate will never be a good player on a championship team. I would rather see teague playing and struggling. At least let the kid learn. We know what Nate is.

I still think Reinsdorf is a cheap ***. Spends all this money on his bum white sox (i'm a sox fan) with no attendance, but won't go into the luxury tax with a team that leads the NBA in attendance.
 
damn they just cant get right....all the money they have made and are stil penny pinching on the westside.

I wish I had won that powerball so I could have bought into ownership and had a say in "basketball decisions"
 
^

Ant i'm with you. My boys and I have an agreement where if any of us hit a powerball whatever we split. However if it is huuuuuuuuuuge we trying to get in on the bulls or bears.

What a shame that over the past 30 years Reinsdorf is the best owner this town has had.
 
Last edited:
Everytime Felton dribbles, it should be a carrying violation.


JR Smith is a bird too.
 
Bankstradamus again FTW. Told my pops the Bullies would win tonight. We would have won by more if everyone had not been thrown out. All the offense was thru JR and Melo. Them being gone opened it up for others.

Now just imagine what we will do to them once Rose returns and this team already knows they can hang close with other playoff teams.
 
Rose being out really allowed for Noah to develop nice, can't lose him.
nthat.gif


I can see why they would let go of Nate if Rose is coming back. Kirk would be a better for defense reasons since Nate is primarily offense. 

Still I'd rather Nate stay, because the team is looking good with all these guys together. 
 
Belated Merry Christmas to you all!

Our Bulls have been giving gifts to opponents the last two games....
 
back to you CA

I really hope the Bulls get out of the giving mood and so thankful I didn't buy tickets to last nights game
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

The ultimate sneaker enthusiast community.

NikeTalk was created as a way of giving back to both the sneaker enthusiast community and to the greater global community of which we are all a part.

NikeTalk is NOT affiliated with Nike Inc. in any way, shape, or form. All opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of Nike, Inc.

© 1999-2024 NikeTalk.com

Share this page

Back
Top Bottom