This feels like a now-or-never year for this Chicago Bulls core. They have run it back this season with Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan and Nikola Vucevic (likely with Coby White and Patrick Williams as the other starters) and want to see if this team can, at the very least, get back to the playoffs where they were two years ago. If not, Chicago has already tested the water of a LaVine trade.
Or maybe it’s not a make-it-or-break-it kind of year. This offseason the Bulls locked up Vucevic on a three-year deal, LaVine is under contract for three more years (plus a fourth that is a player option), and now comes a report the Bulls and DeRozan have at least talked contract extension, reports Jamal Collier of ESPN.
Meanwhile, DeRozan, 34, is entering the final season of his contract and is set to earn $28.6 million. The Bulls have expressed interest in re-signing DeRozan to a long-term deal and the two sides have had preliminary talks negotiating an extension, sources told ESPN.
At age 34, DeRozan likely would have to take a pay cut and the Bulls might not want to guarantee more than a couple of years, but DeRozan averaged 25.4 points a game on 56.2% shooting last season so not as much of a cut of one as some might think. DeRozan’s game should age relatively well.
As Collier notes, Bulls executive vice president Arturas Karnisovas said at media day, “we’ll see how the season is going to play out.” The Bulls appear to be hedging their bets, and if this season starts to show more promise than expected they can run it back again (and maybe with Lonzo Ball, although he is out all of this season and nobody is sure what comes next). If the Bulls are again unimpressive, everyone could be on the trade block and a reset could be next.
However, with the Bulls, everything has to be filtered through the prism of the Reinsdorfs (owner Jerry and team president, and his son, Michael). What qualifies as successful enough to keep the team together and how deep they are willing to go into a rebuild may not be the same answers Bulls fans would give.