- Mending fences with Zach LaVine should be one of the priorities for the Bulls as they get ready for camp, observes Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times. The front office began trying to trade LaVine last fall in what was hoped to be the first step of a roster makeover. However, his massive contract and injury history doomed trade efforts and forced the team to keep him. LaVine is still owed $138MM over the next three years, so the Bulls need to build up his trade value ahead of the February deadline. Cowley states that coach Billy Donovan took the first step toward mending their relationship when he visited LaVine in Los Angeles this summer.
4:00pm: The signing is official, according to RealGM’s transaction log. It’s an Exhibit 10 deal, Hoops Rumors can confirm.
11:30am: The Bulls have agreed to a contract with forward E.J. Liddell, according to Michael Scotto of HoopsHype (Twitter link). While the details of the contract aren’t yet known, it’s probably safe to assume it’s an Exhibit 10 deal, with Chicago having also signed Talen Horton-Tucker and Kenneth Lofton Jr. to such contracts in recent weeks.
Liddell, the No. 41 pick in the 2022 draft, spent two years with the Pelicans. He missed what would have been his rookie season in 2022/23 with a knee injury before playing eight games with New Orleans last season.
This offseason, Liddell was moved to the Hawks as part of the trade that sent Dejounte Murray to the Pelicans. He was then re-routed to the Suns before being waived.
In 29 G League games last season, Liddell averaged 17.3 points, 8.0 rebounds and 1.8 blocks while shooting 50.8% from the floor and 27.0% from deep. The Ohio State product averaged 14.1 points across 92 career collegiate games as well.
If Liddell’s contract is an Exhibit 10 deal, he’ll be competing for one of the Bulls’ last remaining roster spots. As noted above, Chicago has Horton-Tucker and Lofton alongside Marcus Domask on training camp contracts. Chicago has 15 players on standard contracts but Onuralp Bitim‘s contract is non-guaranteed. The Bulls also have one two-way spot open.
It looks as though the Bulls are fielding an open competition heading into training camp. Bitim will battle to hold his 15th spot on the roster while the Exhibit 10 players compete for either that spot or the Bulls’ open two-way. It’s important to note that Liddell, Lofton and Domask are eligible for two-way deals while Horton-Tucker is not.
Although the Sixers‘ projected starting lineup (Joel Embiid, Paul George, Tyrese Maxey, Kelly Oubre and Caleb Martin) is versatile defensively and features plenty of shooting, Martin projects to be the NBA’s shortest starting power forward this season, according to Tim Bontemps of ESPN, who suggests that Philadelphia could benefit from adding some more size to its frontcourt.
Philadelphia is one of five Eastern Conference threats to Boston discussed by Bontemps as he identifies one piece each of those teams is missing. Some of those pieces are positional — the Knicks could use another center, while the Cavs would like to add a two-way wing, Bontemps writes.
Other missing pieces are more general traits. For example, Bontemps says the Bucks are lacking “dynamism,” pointing to the team’s dearth of dunks by players besides Giannis Antetokounmpo last season as a sign that Milwaukee would benefit from adding more athletic, explosive pieces to its roster.
Here are a few more odds and ends from around the basketball world:
- Although Amazon reportedly scrapped plans to make a $115MM investment in Diamond Sports Group, it sounds like the mega-corporation and the parent company of the Bally Sports networks are still in discussions. As Josh Kosman of The New York Post reports, Amazon is exploring a deal to stream Bally Sports broadcasts of 12 NBA teams for the coming season. According to Kosman, under the proposed deal, Bally Sports would continue its local broadcasts, but Amazon would give customers the option of paying approximately $20 per month to access their home team’s games through Prime Video.
- Keith Smith of Spotrac takes a look at how the teams operating in tax apron territory approached the offseason, breaking down the moves they made and considering how the apron-related restrictions affected them.
- While few teams have a contract as onerous as Zach LaVine‘s on their books, the Bulls aren’t the only club carrying a deal they may regret. Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report identifies one possible such contract on the books for all 30 teams, ranking each one out of 10 in terms of “potential regret level.” LaVine’s deal is the only one that scores a 10/10, but Pincus gives a 9/10 to Bradley Beal (Suns), Jordan Poole (Wizards), and Michael Porter Jr. (Nuggets).
Speaking to veteran NBA reporter Marc Stein (Substack link) at Goran Dragic‘s farewell game in Slovenia recently, Bulls center Nikola Vucevic clarified his recent comments about wanting to play for four more seasons.
“I think that kind of came out wrong. It wasn’t that I want to play four more years. It was just more so that … they were asking me, like, am I thinking about retirement? I was just like, ‘Retiring?’ In my mind I have at least four more years and then I want to see from there what I can do,” Vucevic said. “But it came out as, like, I want to play four more years.
“I have two more years in this contract (with the Bulls). And hopefully I’m able to get two more after that, which will take me to 37. And at that time, I’ll have to see what I would like to do. This is more so four years of me being at a high level. Maybe in two years I’ll say four more. I said it in the moment; I didn’t think it’d turn into such a big thing.”
Vucevic, who has been with the Bulls since 2021, was the subject of trade rumors this offseason, but no deal materialized. It’s possible that will change before the season begins, but for now he projects to be Chicago’s starting center on opening night.
In his conversation with Stein, Vucevic discussed how he handles those trade rumors, the Bulls’ potential for 2024/25, Lonzo Ball‘s comeback chances, DeMar DeRozan‘s departure, his dip in three-point efficiency, and several other topics.
The interview is worth reading in full if you’re a subscriber to Stein’s Substack, but here are a few more highlights:
On dealing with trade rumors:
“I’m used to it at this point. Since I’ve been with the Bulls, I’ve been in a lot of trade stories, especially last summer as well throughout last season. So it’s just part of it. If things were going well and we’re winning and everything was great, that wouldn’t be the case. But because things weren’t going that well, we weren’t winning and we weren’t achieving our goals, then obviously change is bound to happen.
“Honestly, I know it’s a pretty basic answer, but you don’t have much control over it, so you kind of just wait and see. If they decide to change and trade me, it’s on them to do. Just like a year and a half ago I was a free agent and I could have chosen to go elsewhere. … I chose to stay and I felt like we had something to prove and unfortunately we didn’t do it. But now it’s a new team and I’m excited to play with these younger guys and I think we can play better than people think.”
On what he expects from Zach LaVine after a down year in 2023/24:
“I spoke to him a couple of times over the summer. He’s good health-wise. I think he’s in a good place mentally. I’m sure, knowing him, he’ll come back motivated to show that he’s still a great player — that maybe he kind of had a weird year last year with the injury and everything. I think he’s motivated to show people that it was just one season and that he’s a really good player.”
On the impact of DeRozan’s offseason exit:
“It’ll definitely be a little bit of an adjustment just because obviously we all know what he brought to us on the court. But I think also just his presence in general. DeMar was really liked and obviously very well respected in the locker room … kind of the guy that everybody gravitated towards and was always the storyteller of all these veteran stories and all these things and the young guys really gravitated towards that.”
September 5: Horton-Tucker’s contract with the Bulls — which features Exhibit 10 language, according to multiple reports — is now official, per RealGM’s transaction log.
September 4: Free agent guard Talen Horton-Tucker will join the Bulls on a partially guaranteed contract, sources tell Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).
Charania notes that it’s a homecoming for the 23-year-old Chicago native, who has five years of NBA experience with the Lakers and Jazz. He appeared in 51 games with Utah last season, making 11 starts and averaging 10.1 points, 2.4 rebounds and 3.5 assists in 19.8 minutes per night.
Shooting has been a persistent issue for Horton-Tucker, and he connected at a career-low 39.6% from the field last season, along with 33% from three-point range.
The Jazz renounced their free agent rights to Horton-Tucker last month to clear cap room for Lauri Markkanen‘s new contract. Reports surfaced this summer that the Rockets and Mavericks might have interest in signing him, but nothing ever materialized.
Charania states that Horton-Tucker will be given a chance to earn a roster spot with the Bulls. Chicago currently has 14 players with fully guaranteed contracts, plus Onuralp Bitim, whose deal is non-guaranteed until opening night and then carries a $350K guarantee until the league-wide guarantee date in early January.
Free agent guard Talen Horton-Tucker will reportedly be signing with his hometown Bulls. According to K.C. Johnson of NBC Sports Chicago, the five-year veteran will sign an Exhibit 10 deal for training camp.
Shams Charania of The Athletic, who broke the news of both deals, said that Horton-Tucker and Mac McClung (Magic) received partially guaranteed contracts. From the players’ perspective, that’s not wrong in a sense — the Exhibit 10 language in their contracts makes them eligible for a bonus worth $77.5K (on top of their G League salaries) if they’re waived and spend at least 60 days with their clubs’ NBAGL affiliates.
It is misleading though, because for NBA teams, Exhibit 10 deals are one-year, minimum-salary contracts that are non-guaranteed. For example, if Horton-Tucker is immediately cut after the deal is official, the Bulls won’t carry any dead money toward the salary cap. That’s different than a player like Keon Johnson — if the Nets waive him today for whatever reason, they would owe him his full $250K partial guarantee while carrying an identical dead-money cap hit for 2024/25.
Here’s more from the Central:
- In another story for NBC Sports Chicago, Johnson attempts to predict the Bulls‘ starting lineup and rotation. Despite the obvious defensive shortcomings, Johnson believes Josh Giddey, Coby White, Zach LaVine, Patrick Williams and Nikola Vucevic is the “most logical” outcome for the starting five. However, only Ayo Dosunmu and free agent addition Jalen Smith seem like locks for rotation minutes off the bench, per Johnson.
- Eric Nehm of The Athletic answers mailbag questions related to the Bucks, including whether they should reduce Giannis Antetokounmpo‘s workload during the upcoming season to try to keep him fresh ahead of a potential playoff run. Nehm also examines whether Taurean Prince could be used at power forward in small-ball lineups featuring Antetokounmpo at center.
- Will the Pistons carry a 15th player on their standard roster to open the season? What about their remaining cap room — will they use it before the season starts or carry it over until the trade deadline? Keith Langlois of Pistons.com explores those questions.
As long as a team is operating below the second tax apron, it has access to at least some form of the mid-level exception, a tool designed to allow clubs to add talent without using cap room to do so. As we outline in more detail within our glossary, one of the following MLEs is available to a team below the second apron of $188,931,000:
- Taxpayer mid-level exception ($5,183,000): For teams operating between the first and second tax aprons.
- Non-taxpayer mid-level exception ($12,822,000): For teams operating above the cap and below the first apron.
- Room exception ($7,983,000): For teams who operate under the cap and use up all their room.
While four teams – the Celtics, Suns, Timberwolves, and Bucks – currently have salaries above the second tax apron, the other 26 clubs have access to one of these three mid-level exceptions. However, only a small handful of those clubs have actually taken advantage of the exception, as our tracker shows.
The Warriors are the lone team to use the full portion of the non-taxpayer mid-level exception so far in 2024/25, having signed free agent guard De’Anthony Melton a one-year contract worth $12,822,000.
Four other teams have used at least some portion of the non-taxpayer mid-level exception, but still have a chunk left over for one or more signings later in the league year. That group includes the Bulls (approximately $4.25MM remaining), Mavericks ($4.25MM), Clippers ($3.3MM), and Wizards ($6.38MM). They used part of their MLEs to sign Jalen Smith, Naji Marshall, Derrick Jones, and Saddiq Bey, respectively.
The Nuggets used the entire $5.2MM taxpayer mid-level exception to add Dario Saric in free agency, while the Sixers re-signed Kelly Oubre using their full $8MM room exception.
The remaining 19 teams have yet to dip into their mid-level or room exceptions at all.
In some cases, it’s not practical to do so. For example, the Heat and Lakers technically have access to the taxpayer MLE, but are so close to the second apron that they can’t realistically use it without shedding some salary.
Other teams are close enough to the luxury tax line that it wouldn’t make sense for them to spend their mid-level exception and become a taxpayer. The Nets and Hawks, for instance, have yet to touch their MLEs, but they’re each less than $2MM away from the tax threshold, so it’s safe to assume neither team is on the verge of bringing in an MLE-level free agent.
Still, there are plenty of teams that have more than enough spending flexibility to use some or all of their exception. That group includes every club with access to the room exception, including potential contenders such as the Thunder and Magic.
The 2024/25 season represents the first league year in which teams are permitted to use the non-taxpayer mid-level exception or the room exception to acquire a player via trade rather than just to sign a player to a contract, so some clubs may be waiting until mid-season to see if a better opportunity arises on the trade market. Others may use some of their leftover exception money to pursue a free agent on the buyout market in February.
Two-way contracts allow NBA teams to carry three extra players in addition to the 15 on their regular season roster. These players generally bounce back and forth between the NBA and G League, but remain under team control and can’t be poached by rival franchises.
With training camps set to begin in about a month, there are still nine NBA teams with open two-way spots. Two clubs — the Nets and Magic — each have a pair of two-way openings, while the remaining seven teams have one opening apiece. That means there are currently 11 two-way openings in the NBA.
Here’s the full list of NBA teams with two-way vacancies, as shown by our 2024/25 two-way contract tracker:
- Brooklyn Nets
- Chicago Bulls
- Charlotte Hornets
- Dallas Mavericks
- Detroit Pistons
- Los Angeles Clippers
- Orlando Magic
- Portland Trail Blazers
- Washington Wizards
Technically, the Cavaliers have yet to finalize their reported two-way deal with JT Thor, but we expect that to occur at some point before training camp — that’s why they are not included on this list.
Since two-way deals are non-guaranteed and don’t count against the salary cap, it’s pretty common to see players shuffled in and out of rosters both before and during the season. It’s worth noting that Exhibit 10 deals can be converted to two-way contracts under certain conditions — these teams may be waiting until training camp and preseason to get a better look at young players.
First introduced in 2017, two-way deals have undergone some rule changes in recent years, and the NBA’s new Collective Bargaining Agreement has updated them further. Here are some key points to remember:
- Teams can now carry three players on two-way contracts, rather than two.
- Two-way players are eligible to be active for up to 50 of their team’s 82 regular season games. If a team isn’t carrying a full 15-man standard roster, its two-way players can only be active for a combined 90 games.
- Players on two-way contracts will earn $578,577 in 2024/25, half of the rookie minimum.
- Two-way contracts can’t be signed after March 4.
You can check out our glossary entry to learn more about two-way contracts.
Boban Marjanovic turned 36 this month. The affable big man told Marc Stein in his latest Substack post that he’d like to still be playing at 40 years old, as LeBron James is doing.
“I want to stay in [the] NBA; this is the main goal,” he said. “I want my kids to be there and I want myself to be there.”
Marjanovic remains on the free agent market and continues to search for a new opportunity. He was on the Rockets’ roster last season.
We have more from around the international basketball world:
- Bulls center Nikola Vucevic hasn’t ruled out the idea of finishing his career in Europe, but doesn’t plan to play overseas anytime soon, BasketNews.com relays. “I would love to play in the NBA for as long as possible. It’s the best league, with the best players and conditions,” Vucevic told Iva Jevtic of B92. “At this moment, I’m not thinking about a return to Europe. If it ever happens, Crvena Zvezda would be the main favorite, but many things would have to fall into place.” Crvena Zvezda is based in Belgrade, Serbia.
- A number of NBA teams are in rebuilding mode and Grant Hughes of Bleacher Report ranks how each of them are faring. He sees the Spurs being ahead of the pack and not just because they have generational talent Victor Wembanyama. The Pistons come in at the No. 2 spot due to the amount of young talent on their roster, headed by Cade Cunningham.
- In a comprehensive feature story, Kyle Tucker of The Athletic details the difficulties that Willie Cauley-Stein has endured in recent years. Cauley-Stein, who hasn’t appeared in an NBA game since the 2021/22, remains hopeful of getting another NBA contract.
This summer, the Bulls finally, officially stopped pretending they were close to competing for anything but a play-in tournament berth.
Three years after offloading major draft capital in the hopes of becoming Eastern Conference contenders, Chicago waived the white flag. The Bulls’ front office moved probably two of its three best trade chips in two-time All-Defensive Team guard Alex Caruso and six-time All-Star small forward DeMar DeRozan. The third, 24-year-old emerging point guard Coby White, remains on the roster after a breakout individual season in 2023/24.
DeRozan agreed to a three-year, $73.7MM deal with the Kings as part of a three-team sign-and-trade with the Bulls and Spurs. San Antonio netted an unprotected first-round pick swap, as well as the contract of 3-and-D combo forward Harrison Barnes. Chicago, despite moving by far the best player in the deal, only nabbed two second rounders and reserve shooting guard Chris Duarte.
Caruso was shipped out to the Thunder in exchange for point guard Josh Giddey, who by the end of this spring’s playoffs was a barely-used eighth man, averaging just 12.6 minutes per game in Oklahoma City’s second-round series to the Finals-bound Mavericks. Giddey’s missing-in-action jumper and poor defense made him a liability in his postseason debut. Luckily for the 6’8″ Aussie, he’s not in danger of making the playoffs again any time soon.
Oklahoma City gave up a pair of second-round picks to obtain Gordon Hayward in a trade deadline trade. Caruso, on an expiring $9.9MM sweetheart deal, is one of the league’s elite defenders, and surely could have netted some level of first-round equity. The Bulls reportedly received offers along those lines but preferred to acquire an established young veteran in Giddey.
Two more veteran former All-Stars remain very available on the trade market. But the Bulls can’t seem to give away either shooting guard Zach LaVine or center Nikola Vucevic, both of whom are on far-too-generous multiyear contracts.
Armed with a core of DeRozan, LaVine, Vucevic, Lonzo Ball, Caruso and White, the Bulls went a combined 125-121 across three seasons. Chicago did make the playoffs once, during this group’s first year together in 2021/22, but was quickly eliminated in the first round and hasn’t survived the play-in tournament since.
The team has been stubbornly resistant to making significant moves to improve its defense or long-range shooting since Ball went down with a left knee meniscus tear in January 2022. He’s currently rehabbing after his third surgery, and hoping to make a comeback in the final year of his contract.
The Bulls selected intriguing young G League Ignite forward Matas Buzelis with the No. 11 pick in this year’s poorly regarded draft. The 6’10” pro was an underwhelming floor-spacer in the G League, making just 27.3% of his 3.4 three-point tries, but flashed encouraging finishing ability and athleticism during his Summer League games with Chicago.
Chicago’s only major free agent addition thus far is ex-Pacers reserve big man Jalen Smith, who signed a three-season, $27MM deal. At 24, the 6’10” Maryland alum could conceivably grow along with the rebuilding Bulls.
The Bulls also re-signed restricted free agent forward Patrick Williams to a generous five-year, $90MM new deal. The 23-year-old incurred a left foot injury in January that required season-ending surgery. Due to minimal frontcourt size elsewhere, the 6’7″ wing has often been miscast by Chicago head coach Billy Donovan as a power forward, but his skinny frame has impeded his ability to get much offense cooking against opposing defenders.
Across 43 games last season, Williams averaged 10.0 points, 3.9 rebounds, and 1.5 assists with a shooting line of .443/.399/.788. Those numbers are more or less the same as his rookie season output (9.2 PPG, 4.6 RPG, 1.4 APG, .483/.391/.728 shooting). Though he has improved defensively during his four pro seasons, the Florida State alum has been a developmental dud on the other end, hampered by a slow release on his jump shots.
We want to hear from you. Did the Bulls get enough back in their deals for DeRozan and Caruso? How should they handle the contracts of Vucevic and LaVine? Will Ball even vaguely resemble his pre-injury self? Was Buzelis the right draft pick, or will he eventually go down in Bulls history as a lottery misfire? How much more leeway should owner Jerry Reinsdorf give team president Arturas Karnisovas, who has underwhelmed during his tenure with the team thus far?
Let us know how you feel in the comments section below.