Will Noa Essengue Or Matas Be Another Bulls’ Failed Experiment? | P-Will Worst Valued Contract

Will Noa Essengue Or Matas Be Another Bulls’ Failed Experiment? | P-Will Worst Valued Contract

Many Bulls fans have lost trust in the Chicago Bulls and more namely their front office and ownership group years ago. On today’s episode, I want to ask the question, talk a little bit about this. What does what needs to happen this season to start restoring the faith if it has not started by some Bulls fans already? We’re going to take a look at that. Plus, Patrick Williams has called the worst contract in the NBA and Yuki Cara talks about how comfortable he’s getting with the Chicago Bulls. Hopefully, that means he’s going to stay around for a while. We’re going to talk about all that and more right after this. [Music] What’s going on, Bulls fans? Welcome to another episode of Chicago Bulls Central, your number one spot for everything Chicago Bulls related. I’m the host, Hayes, but more importantly, you guys can follow the channel at Bull Central Pod on every social media platform we happen to be on. With that said, let’s go and get into this content today, y’all. And uh I want to start off talking a bit from this thought, right? Um the Chicago Bulls, I you know, a couple episodes ago, I talked about the Bulls picking a new direction and path. And while as of right now they still have a lot to prove that this direction path is going to be more successful than the last direction that they chose, I want to talk about it from more so the fan standpoint, right? I I the Bulls went out and drafted Misbellis last year. They got Noah SN uh this season as well. They they traded for Josh Giddy. You start seeing like a young core develop, right? You add into that with players that are still young, but you know, more veterans and Kobe White, IO Dumu, and you’re starting to see a path being forged there. Right now, the Bulls, I do think before they they commit to one direction or another, waiting to see how much of this team brings over uh the fire that they that they’ve played with towards the end of the season and if that that win run that they were on is more sustainable, how how much of that is sustainable over the course of the entirety of the season. I’ve talked about on on prior episodes how that is the right move when you have a team that finished the season very very strong in the regular season. We know the playin performance left a lot to be desired. Um but when you have that right and then you and and and you you are at a point where you have a lot of flexibility after the season. Most those players a lot of the players on this roster have expiring deals at the end of this year. Meaning that if you give it a chance to see, hey, how much of this is legitimate? You have two pivot points. You have one at the trade deadline, which if the team is looking good, you may look to make moves to strengthen what that team has going on. Or you could wait till the end of the season. A lot of these players expire and then you could try to reconstruct re uh construct your roster a little bit at that point. But what needs to happen here? Is it a win total? Right? For so long, the Bulls win total has gone down. We’ve only had one above 500 season since AK has taken over. Does it need to be something like that? Are people more now looked at the development of the young players that we have here? Modis Bzelis who I I don’t think you can deny developed over the course of last season. Now, you know, when when we’re in the midst of the season, you’re looking at Modis like not playing a lot to start off and you’re seeing this guy that like has tons of potential but not playing on this team. You know, that was a little frustrating. But then by the end of the season, even Modis Bzelis admitted like, hey, no, what Billy Donovan did actually ended up being uh the right thing there. I actually appreciate what Billy Donovan did because he didn’t throw too too much on me too early. But now coming into year two, you want to see Billy Donovan put more on Mus Billis early on, you’re going to see typically the same thing under a play for a player like Noah Essen as well. I think that the more and more I’ve seen Noah Singay play, we know the Bulls only have one more summer league game left on their schedule that is tomorrow um against the Utah Jazz, no doubt. Um but you have, you know, you you expect that now from Noah Sing. Yeah, I’m starting to see like as I talked about in yesterday’s episode, like how he can help the Bulls right away with certain things that are his strengths, rim running, running the floor, rim protection, things like that, I think are things that definitely can help him um in those area or help the Bulls in those areas. So, is it that we just need to see that steady development? Um what is it for you personally that’s going to get there? And got to ask myself this question, right? And you guys know I try to be more patient with this team, especially more patient than when I started off this show, right? Um, but I look at this now and I and I realize that the Bulls have picked what’s probably the longer path and that comes with a little bit of patience, right? It has to come with a little bit of patience. The Bulls went after it too early last time in training for Nicola. That move alone may have not been the too early, but then you know when you look at the number of young players who traded out, the number of draft picks and then uh you know to get back over the course of that time, uh Demar Rose and Allonzo Ball and Alice Gruso and had some good moments with those players, but the Bulls maybe went too far in before they really made sure that they had a team that was good enough to make the playoffs. And therefore, once things started crumbling down, like after the Lonzo injury, of course, you have far farther to fall fall, right? So, uh, you know, that’s something that that hurt this team. But, you know, I’m somebody who I I realize the Bulls aren’t really in a position to where I want them giving up a whole bunch of first round picks. We we don’t I don’t want them to give up a bunch of picks to to to all of a sudden try to try to go all in on this team yet. I don’t want that to happen yet. Also realize where I think some more Bulls fans need to realize as well. The Bulls assets aren’t great. Kobe is a is a really good player, but you’re not netting a lot back for Kobe. So many people are like, “Well, we need to trade Kobe so we can get multiple first round picks back now.” Probably not getting that, right? We need to trade IO because IO’s going to get us a lot of a lot of picks back. You’re probably not going to get a bunch of picks back for that. And so the place that this front office has to be in, and I think especially when you hear the number of of trade rumors that they’ve been in is that you’re measuring what the value is versus the value that you already have in the player. And here’s what I’ll tell y’all. Um, and I know this is not something that’s common, you know, of how Bulls fans think. We always think pick pick, but I would assume, even though as a second round pick, it’s probably better than you’re getting uh as as a better player than you’re going to get with anything in the lower end of the first round. It’s probably better than that. Now, of course, there’s outliers there, but you but you’re looking at that as like more of a certainty. you know what I Dumu is. And I would say this, he’s even still scratching the surface of exactly what he could become because his role has changed so much just like Kobe White. So it’s it’s it’s a place where like I’m so interested in a lot of the pieces on this team and I’m so interested in how see how they fit together. Now we’re going to get the answer to that sooner rather than later because this team’s really kind of starting off the season. Um and I don’t think there’s going to be a lot more changes made after Josh Giddy signs the roster’s basically locked in. No. Jonathan Kaminga is no longer coming to this team. He doesn’t make any sense for this team anymore now with where we are after getting Isaac Akuru and um and Noah Essen. It doesn’t make any sense there, right? So that’s not coming. So you’re looking at this team having this and and really trying to evaluate. All right, Josh Giddy, Kobe, how good do you guys look together for a full season? No Zack Lavine to start off this season. Let’s see what you do. Manus Bzelis, are you ready for a a bit more on your workload? Are you ready for more on your plate? If you are, great. How does Isaac Akuro, somebody who’s who’s more healthy than Lonzo Ball typically and still is a decent three-point shooter as well, how much can you bring defensively? Can you can you handle keeping up a a solid three-point percentage with more volume? Can you do that? Then, of course, the the things that we’ve been looking at for a while now. Um, you know, does Julian Phillips look more and more ready? Does he look more more like a player that kind of knows and understands what he can do on the basketball court? Dalon Terry, does he look better? This is the last year on your rookie scale deal. you’re going into restricted free agency, what you got for us, right? Patrick Williams, you know, we’ll talk more about Patrick Williams here in a second in the second segment, but so you’re still looking at players and evaluating certain players. And then even your veterans, Trey Jones, Kevin Herder, Zack Collins, the three guys that you got back in the Zack Lavine trade, you’re still looking at those guys a little bit to see, all right, are are you guys pieces that we can invest in long term? Are you just current pieces? What are that that we are maybe looking to move off of on the trade deadline because you’re expiring contracts? Same thing for Nicolus. That’s really where we are. So to get to circle all that back, right, to get not as longwinded, to circle that back to the to the topic. What needs to happen for faith to be restored in AK, something got to work. And I think that’s the easiest way to dumb it down and say it is that something that you have here has to look like not only it’s working, but you’re moving forward. Right? For years, Demar Rosen had great statistical seasons. The Bulls didn’t go forward with that. Alex Cruso was great when he was only quartered. D amazing to watch. The Bulls didn’t go forward with that. I’m not blaming that on the players. I’m just blaming that on the build that you had of this team. That build of the team did not really get places. If that was a team that no matter what and how people looked at Zack Lavine and everything else, if that team was progressing, that team went from a 42- win team to a 45 win team to a 50- win team, people say, “Hey, we’re we’re working on something here.” You got to show progression. This was the first year in a long time our record did not drop from from the season prior to that. Now, all right, you saved off the drop. How much can you win more now going forward? Because Vegas doesn’t believe in you. Some Bulls fans don’t believe in what we have right now. And that’s going to be the part that we have to look at and see is that if you want if AK wants that patience, you have to show a proof of concept. And I will say that there was a little bit of that last season. But it was in a period of time and a point in the season to where it’s easy to to for for Bulls fans to write it off as a mirage. So you have to show the proof of concept and this is a big season of showing that and showing what this Bulls team can do and what you’re trying to build here. And let’s hope that the Bulls are going to have success in it because if they do, all right, cool. We’re off to a good path. If not, the only path we may be on is maybe finally to the end of the AK and Eversley path. And I can’t even say that that’s for sure because of the ownership that we have here. But we shall see. Another day, another dollar. Hopefully more wins. But you guys can let me know on that down below. I want to hear from all you guys on this one. What do the Bulls need to do to restore a monochrome of faith in what the Bulls are building here? Let me know that down below. Or do you already have it? And if so, why? Let me hear that as well. Let’s move over to the next topic today. There was an article written uh over on uh uh Pip It Ain’t Easy, I believe, is where where this was from. Uh yes. And it and it was they called Patrick Williams. is w written by Austin McGee and he says that uh the Patrick Williams is the worst contract in the NBA. Now this is a Bulls focused website so this is not like a national media website and they said this although Williams 18 per season is drastically less than many other contenders for the league’s worst contract he’s achieved quite less than just about any player earning a lucrative salary. Uh Williams whole career averages of 9.6 points, 4.1 rebounds, 1.5 assists, 0.8 8 steals, 0.7 uh blocks, and 1.2 three-pointers per game. And I think that’s a key part there, right? So often with Patrick Williams, we talk about the percentage of three-point shots that he makes where volume does matter into that as well. And when you’re shooting such a low volume, yeah, your percentages better be high, right? But here’s the thing. Patrick Williams is never going to be a counting stats darling. We all know that. Um he’s not had that role. He hasn’t earned that role, and that’s what it comes down to. But then when you start looking at some of the other advanced things that are really kind of frustrating, Patrick Williams is 27th in win shares amongst his draft class of the 2020 draft class. He ranks below Sadique Bay, Trey Jones, KJ Martin, Paul Reed, Jaylen Smith, and Xavier Tilman senior, right? And that is pretty bad when you look at the that fact that he was the fourth overall pick in that draft. He’s 27th in win shares. That means that you were basically have win shares of a of a second round pick almost, right? And that’s the problem in the in the disappointment in Patrick Williams. But in and I’m going to use this article more so if you can’t tell, I’m trying to be more positive than this episode. I want to talk about this. A Patrick Williams that finally wakes up can completely and utterly change the way that this team operates. And I don’t mean that by hyperbole. If Patrick Williams can come in and be a 3ND player, and I mean go back to the player that played tough, strong defense on some of the better wings in the NBA, if you can go back to that for a team that needs on ball defenders, you can really change that. And then on top of that, if you can hit the three at a decent enough rate on more volume, Patrick Williams doesn’t have to do a whole lot to be to to make this Bulls team better. Now, he does need to do a whole lot if he wants to turn his career completely around. But let’s let’s not even let’s move off the fourth overall pick thing. Let’s just talk about Patrick Williams as a player and as a role on this team. I said it before we even drafted Noah SN and traded for Isaac Akuru. This team, every year that goes by, Patrick Williams becomes less and less prioritized. And you’re talking about how many forwards we now have on this team. Patrick Williams is going to find it very difficult to crack the rotation consistently unless he’s playing well. If he’s not playing well, guess what? You got guys that even at at a minimum are going to play better than you. And we said it Pat the Designer said it on lockdown on Bulls like a year ago. You got dogs behind you ready to go. What are you doing? Misellis passed you up. There were times last season where Julian Phillips was getting off the bench before you. Noah Essen is now in the building. Right. And so when you look at that, this needs to be a wakeup call for Patrick Williams. But as many people are and many people have seen about me, I’m no longer betting on P Will to wake up. I’m no longer betting on Pee Will to all of a sudden become this player. And the Bulls seem to not be. At the start of of the early in the offseason, we heard that the Bulls have basically said it’s all on P will. They’re no longer investing in in him. He’s going to have to show it if he wants to be in in in the in the rotation of this team. I’m not willing to say that Pee Will is the worst contract in the NBA. I think the monetary part of it has to matter in a case like that. And 18 million isn’t what 18 million was a couple of years ago. But I am saying this, Patrick Williams is probably the most disappointing player in his draft class. In a draft class that was already looked at to be thin, but has actually proven to have some considerable depth in that in that draft class, Patrick Williams is the one that stands out as as the bust. He just does. And so you you you want better for Pill, but at the end of the day, when it comes to Pill, it’s all what’s between his ears. And that’s what makes it even more frustrating because it’s like he has the talent to do it, but he’s not. And I know a lot of Bulls fans are like, “Well, let’s trade P.” Will, who the [ __ ] is going to take him? Cuz there’s not a lot of teams right now looking at and saying that they want a disappointing forward who has gotten worse defensively and is passive as [ __ ] on the offensive side of the ball. There’s not a lot of people who want that on their team. The Bulls, unfortunately, locked him into a full five years to get that done when really they probably should gave him a two plus one. And that’s where the bulls sit at when it comes to Patrick Williams right now. He’s disappointing. He’s frustrating. And that doesn’t shape up to stop anytime soon because that is who Pew Will is. That is the Pew Will experiment, experience, I should say. And until he he he decides to want better for himself, this just is what it is for Pew Will. And it’s unfortunate, but that’s where it is. But let me know what you guys think on that down below. Do you think Pee Will is actually the worst contract in the NBA? Do you think Pee Will’s going to have a role on this team or do you still have some faith that PE is going to turn this thing around and play better next season? Let me know all that down below. One player that is turning head heads though is uh Yuki Kura who had another big game last night, especially down the stretch of that game was really important for the Bulls. Overcoming that fourth quarter deficit and ended up winning that game. Yuki Kura was at was interviewed after um the game. He said this, “The Chicago organization is so great. Have great teammates, great staff, great facilities. I’m so satisfied, but we still have a game the day after tomorrow. We’ve got to uh be ready for the next game, which is the last game on the season. He said this, “To be honest, I don’t practice uh passing. I watch a lot of NBA players, and this is my style. I want to bring energy from passing and from defense. This is my style. I worked hard this summer every day. I need to be physical, and I’ve got to be better. I’m not tall. That’s why, especially with defense, I need to be better.” Yuki Carmore is one of the best stories of summer league for the Chicago Bulls. Yes. CNO SN have two really good games after a disappointing first game. Seeing Miles Buzzales after his disappointing first game absolutely be the best player on the floor the the the next game that he played right the third summer league game and that was all great to see. But when you look at somebody like Yuki Kamura who is a player that you know people he has a big name around like because of where he’s from and stuff like that but like to see him come here and when he’s on the court the energy is different for that summer league Bulls team. And that is why I said on yesterday’s episode, Yuki is somebody that I absolutely want to see be on the G-League roster. And people asked, well, why not the main roster? A, because the Bulls have all guaranteed contracts. We don’t have a spot. And I hate to tell y’all this, no matter how good Yuki Karma looks, they’re not going to wave uh Javon Carter to sign Yuki Karma. And and I I will say this, you shouldn’t want that either. Yuki would not play. If the Bulls were to wave Javon Carter and put Yuki on the bench, Yuki’s going to sit on the end of the bench and not play. I want Yuki down in the G- League because he’s going to be able to play and he’s going to be able to play effectively and he’s going to be able to help players develop and himself develop. And then at that point in time, if he continues to do that, then he can come up to the NBA and and you know, take take a back into the bench spot. But as it stands right now, I would hate to reward Yuki K, and it sounds bad, but I would hate to reward Yuki Kmore with a full NBA contract just for him to sit in the end of the bench and be the Javon Carter row. I don’t want that for him. I want him to be out there actually able to play basketball. I want him to be able to out there and actually to dazzle fans. That’s going to have to come be via being being in the G-League. And one of the players I think are going to benefit the most from him is Lachlan Alber. This is another guy that I get I get it. Noah and Modis are receiving a lot of the praise as they should for how they’ve been playing. But Lachland, a player that’s averaged 7.8 points per game, 2.3 assist, one steal, eight blocks. He’s a player that’s been all over the place in summer league. No, while those stats don’t blow don’t blow it out the water for you, when you realize that you got players like Javon Freeman Liberty averaging nearly 20. Jir Young finally had an explosion uh yesterday’s game scored the most points in Bull summer league history. You had Noah S in game, Mus Bales and them playing. Lachland hasn’t really, you know, had the the the the big numbers even though he had a big game as well in in game three with Noah and with Musellis, but Lacklin Albr is one of the players that would benefit the most from Yuki Carmore going down to the G-League. And that’s what I want. I want to see us actually developing players. And I think the summer league so far has been fun to watch. Hasn’t been a whole lot of wins, but it’s been very fun to watch. And you know, one more game, if the Bulls aren’t going to qualify for the summer league playoffs, that’s perfectly fine. One more game. Let’s see what the Bulls can do. With that said, I got one voicemail that I want to get into, man, that that piggybacks off a different episode that we did. This one’s from Reggie. Hey, hey, this is going uh hopefully this time the connection is better. My work is really terrible. But uh when it comes to you know trade rumors which I know you said that this was it you know Kuzma for Patrick Williams and how he didn’t really like trade. Personally, I think it’s a far better deal than anything you get with tattoo because just looking at um modest I don’t think get a whole lot of minutes three four even that small ball five I don’t think that obviously you know there’s the type of toughness you need not just physical toughness but mental toughness and great And I don’t think Ky really have it, you know. I think he does need a change of value just to just to stay in the league really. The nine of four is a isn’t going to cut it. Especially if you if you want to be a part of a uh if you want to keep going in this league because something a lot of backand first rounders early second round could do. But onto uh I think how his offense will be far more far more um valuable than Patrick Williams body defense as we saw last year. So if the offer is KMA from Pat straight up I do that deal and you know be happy for the fact that I get all passive contracts. Also, when it comes to this summer league, you know, watching Modest, watching Noah, looking at those two guys play really well together, you know, being aggressive, being efficient, you know, I like seeing that. And I think guys like Yuki and Liberty both realize that they want to have a shot of getting a two-way deal, they have to make uh those two guys look good. They got, you know, getting them the ball, making sure put them in the best position of the floor, show out. That’s how uh you get to notice you. Anybody can put up a bunch of shots. But, you know, actually making guys better, those guys find a way to stick around in some organization. But hey, do you think Liberty and have a shot at the two-way deal? I think there’s three of them, but those two and uh second page lock has it locked up. How many minutes will be there for Patrick Williams this season? That is the ultimate question because when you look at it, we know that Modis Buzzellis is going to be ahead of him. Uh we expect Kevin Herder, Iodumu or um uh Isaac Auru to start at the three, which means that that’s another player that’s ahead of him. I think most of those players are still going to be ahead of Pee Will in that forward rotation. And then it comes down to like Julian, Noah Essen Gay, Dalen Terry. Now Dalen can play the one, two, or the three. Um, Julian could play the three or the four. No, Essen Gay can play the three or the four as well. And so you’re looking at those things and that’s going to not leave a lot for Patrick Williams if those guys are playing well. And I think that’s by design. I don’t know if Patrick Williams is going to get a huge amount of minutes on this team. Now, to your point, for the Koozma trade, would that mean trading for Koosma? Would that make it more that would that make it smarter? And here’s the thing, I don’t think that the Bulls would do that before the season starts. But best believe, if the Bulls are winning, if this thing like I talked about at the top of the show, if Zack uh uh if Zack Lavine, if uh Josh Giddy and Kobe White look good and they look like a back court, that’s formidable. If the Bulls look like a team that’s going to be floating around 40 42ish wins on the season, I can see the Bulls then flipping a player to add somebody to this team to make it better. and Kyle Koosma is at least a score that can help win the offense. The defense is not really there right now. I think bringing in somebody like Koozma would then obviously affect the guys that we mentioned before and Julian Phillips and Noah essing at least right away. But the Bulls will then have to have to manage that. I do think Pew is definitely going to be on the chopping block come February. But the question is is what type of deal are you moving him in? Unless and it’s not really a salary dump because he has even after this upcoming season still three years left on his deal. So there’s that part. So you’re not really teams aren’t benefited. Do you have to attach a uh a asset to it? If you do that then I don’t I’m not moving off Pill because P will’s contract isn’t at the point where it’s hurting you too much yet to where you need to attach any type of picks to get just get off PW’s deal at least in my opinion. Right. So that’s the thing that I see playing into that and we’ll see how it ends up shaking out for the Bulls. But, you know, I think it’s going to be it’s going to be difficult for P Will if he’s not playing well to stay in the Bulls rotation this year. And we’ll see. Now, as far as the last question, Yuki Kora taking one of the one of the two-way roster spots. I do think that that’s between Emanuel Miller and between uh Jir Young. I do think that there’s a chance that Yuki can get one of those two-way spots. And we just got to see how he continues to play here in summer league. But I think he has a really good opportunity and chance to take one of those spots and we shall see what happens there. But that’s my time for today, guys. Make sure you guys are following us at bullcentralpod. You can send us any feedback, questions, comments, concerns. Bullropodgmail.com. Lastly, if you want to leave a text message and our voicemail for the mailbag, the number to do so, 773-270-2799. We are the number one spot for everything Chicago Bulls related. But that’s thanks to you lovely and beautiful people. And like I like to end every episode on, go Bulls. Love you guys. See word if you can y’all. Peace. This has been a presentation of the break media. [Music]

Can the Chicago Bulls restore faith in their front office? This episode explores what needs to happen for fans to believe in the team’s direction again. Patrick Williams’ contract is scrutinized as potentially the worst in the NBA, raising questions about his future with the franchise. Meanwhile, Yuki Kawamura’s impressive Summer League performance has fans excited about his potential impact. The discussion delves into the development of young players like Matas Buzelis and Noah Essengue, and how they fit into the Bulls’ long-term plans.

Tune in for an in-depth analysis of the Bulls’ roster moves, player development strategies, and the path forward for this storied franchise.

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