There could not have been a worse year for the Chicago Bulls not to have a pick in the NBA Draft, as the 2023 class is supposed to be loaded. They had a chance to keep their first-rounder, but the draft lottery balls didn’t fall in their favor, and their pick conveyed to the Orlando Magic via the Nikola Vucevic trade.
Chicago still has a chance to trade into the draft, but that could prove to be difficult. They don’t have many assets on the roster outside of their star players, and Arturas Karnisovas has expressed his desire to run back the current core.
Julia Poe of the Chicago Tribune believes a trade into this year’s draft could cost them, at the very least, Alex Caruso or, more likely, a player like DeMar DeRozan.
“The Bulls could set their sights on a pick lower in the first-round rotation, but this would likely require trading away an attractive glue player like Alex Caruso — or even a veteran like DeMar DeRozan,” Poe wrote.
As noted, this year’s draft class has a ton of talent all throughout the first round, but trading one of those two players would be a serious shift in mentality for a Bulls team determined to compete for the playoffs.
That being said, a push toward a youth movement could be better for the Bulls, who are firmly stuck in the middle of the East with no real pathway toward significant improvement.
A trade seems unlikely, but it could be what’s for the best.
