The Chicago Bulls have been a midterm team for the past few seasons, and trades they missed could have fixed it.
For the third season in a row, the Chicago Bulls landed in the NBA Play-In Tournament, signaling Windy City’s long-standing mediocrity.
The Bulls have young players with promising potential, including Josh Giddy, Coby White, Matas Buselis and Patrick Williams, but they are not expected to cause any fuss anytime soon. In recent years they were unable to escape the middle of the pack, but they tried to build around Demar DeRozan, Zac Lavine and Nikola Vosevic.
In their final offseason, they traded all defensive guard Alex Caruso for the Oklahoma City Thunder and Giddy. Giddey shows the promise, but the Bulls clearly lost trade and were unable to add a draft pick for Thunder.
However, Giddey’s deal was not the first offer they received for Caruso.
It quickly became clear that Dub could have bolstered his defense, rather than all the defensive players the Golden State Warriors had tried to capture the same magic they found in 2022.
Before the 2024 trade deadline, the Warriors reportedly provided Jonathan Cuminga to Caruso.
“In an exploratory trade talks with the Golden State Warriors, centered around Caruso, league sources said the Bulls had asked about Jonathan Kuminga’s availability,” Bulls insider KC Johnson reported in 2024.
“It was rejected and the Bulls made it clear in discussions with all the teams that they didn’t want to trade Caruso, especially for packaging for other younger pieces like Moses Moody, so they’ll need to floor their offers to do so.”
The Kuminga and Moody package probably even Draft Capital would have given them a more balanced roster, at least, at Chicago.
The Eastern Conference has always been weak, but in recent seasons we have taken a step back.
If the Bulls signed the Warriors, they ran through the lineup this season with Coby White, Zach Labine, Moses Moody, Jonathan Kuminga and Vsevic. Lonzo Ball, Patrick Williams and Ayo Dosunmu could have come off the bench.
That team is not the title winner, but rim protection is still weak. They’re well balanced, much better than the Bulls’ current iteration, which missed both the postseason and top picks in the 2025 NBA Draft.
Giddy flashed light with the bull, but his tenure with the lightning made it clear that his defensive weaknesses were becoming more difficult to build around him. Cuminga and Moody are not stars, but they would have concluded Chicago’s extremely shallow roster.