The Chicago Bulls are not headed into the kind of season that will dominate national TV windows, and that much is pretty clear. But there is a difference between being out of the spotlight and being off track, and this summer gave the franchise a lot more of the latter.
That starts with Caleb Wilson. The No. 4 overall pick gave Bulls fans exactly what they wanted to see in his five Summer League games: highlights, flashes, and the look of a player who could become the kind of talent that changes everything.
He is not going to drag Chicago to a new level immediately, though. That part will take time, patience, and a lot more than one promising summer.
Still, the bigger story is that the Bulls finally look like a team that knows what it is doing. They may not be a playoff threat right now, but they have at least moved themselves onto a healthier path.
That matters. The previous front office never seemed to grasp that a rebuild does not have to be miserable.
It can be a legitimate plan.
That shift showed up in David Aldridge’s annual NBA Offseason Rankings, where the Bulls landed at No. 13.
That placed them ahead of the Mavericks at No. 15, the Kings at No. 17, the San Antonio Spurs at No. 14, and the Houston Rockets at No. 16.
Not flashy, not headline-grabbing, but a sign that Chicago’s summer earned more respect than it is likely to get from the broader audience.
Aldridge also made the obvious point: the Bulls deserve credit for finally ripping off the Band-Aid. The Arturas Karnisovas and Marc Eversley era did not work, and while the change probably should have happened earlier, it still marked a meaningful turn for an organization that usually prefers to move carefully and predictably.
Instead, the Bulls brought in a search firm, then turned to a young and relatively unknown face to run the operation. For this franchise, that was a jolt.
They also landed a coach worth watching. Tiago Splitter drew interest from multiple teams, including the Portland Trail Blazers, but Chicago got him into the building and let Bryson Graham get his guy.
The roster work fits the same theme. Not every move is going to get fans fired up - Zach Collins’ new two-year deal probably did not send anybody jumping for joy, and leaving a roster spot open into the fall is not exactly the kind of thing that creates instant buzz. But the Bulls’ decisions all point in the same direction.
Graham has clearly been trying to keep the future open while building around development. Norman Powell’s two-year, $45.0 million deal is a clean example.
Chicago gets a veteran shooter with real floor-spacing value and locker room leadership, and the second year is a team option. It is the kind of contract that can help on the floor now and also give the Bulls a useful trade piece later.
Collins’ deal works in a similar way. It is movable, and it can basically be treated like an expiring contract.
Then there is Nic Claxton, whom the Bulls added as a rim protector on a diminishing contract without giving up anything in return. There are real questions there - he has guaranteed money in 2027-28 and has struggled over the last couple of seasons - but the defensive upside is still there, and he should be the best lob threat Josh Giddey has played with.
And then there is Wilson, which is the biggest reason to feel better about the direction of all this. Sometimes one player really can change the whole feel of a franchise, and Wilson has that kind of potential. The lottery played a huge part in that, not Graham, but that does not make it any less important.
For too many summers, the Bulls looked stuck between ideas, drawing criticism around the league for never picking a lane. This one is different.
The direction is obvious. Graham is treating this as a rebuild, and he is not pretending otherwise.
There is still work to do, and the real payoff will have to come later, when all of this flexibility gets used. But that is how a reset begins. This summer was the first step, and for once, the Bulls look like a team that understands the road they are on.
In Other News...
Bulls Face A Costly Bennedict Mathurin Decision They Can't Ignore
The Bulls have been linked to Bennedict Mathurin, and on paper the fit is easy to see. Chicago is believed to have a workable path to a sign-and-trade, which gives the front office a possible route to add a young scorer without having to wait for the market to break its way. For a team still sorting out its long-term identity, that kind of opportunity can look tempting.
But the real question is whether this is the kind of move Chicago should actually want to make. The Bulls have spent time positioning themselves to keep roster spots available for absorbing contracts and to preserve room for developing younger players, and that approach has value of its own. Mathurin would likely come with a pricier future commitment than what he played on last season, which puts the Bulls in the familiar spot of deciding whether immediate scoring is worth giving up flexibility and the chance to collect assets later. [Read more 🡒]
Bulls Fans Will Circle One Blazers Game For Tiago Splitter
The Trail Blazers upcoming schedule should be out soon, and it already comes with a few clean hooks for NBA fans, from Ja Morants first return to Memphis after being traded to Portlands playoff loss to San Antonio last season. But for Bulls followers, one date will stand out for a different reason: the first chance to see Tiago Splitter back on the sideline after he left the Blazers interim role and landed in Chicago.
Splitters move gives the Bulls an added layer of intrigue whenever Portland comes around, especially because his brief run in charge in Portland left enough of an impression to make his next stop worth tracking closely. When the schedule drops, the matchup that matters most in this corner of the league wont just be about where the Blazers are going next, but when Chicago gets its first look at the coach who changed directions rather than staying put. [Read more 🡒]