The Chicago Bulls have moved into a different phase this summer, shifting their attention from the present to the future and fully embracing the rebuild. That puts a premium on getting the money right. In a salary-cap league, a front office can’t just hit on talent - it has to hit on contracts, too.
That’s why the Bulls’ current deal sheet tells a pretty clear story. One end of it is ugly. The other is a bargain.
Patrick Williams sits at the top of the overpaid list, and it’s hard to argue otherwise. His five-year, $90 million contract, signed in the 2024 offseason, already looked rough when it was handed out.
Now it looks even tougher to defend. The former fourth-overall pick is set to make $18 million next season and still has two more years left on the deal after that.
The issue isn’t just the number. Williams was a DNP-Coach’s Decision multiple times and didn’t even perform at a fringe backup level last season.
If he were available as an unrestricted free agent this summer, it’s tough to imagine him landing anything close to that salary. The source material pegs him as about $15 million overpaid, which makes his contract not just the Bulls’ worst, but one of the least team-friendly in the league.
There is at least one wrinkle: Williams is still only 24. That leaves a sliver of hope that he can grow into something closer to the expectations attached to the contract. But based on where things stand now, Bulls fans aren’t exactly waiting on that turnaround with confidence.
On the other side of the ledger, Tre Jones is the clear answer for most underpaid. The 26-year-old point guard is so effective, and so overlooked, that his value stands out immediately once rookie-scale deals are removed from the conversation.
That exclusion matters here, since those contracts are predetermined rather than negotiated. If they weren’t, Matas Buzelis and his $5.7 million salary for next season would have been the easy pick.
Jones earns his spot because he keeps producing without much recognition. He has never really been in a winning situation or played in the playoffs, and that’s a big reason fans and the league haven’t fully appreciated how good he is. He’s one of the best finishers among point guards despite being undersized and underathletic, and his feel for getting to his spots and finishing in traffic stands out.
The numbers back it up. Jones shot 69% at the rim, per Cleaning the Glass, and finished at 63.7% True Shooting overall, making him one of the most efficient guards in the league. He also brings the kind of steady ball security teams love: a 5.4 assists-to-1.4 turnover ratio while handling the ball a lot and playing 27 minutes per game.
For all that, Jones is making $8 million per year. He has one more year on the deal, and then the Bulls hold a team option for that same amount. In a league where backup point guards often earn eight-figure salaries, that’s a strong contract for Chicago.
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