The Chicago Bulls have been in a weird spot for the past few seasons, and they’ve made some relatively questionable decisions. In addition to the fact that they haven’t made a trade at the deadline in three years, the Bulls have also signed players to some iffy contracts.
Nikola Vucevic deserves the money he was paid, but should the Bulls have been the ones to sign him to the deal? That’s a better question. But the better question is whether or not the Bulls should have inked Zach LaVine to a max contract. A couple of seasons in and the answer to the question looks like a no.
Zach Buckley of Bleacher Report listed LaVine in the top five NBA players not living up to their big contracts.
“He has never had a discernible impact on his team’s success,” Buckley wrote. “Not in a positive way, at least. While others have contributed to this, the fact remains he has booked a single playoff trip—which lasted all of five games—during his first decade in the league. He isn’t someone who elevates the players around him, and he can actually make things more difficult for them given his limitations as a defender and his bouts of tunnel vision.
And imagine, we’ve gone this far discussing his flaws as a huge-money player without even bringing up his injury issues. He has suffered a medley of maladies over his career, including an ACL tear in 2017 and soreness in the same knee that required surgery in 2022.”
The other four players on Buckley’s list are Bradley Beal, Jordan Poole, Ben Simmons, and Andrew Wiggins.
