Earlier this month, Chicago Bulls team president Arturas Karnisovas was apparently poised to make his squad the Eastern Conference’s “biggest sellers” at this season’s Feb. 5 trade deadline. This week, the Bulls are… going to be buyers?
This is the kind of overreaction that one can expect out of the least competent current front office leader this side of maybe Kings GM Scott Perry, who apparently has been inspired by Chicago’s recent four-game win streak to jettison assets and equity in pursuit of young “win-now” components.
Eric Pincus of Bleacher Report claims that “multiple league and agent sources” inform him that the Bulls want to get better this year, around what the club identifies as its “core duo,” $100 million point guard Josh Giddey and Matas Buzelis.
The notion that a .500 team (23-23) that doesn’t play defense and boasts zero reliable depth along the wing or in the frontcourt feels like it’s a trade or two away from contention is quite funny. Karnisovas has picked up a bad habit of offloading draft picks in pursuit of a low playoff seed in the past.
Now that Chicago actually could possess two first-round draft picks (if the Portland Trail Blazers make the playoffs, their first-rounder will convey to the Bulls), including what looks like a lottery selection in a loaded draft, Karnisovas naturally wants to worsen the club’s chances at picking up another stud by trading for… what, exactly? Zion Williamson and Yves Missi? Ja Morant? Jonathan Kuminga? De’Andre Hunter?
Williamson has massive upside still, but is such a health question mark that he feels like a stay-away. Missi, who’s just in his second season and has been buried on the bench, would be fun on a flier, but isn’t worth sacrificing any major capital to acquire.
Morant of course has been an All-NBA talent, but he can’t stay healthy, seems to have gotten worse every year for several seasons, and has been a legal headache. Kuminga was a DNP-CD on a No. 8 seed for much of the 2025-26 season. Hunter is making $48.2 million across the next two seasons — an incredibly generous sum for another injury risk.
Although Kuminga can keep up with Billy Donovan’s breakneck pace, he may occupy the same spots on the floor as Buzelis, and there’s a chance that both players’ most natural position is power forward. Hunter is intriguing, but if Chicago has to do more than match salaries and maybe throw in a pair of second-rounders, the juice may not be worth the squeeze.
The Bulls have been most linked to the Minnesota Timberwolves, who look borderline-desperate to add some more backcourt help amid a brutal five-game losing streak. Minnesota appears to be trying to buy low on the expiring contracts of a Coby White or Ayo Dosunmu, or to obtain Tre Jones. In fairness to the Timberwolves, Karnisovas has been happy to sell low on his own players in the past. So the longer Minnesota holds the line, the likelier the club will be able to pry one of those talented guards away from Chicago for very little.
© Jesse Johnson-Imagn ImagesHow Arturas Karnisovas Could Blow the Bulls’ 2026 Trade Deadline
If Karnisovas, say, straight-up flips Coby White for Rob Dillingham and convinces us that adding him will be “like a second draft” for the former lottery pick, that would be both the most infuriating and the most expected outcome on the board.
Chicago has seven players on expiring deals. Maybe no one will want the Zach Collins contract (unless they’re looking to trade long-term money for him) or Dalen Terry, but otherwise, many of the Bulls’ future free agents should have real value on the market. The Bulls need to think about adding young pieces and more draft chips, not competing for the sixth seed in the JV Eastern Conference.
If, instead of being moved, Nikola Vucevic gets extended yet again because he adds to a “winning culture” and the Bulls flip first-rounders in pursuit of slightly-better mediocrity, a fan revolt would be understandable.
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