Depends on how plan b, c, or d works out. We were a .500 club without James. Adding pieces will make us better. We are still awfully young.
We're a decimated roster without James. And we'll certainly not have a good go of it against the teams that do sign the big FAs.
It looks like Johnson is re-signing with Hawks so he's out. Boozer's talked to Wade about coming to the Heat. Which would be plan B for the Heat if they don't get Bosh. So if LeBron stays in Cleveland, Bosh goes to Miami, and Boozer goes to the Bulls, or Stoudemire goes to the Bulls OR we David Lee goes to the Bulls.. But if LeBron goes to the Bulls, then it does make a things a bit more interesting. The question would be would Chris Bosh take a paycut to play with the Bulls or sign a MAX contract and go to the Heat? So the way I see it, we get both LeBron and Bosh or we get neither and end up with Boozer or Stoudemire. It's not abad lineup if you add one of the 4 PF's, but we certainly won't be contenders like we would be with LeBron and Bosh. Personally, I think we end up with one of those 4 guys while LeBron stays in Cleveland and Bosh goes to Miami.
I would probably be one of few Bulls fans happy without Lebron coming to Chicago. I'd rather get a PF like Stoudemire, Boozer, or Bosh this year and then either trade for Melo this year or sign Melo next year
I think itd be a failure in a sense that we didnt snag bron. It wont be a failure cuz we'll end up wit a top FA. If its bosh, booz, or stat, we still end up with one of our biggest needs filled.
If Lebron ends up staying in Cleveland, then it's absolutely not a fail, because it wasn't an entirely a rejection by Lebron. But if he ends up in NY, it is absolutely a fail. If he ends up in NJ or Miami, it's not as much of a fail, but it would be disappointing. If the bulls end up in a position where they don't have a FA worth spending money on and don't end up right at the cap, I'd consider it somewhat of a failure because they should end up with either Bosh, Boozer or Lee, and they could get a guy like Reddick. But if Joe Johnson is getting $120 million to stay in Atlanta, I don't really see what else the bulls could do.
Anytime you don't have a championship contending core you're failing. But that would take a bit more time to figure out, it depends on what else you guys sign.
Big Fail if you end up not getting either Bosh, Wade, or LeBron. Still a good team but the main target was one of those guys.
Success in that the team is better than it was last year by getting Boozer and still having plenty of ammo to get a guard. Epic fail in that the Heat appear to have sealed the deal on the moder day equivalent of the original Olympic Dream Team, and I don't see any real means of combating that. In the end, all values are relative. Our internal "getting better" only matters insofar as we can beat other teams. And another team got better enough that we can't beat them. As a matter of strategy, I think we had more or less the right plan. I think it would have worked a lot better if we'd ditched Kirk and kept Gordon a year or two ago, but I don't think it was necessarily decisive. Might have helped if Lebron or Wade could have looked to us and seen a more complete team with a great shooting option. But in the grand scheme of things, they took the right sort of swing, they just didn't succeed. The task now is to figure out how to compete. I tend to think the only way is 1. Think big - OK, we've got Rose and Boozer. We need another major player. Let's figure out how to get one, and if we can't immediately, let's build assets to get one. At least call up and offer all sorts of stuff for Evan Turner and see what happens. 2. Don't draft mistakes (Tyrus!) 3. Don't overspend for unnecessary luxuries ($9M for backup PG, for example) when your starter cupboard is bare. Don't overspend. Not just in terms of money, but in wasting picks and money on non-difference-making players (JJ Reddick!)
