The Chicago Bulls are exploring avenues to acquire Los Angeles Lakers forward Pau Gasol before Thursday's trade deadline, according to sources close to the situation. The Bulls have long hoped to wedge themselves into the trade running for Orlando Magic star Dwight Howard, but sources told ESPN.com that Howard's well-chronicled lack of interest in a trade to Chicago has prompted the Bulls to switch their focus to Gasol in advance of Thursday's 3 p.m. ET deadline. Sources say that the Lakers, however, have limited interest in the players Chicago would be offering, starting with Bulls forward Carlos Boozer. Read more: http://espn.go.com/chicago/nba/stor...uire-pau-gasol-los-angeles-lakers-sources-say
Well, Pau and Tellum have made it explicitly clear in the Spanish press that Pau wants out and the Bulls are his preferred destination. You listen to that phone call, right?
Ironically, the Bulls play the Heat just 24 hours before the deadline. If we win, management might think we can win a 4-3 series with home court advantage. After all, we'll likely be missing Rip, CJ, and maybe Deng. Imagine how we'll kick their asses come playoffs when we have those guys healthier! If we lose, we have an excuse. We're missing 2/5 our starters and a key reserve. If we lose but it's close, our injured players might be enough to beat them. That's the ticket, and I've seen Morgan Fairchild naked. A realist might say we're likely to have a dinged Deng, at best, Rip might play in one of the games and make us drool, because he really is good, and we beat 'em 4-0 last year in the regular season, we were healthy, and it wasn't really close once they figured out to shut down Rose. Whew. As much as a dislike paxson and reinsdorf, Gar Foreman has been pretty amazing. He seems to be the real basketball mind with the ability to persuade the other two to let him do his thing. He'll even share the credit if that's what it takes. So in Gar I trust. PaxDorf and Krause not so much.
Of course you have to listen. Pau's legit. I'm not privy to inside information, but I find all the trade chatter around this team to be revealing. Maybe it's just because we're a big market team and most of it is noise. But we have the best record in the league 2 years in a row and it seems like rumours are always swirling about the moves we're considering. For the record I'm skeptical of any big moves that don't bring Dwight Howard back in return. I don't want to amnesty Boozer, I don't think making a mid-season trade for a SG is likely to work out, and I'm content to ride out the storm with the team we have for the next 2-3 years if great options don't present themselves. We're really good as it is, and I'm fine with that. We're probably more like the 90's Pacers or the 2000's Mavericks than dynasty Lakers or Bulls......but that shouldn't be taken for granted. Those teams win championships too, and it's much easier to mess that situation up than to make it better. If you can get Dwight and Rose on the same team you have to do it. That team could win multiple championships. Pau puts me on the fence. He'd clearly be the 2nd best player on the team, but I don't think he's *that* good that acquiring him would clearly put us over the top if we had to give up comparable talent (Boozer + useful bench players).
The thing about Pau, is that if you could get him with Boozer and Asik being the centerpieces, then you really haven't messed with the team at all for this season's playoff run. Pau would fit in as perfectly on the Bulls as any player in the league. There's a reason he wants to play here. I think working Howard into the mix would involve an adjustment period, and you'd also have to give up a lot of pieces to obtain him. I imagine it would make the Bulls a non-contender until Gar/Pax has an off season to fill in the gaps via free agency and additional trades.
The fact that the Bulls FO may be entertaining trade proposals that they think might make the team better doesn't translate to lacking confidence in the current team. It's kinda what they're paid to do. The Bulls are obviously very damn good, but they're not a royal flush. They also have some very desirable assets, particularly Watson and Asik, who figure to see more limited minutes come playoff time. If they can use these somewhat disposable assets to upgrade a starter like Boozer, they'd be negligent if they weren't working on this.
I dont think we need Pau, but I also dont think I'm the only one in the bandwagon that doesnt want Pau. He's doesnt bring toughness (boozer at least still has that). I think the whole him being traded thing really messed with him and to me I believe you're a player and this is a business. Yes it's disappointing to get traded or hear your name in rumors, but man the fuck up and play. I'm also still giving Boozer the benefit of the doubt, because this is still the regular season. For the numbers guys, I think he has a better PER this year than last (someone correct me about that) and IMO I've seen him give a little bit more effort on defense this year. Now it would be key for him to go on a roll going into playoffs so he would have a rhythm, but right now I'm really only looking for Boozer to show up in the playoffs, mainly against Miami. People are still crucifying Boozer but I think we need him to show up in the playoffs when it really counts. Also I think that if we were to go after someone at the trade deadline, I would have gone after Chris Kaman. Now idk if NOH would have taken Booz's contract but Kaman is a legit post player, 4/5, rebounds, scores, blocks shots and is a good passer (I have him on my fantasy team and he's been consistently giving me between 3-5 assists and even had like a 8 assist game recently). That would let us move Joakim back to his natural 4 spot and I dont think we'd miss a beat. Remember, a couple of years ago people were arguing that Kaman should have made the All Star team over Gasol (I was one of those people because he was playing better at the time).
