As I recall your comment, it was to the effect that, "if the Bulls get Gasol, it will essentially be trading Deng for Gasol and I'm good with that" Does that sound familiar?
How many times do you want me to answer? Yes, I think it's a good thing to have a player of Pau's caliber on the team. More than having Deng at this point. It was an even better, hands down, no brainer, deal when we could have had him before he was traded to the Lakers. If what we read in the papers is true.
Pau was terrific last year when he played. At least on offense. He's better at 34 than Lu will be, I'm sure. MUCH better. My concerns are that he misses a lot of games is all. But then, Lu missed a lot of games, too. When Lu missed them, it always seemed like we did fine without him (having him added depth, obviously). If Pau misses games, we're relying on Taj at C some of the time, and I think he's a bit undersized for it. The other guys, Mirotic and Bairstow have zero NBA experience. All things considered, Pau over Lu.
Official numbers on Pau Gasol's contract w/Bulls: $7,128,000/$7,448,760/$7,769,520. Three-season fully guaranteed total: $22,346,280. (Source: Marc Stein) I realize that tweet is just hearsay, so take it for what it's worth. Damn, I had my estimate as $7,018,836 four days ago. Within $109,164 - I'll take it. I had Mirotic at $5,414,927 - apparently he's right at the MLE of $5.305 first-year (according to the latest hearsay). So according to the latest reports, the two will combine to make $12,433,000 this season. My estimate had them combining to make $12,433,763. Again, I'll take it.
