Who is the best Chicago Bulls point guard?
During the 2016/17 NBA season the Chicago Bulls had five natural point guards play some amount of time as their lead ball handler. That’s excluding Jimmy Butler and Dwayne Wade who also demand the ball in their hands. This upcoming season the Bulls GarPax front office is faced with the same problem of too many guards. So who should be given the most of the responsibility? And more importantly, who shouldn’t?
Zach LaVine
LaVine is not a point guard. This has been proven, especially in the Wolves season with Sam Mitchell as their head coach where he struggled to create for others effectively.
Last season LaVine played most of his minutes next to a traditional point guard in Ricky Rubio, Kris Dunn or Tyus Jones and excelled averaging 18.9 points a game before his ACL tear cut his season short (pardon the pun).
Not a point guard, Hunter Kuffel of Bulls Confidential breaks down what the Bulls will be getting in LaVine in this article.
Bulls coach Fred Hoiberg said that the team is hopeful they can get LaVine to play shortly after the start of the season. Regardless, LaVine will likely not be playing much as the lead guard.
While we’re here let’s look at some of his highlights because they’re eye candy:
Kris Dunn
During the 2016 NBA draft the Bulls offered a trade that would’ve sent Jimmy Butler to the Minnesota for the fifth pick and LaVine. The trade was rejected by Minnesota and Chicago was not able to draft the guard in Kris Dunn that they were reportedly in hot pursuit of.
A year passed, LaVine tore his ACL and Dunn severely underperformed as a rookie, yet Minnesota somehow managed to Jedi mind trick the Bulls into trading Butler for almost an identical trade.
This time with the addition of the seventh pick in the 2017 draft, shooting big man Lauri Markkanen, who is showing out in EuroBasket right now and silencing his many critics around the time of the draft. For now.
Point guards typically develop later than any position in the NBA, a cliché that Chicago will be hoping holds true. Dunn will be 23 on opening night next season. For reference that’s one year younger than Bradley Beal, a player who will be entering his sixth season in the league.
His 6-foot-9.5-inch wingspan, hounding lateral quickness, general athleticism and ability to move around the court show the all-defensive team potential that so many scouts projected prior to the draft.
While his defence will have Chicago giddy at this moment, his offence has a lot further to go. He shot 29% from behind the arc and just a bit above 50% between zero and three feet from the basket. These numbers will have to improve if he hopes to be average on that end of the court.
But Chicago wanted him a year ago, maintained their interest throughout a disappointing rookie year, and eventually picked him up.
Antonio Blakeney, Ryan Arcidiacono or David Nwaba
All these players will see much time with the Windy City Bulls in the G-League.
Arcidiacono and Blakeney signed on with the leagues new two-way contracts that don’t count towards the Bulls salary sheet. They are just like all other players signed to these contracts, cheap low-risk bets on young players.
Don’t expect much from these guys this season, come back in a few.
Cameron Payne
When initially thinking of who will be playing most of the minutes at the lead guard position I had Payne up there due to how much Chicago gave up to obtain him (similar to Dunn). After all, he is “the point guard of the future” as dubbed by the front office.
At the trade deadline last season the Bulls traded consistent production in Taj Gibson, a young wing in Doug McDermott and a second round pick for Payne, Anthony Morrow and Joffrey Lauvergne. A trade scrutinised as it seemed Chicago overvalued Payne’s potential.
However, at the time I wasn’t disappointed with the trade. Gibson was likely leaving in free agency, McDermott was a one-way player who wasn’t playing well on that one way and they were getting a guy in Payne that they and their scouts valued.
However, a report from the Chicago Sun-Times has stated that the team might move on from him. This would ease some of the congestion at the point guard position for the Bulls, at the cost of a little egg on the face the GarPax front office.
Payne was riddled with injuries last season as he only played 31 NBA games for the Thunder and Bulls collectively. Missing the first 37 with a foot injury and then being assigned to the D-League (now G-League) occasionally after his return.
His on/off numbers showed a -10 and -8.8 offensive rating for OKC and Chicago respectively. However, those stats will never look good if you’re backing up the league MVP in Russell Westbrook and recovering from an injury.
Maybe it was just a lost season for Payne. He was injured and after returning had to adjust on the fly in just his second season.
I thought the Bulls were going to at least hold onto him for their upcoming season. A season focused on young players and development where it wouldn’t hurt to keep another young prospect in Payne on the roster.
That, as of September 1st, is looking not to be the case as Payne is due to have a surgery on his foot and likely be waived by the Bulls.
Hopefully the 23 year old can recover from numerous injuries and find a home for his young NBA career.
Jerian Grant
Statistically Grant had an almost identical season to his rookie season in New York. What he did improve on was his shooting; on 2.1 three point attempts he shot a respectable 36%.
He had almost the exact same minutes as his rookie season (16.3 in 2016/17) but with the roster downgrading from last season he should see an uptick in those numbers.
The playoffs series against Boston saw him all over the place in terms of his role and playing time. He started games three and four, but in game four only played five minutes and had a DNP-coaches decision for game five.
Last season’s Bulls are a whole different beast to this new team. With wide open holes at the guard spots Grant and his consistency to simply be a serviceable guard, along with what should be natural growth he should see a lot more minutes.
If Grant has something more to show, this season is perfect. Players generally show more improvement in their third seasons and this training camp the starting spot is wide open for the taking.
Dwayne Wade
Wade will definitely not be running the point for the Bulls and reports have indicated that he might not even be wearing a Chicago jersey this season.
He is under contract for one more year after he picked up his player option of $23.8 million. There have currently been no buyout discussions between Wade and the Bulls.
However, people expect these to pick up sometime before or during the season as it’s unlikely that Wade, at 35 years old, would want to stick around with a rebuilding team.
In a podcast for Cleveland.com, Joe Vardon reported that LeBron’s camp believes Wade will end up in Cleveland: “As of right now, people close to [LeBron] are fairly confident that, at some point this year, Dwyane Wade is going to end up on the Cavs.”
It is completely likely that a buyout will not be reached before the start of the season but if not before the season, it is very likely that by the end of the season Wade will not be in a Bulls jersey.
Collin Sexton
Is the best future Bulls guard even on the roster?
Chicago will likely be one of the worst teams in the NBA this upcoming season, giving them a higher draft selection.
Right now most mock drafts have Sexton as the highest ranked point guard. However, the top of this upcoming draft seems to be dominated by wings and forwards.
In the best case scenario for the Bulls one of the many young guards on the roster will stand out and come next June they can draft on talent, not fit.
Dennis Smith Jr.
When the Bulls traded Butler to Minnesota they got the seventh pick in return. Right in position to select North Carolina States’ Dennis Smith Jr, a player some scouts had earlier in the draft, some even as high as a top three.
If they had selected him, he would slip right into the starting point guard position and would probably have the highest upside on the roster. Instead the Mavs got a mid-lottery steal, being able to take him ninth after the Knicks selected Frank “Frankie Smokes” Ntilikina a pick earlier.
But the Bulls shocked some by taking Lauri Markannen above him. At the time some people complained about the pick, saying that they didn’t get the highest upside possible. However, as Markannen continues to play well in EuroBasket he has the critics on pause for the moment.
Smith is not the best point guard on the Bulls roster, sadly. Bulls fans might even say they were this close to having him.
So … who is the best point guard for the Bulls?
There will be opportunity for all of these guards to shine (or fail). The starting point guard spot appears wide open for any player in training camp to take.
My pick for the starting guard is Kris Dunn. The team has clearly shown their interest in him. Whether it was necessary or not, they will find out. For Dunn himself, he is in a very lucky situation: he has the backing of the front office behind him and no pressure for the team to perform immediately. He can make the mistakes all young players make and use this season, and more to grow.
It may be unfair as Grant, Payne (if he stays on the roster) and [insert potential guard to be traded for] could be outperforming him, but we will see.
Who is the best Chicago Bulls point guard? I have no clue. That’s why we watch the games.
