Chisoxfn

That 2nd movie was freaking terrible. Hands down the worst Star Wars movie ever made.

They need to get taken to the woodshed and it just is a bad look. Same as the whole charges saga last year with Bosa. Get it done Bears....get it done. We have good momentum, lets not kill it over some remotely to be used language in a deal that fundamentally seems should be on the players side. It isn't like the league is pushing the Bears on this (since the LB the Bills drafted apparently got the language in his contract that the Bears aren't willing to give).

I tend to be typically pretty mixed on these sort of mixups but this seems very cut and dry. Bears appear to be in the wrong side of this argument, big time.

You never know...always possible given his injury last year that he sees some value in a longer term deal that buys out a year or two of free agency while securing him a heck of a lot of guaranteed money. Obviously risk on the Sox side as well.

If the first year this team is competitive is 2021, than a lot of things went wrong.

His arm is the only thing I worry about. Rodon is going to be an ace, lock down front of the rotation pitcher if he's healthy. I'll worry about his contract in 3 years. We are trying to get good in the next 1-2 years and you are going to need front of the rotation horses to do that. We can project Kopech and others, but Rodon is by far the best pitcher on the southside and I'd also say he has as much if not more upside than anyone else as well. His stuff is dynamic. When Rodon is due to get paid, we can start talking about moving him if need be, but this is a couple years premature (unless the Sox don't believe in his shoulder LT).

The flipside to this equation is why should the Sox trade a guy who is young, has upside, and is cost controlled. He certainly seems like the type of piece you keep. If we are going to contend, we are going to need to have a bullpen and having a nice, young, cost controlled piece is a good thing. Now if the concern is injuries (given his checkered injury history), than I understand.

I really hope he makes it cause he's the kind of player that I like to see. MLB needs more guys (in his mold).

I really don't like this thought process. People have found stats that make them rationalize why certain things are okay / aren't okay. This "absolutism" baseball has evolved into is just not good for the overall excitement of the game (i.e., HR / BB / K). Batting average is a good stat (it is not a worthless stat). Getting more hits is a good thing. Yes, luck and other factors exist (and need to be accounted for), but guys who get more hits are just generally going to be more likely to deliver in critical situations and help you win more "one-run" games. The fundamentals of players, etc has declined. Doesn't mean guys aren't physically gifted...cause are incredibly gifted and pitchers throw ridiculously harder, etc, which adds to the nuances, but the advent of the shift, the ridiculous amount of strikeouts...none of that would have happened in the first 100 years of the game.

Other teams camps are starting soon too...so that should put an extra push on the market. With the Bears being in camp a week early and so many guys being unsigned, it probably made the dynamic more difficult. That said, the whole Bosa saga was pretty fresh and these are the same representatives.

Yeah. Great game to attend (I was there too). I really hoped it would be a no hitter.

I tend to think this year is going to be rougher than most, mainly because we are going to be running a pretty complex offense that puts a lot on a QB. Mitch is young and in a brand new system with a lot of new players. I think the key is that he is consistently learning and building on his experience. I expect some rough games, but hope as the season goes on we see good progress.

I'm worried. Look at how long Joey Bosa was out as they battled over the whole "offset" language.

I would have thought this would have been a good fit for him. Toronto is a great city (also a big city) but doesn't have the same pressure / dynamics as say a New York / LA.

Lets try and get this discussion broken up in multiple threads. This is becoming kind of just a random catch-all thread with lots of good discussion, but becomes harder to follow, especially as news and other things get embedded within.

It will be interesting to see how Fred makes all of the pieces work, but the parts fit into his up-tempo style/pace of play. It isn't like he's getting forced parts that don't fit into what he wants to do. Teams this young will suck defensively no matter what...at this point I think they are just trying to see what young parts work vs. what young parts might be moved (since they aren't the right fit). Don't get too worked up on "perfect" fit at this moment and instead maximize the amount of guys with upside. With that, there will bring some challenges of playing time. That said, Hoiberg did a solid job last year and seems rejuvenated. I'm a lot more upbeat on Fred than I was a year ago. Doesn't mean I'm sold on him but I could at least see him panning out and being a long term coach, but he has a tough road ahead of him.

I think the Bulls know that to land an attractive max free agent there are going to have to prove they are a team that can win and that is why they made the move (bet on a young asset / former #2 pick) while trying to get your team to be mediocre. Still very unlikely we are a playoff team but if we do, fine, it means your young guys have probably emerged better/quicker than expected and you now are a more marketable destination. Bare minimum you have to have your young talent showcase itself in a way that a max free agent sees himself + continued youth as a difference maker. Obviously the very ideal scenario (other than everyone just takes it up a notch or two and we become some great super team with our existing guys) is that you are close to the playoffs (but your youth and talent has a nice upward trajectory based upon their performance), we get lucky in the lottery (odds are much flatter) and we than have a young roster with an upward trajectory, a nice asset (pick wise) and cap space to lure a big time free agent (with the ability to create space for two if two want to come). If you completely suck this next year, than you aren't landing any big name free agents. Not happening.

Had just finished reading this article. Was a good piece. It is the 2nd example that I look forward to the most. Parker and Laurie should be a pretty effective pick and roll / pick and pop offense. In a similar way to how Niko / Lauri played with each other (which was pretty well). Fred was pretty creative with Niko & Lauri and I presume he'll be similarly creative with these two. Add in a Lavine to provide good spacing and it should be interesting. We certainly have offensive flexibility and to be honest a good amount of guys who can be versatile defenders, however, the team is extremely young and Parker/Lavine don't have good defensive metrics (or good advanced metrics).

The big difference between the "Alpha's" experiment and this one is that Lavine and Parker are both extremely young. We could argue fit, but this isn't a team ready to win a championship, this is just part of continued asset accumulation none of us have the crystal ball for who is going to develop. Maybe they all pan out and we find out we need more team d or something, who knows, but this is still part of that "asset accumulation" phase and next off-season, hopefully you have many flexible ways to get better, whether it is using cap space on a max player (something they can do without making any major changes) or if they prefer to flip guys for a player who has become available (again, you hope that Lavine and others haven't sucked and now you package a few of those guys and trade for a star while still having a number of quality assets + cap space). Bottom line, there is still a lot of flexibility on this roster and improved talent. That said, the roster is still extremely young and it takes time to learn to win in the NBA. I haven't watched enough of Parker to be able to make an intelligent comment on his post ACL (x2) play but the stats would indicate he's a pretty advanced and efficient scorer (really nice "true shooting percentage" for a guy who can also score quite a bit of points). And in terms of "fit", I really can't talk about Lavine's fit in an honest way. The dude was rehabbing and when he got back Dunn went out and they never really had a very set unit, so hard for me to knock how awkward Lavine played when he came back and not only had to train himself phyiscally (and get past the mental hurdles related to the injury) but also had to learn new teammates and a new system. Look at the 1st year of Bron / Bosh / Wade and the adjustment it took them to figure things out (and NO I AM NOT COMPARING THE BULLS TO ANYTHING LIKE THAT) just making the point that even with 3 great players (who weren't coming back from injury), it took a lot of regular season action to gel (even with a full off-season training camp). And we'll need to remind ourselves of that this upcoming season as I would expect we'll see lots of inconsistent basketball given the new faces and youth of the team.

Loved it

Let's sign Okafor too. All offense squad! In all honesty, he is in awesome shape and knows if he is going to have a career this will be his last chance. Saw a recent clip of him and he is in amazing shape. His jumper looked good too.

This has become a great deal. I had been really worried for a while but am fully on board with this.

Exactly. This would be bulls trying to put out as good of a team possible to market to a max guy in the offseason. Or they leverage some of these guys in a trade for a superstar (of course that assumes someone is demanding to come to Chicago and for the players to look good)

Woj confirming Parker to Bulls. Don't have access to twitter where I'm at or I would post. From what I read elsewhere, sounded like quite a bit of money over 3 years. Seems like a steep price for a guy coming off of 2 ACLs'. Of course Bucks can match.

Wow - Throwback. I'm amazed that domain has been maintained for that long.