Chicago Bulls Rumors: 3 offseason trades sending DeMar DeRozan to Knicks
By Ryan Heckman
Friday night, the Chicago Bulls saw the inevitable ending to their season come to fruition when they lost in the play-in tournament.
A close, disappointing defeat to the Miami Heat gave the the Bulls a ticket back home to start their offseason earlier than they would have liked, instead of moving on to face the division rival, Milwaukee Bucks in the first round of the NBA Playoffs.
With the offseason beginning, it’s now time to start looking ahead. The Bulls very well might blow up this roster going forward and building toward the future. Nikola Vucevic is a free agent, freeing up a bunch of money, and the Bulls could use that as the starting point to rebuild.
If they decided to do that, one of the biggest moves could be trading star swingman DeMar DeRozan.
After this year’s trade deadline, one of the rumored trades of the summer sent DeRozan to the New York Knicks. Should the Bulls and Knicks entertain trade talks centered around DeRozan, a few different deals make sense. Let’s start with the most mild of the three.
Trade Number 1: The Chicago Bulls get two players and two picks for DeMar DeRozan
In this first trade, the Bulls find an easy way to make salaries match up with the Knicks by dealing DeRozan for two players: forwards Evan Fournier and Obi Toppin. Fournier’s contract is more of a filler, as he won’t be part of the future plans in Chicago. He’s under contract for at least next season, with a club option the following year.
Toppin is the younger, exciting and athletic forward the Bulls could choose to keep around for a while.
Meanwhile, Chicago also gets a couple of picks, both coming next year: a first and second-round selection.