If you're the Bulls and you see this, both young players, do you possibly break that up? if they're playing well?

Well, no.

And that's why, you know, you have those from a management perspective, you know, you have the season to figure this out.

It's going to be a fluid situation for sure, because on the one hand, you've got to be projecting one to three seasons out your, your cap sheet and Kobe's going to get a big payday next summer.

I mean, there's, you know, 10 teams, 10 to 12 teams that project to have ample salary cap space that could make it a pretty significant offer for him.

But you have his bird rights.

So to your question, Stacey, like if that's happening, you can let the season play out and then just say, okay, you know, you're going to hit unrestricted free agency, but we're going to give you one extra year at higher annual raises and a bigger salary than other teams.

In a weird way, do you think the Hall of Fame induction is going to motivate Billy, even entering this year, to try to get this group to take that next step?

But yeah,

I mean, he's been here five years and they have one playoff.

series to show for it and no playoff series victories um you know as far as the strategy uh it's it's it's asking a lot because he is clearly still against taking a major step backwards he talks about targeting players with young experience young players with experience We saw this year that they prioritized chasing a playing seat over draft positioning.

So they just do not want to go through the pain of a full rebuild.

They want to try to do this on the fly.

And unless you have like modest become a superstar, Kobe and Josh go to levels that maybe we don't foresee now.

It's going to be tough because you're still going to be drafting unless you get some major luck in a draft lottery.

That's what I saw.

I just find it hard to believe that those other guys couldn't get, even if it were late first-round picks.

Yeah, I mean, management's take on that, at least in the Zach part of that equation, would be that in their minds they kind of did get a first-round pick back because I know people say, well, they just got their own first-round pick back.

But, you know, by removing the protections and getting certainty of that 2025 pick, you know, you could have closed the year poorly, but then the protections just would have shifted to next season.

So, in essence, they did get a first-round pick kind of for Zach by getting their own back and just having – clarity moving forward.

They have all their own first round picks.

You know, the Caruso one we talked about a lot at the time.

I mean, certainly you'd like to think with OKC's stable of draft picks, you'd get some draft capital on that deal.

In your reporting and talking to executives around the league, have you found that there is this feeling that the Bulls front office is indecisive and can't close deals?