After weeks and months of rumors and innuendo, the Bulls finally pulled the trigger on a trade involving Jimmy Butler, trading their franchise player to the Minnesota Timberwolves on draft night.
Butler and the Bulls’ 16th pick will be headed to Minnesota for Zach LaVine, Kris Dunn and the seventh pick, according to sources. Butler will be reunited with former Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau, who is the head coach and president of basketball operations for the Timberwolves.
And the Bulls get to jump start their rebuilding process, apparently with young pieces to implement Fred Hoiberg’s system and a draft pick to come.
The Bulls have long been fond of Dunn, the Timberwolves’ first-round draft pick in 2016 who struggled in his rookie season, averaging 3.8 points and 2.4 assists after being the fifth pick in the 2016 draft.
LaVine was a two-time slam dunk champion before tearing his left ACL against the Pistons in February, and it will be months before he’s able to hit the floor. He was averaging 18.9 points, 3.4 rebounds and 3.0 assists before his injury and was part of a young trio that included Andrew Wiggins and Karl-Anthony Towns.
The question will come as to why the Bulls had to throw in their first-round pick in a deep draft, but perhaps it was an indication of their wont to trade Butler, who made the All-NBA Third Team and repeatedly elevated his game in his six seasons as a Bull.
Butler’s name had been bandied about through the trade market last year at the draft and this year at the trade deadline, with the Bulls feeling like they could only get so good with Butler being the player he developed into combined with the direction the franchise was going in, focusing on youth over proven veterans.
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It’s seemingly step one in a longer process for the Bulls but after being in basketball purgatory for the last two seasons, they’ve chosen a path and for that path to be traveled, it had to be without their three-time All-Star.