Kap & J. Hood
7/9: Joe Cowley on the Direction of the Bulls
[MUSIC] Good morning, Chicago, and welcome in to the Cap and J Good Morning show on ESPN 1000, and we're streaming on the ESPN Chicago app with David Kaplan, Jonathan Hood with you. We've got Kevin, we have got Jack, and we've got you here on this Tuesday morning. Thanks so much for being with us. Full lines over for you, 312-332-ESPN-332-3776 is our telephone number. There's been some movement, finally, with the Chicago Bulls here in the off season. Tamar DeRozan is now a Sacramento King, and we're going to dig into that and talk about the future of the Chicago Bulls. But first, we got to go to the hotline, Cap. >> That would be the Car X tire. >> And auto hot. [MUSIC] >> There's only one source when it comes to Chicago Bulls news and information. We go to the Chicago Sun Times. The great Joe Cowley is with us here on Cap and J-Hut Joe. Thanks for joining us, how are you? >> Good, how you guys doing? >> We're doing awesome, man, getting ready for that 14-win bull season. >> 14, yeah, a couple more, baby, but not much. >> I want you to talk to us about DeMar DeRozan and what he meant to the Chicago Bulls. He's now with Sacramento now, but when you look back now, what did DeRozan mean for this era, for the Bulls? >> I mean, he was the good for them. I mean, he was the leader, he was the locker room guy, the true leader. They've had a lot of false leaders there, guys that thought they knew how to lead. But I mean, just with I/O and with Dailin and just taking guys under his wing and inviting him to work out with him in Los Angeles and going to DeRozan's boot camp every morning at 4 AM and going to Jersey retirement ceremonies for I/O down at Champagne. So, no, I mean, he was, he was unbelievable off the court. And then on the court, I think we all saw how important he was come winning time. And the thing I'll say about him is he tried getting other guys to have that Batman moment early on. I think he led Zach, have some opportunities and came up short. And this year he gave Kobe that opportunity and Kobe delivered a couple of times. So, he also knew that he was the best option. So, yeah, just a winner, just, I can't say enough about him. One of my favorite guys to cover, very introspective, very self-aware. We had a conversation one time, we were just BSing because he's got a lot of tattoos. And I noticed he's got a couple of DC guys. He's got the Joker and Wysos Sirius underneath it. So, I was asking about it. You know, I grew up reading comics. I think a lot of guys did. And he was just like, you know, when you're in content, you have to believe that you're something different. You have to believe that you have some kind of power that no one knows about. Otherwise, you're going to be dead. And so, he was just talking about how important that was for him reading comics and thinking he was something special and had some kind of power that he was eventually going to find out about. So, just a really neat dude. It's going to be a big loss, I mean, not only for the Bulls, but for the media because he was kind of our go-to guy, was always willing to talk and throw out cliche. So, yeah, it's going to be tough seeing him go. So, I have nicknamed the front office of the Bulls the settlers and they go almost three years, would have been three years in August where they did not literally trade a human body for anything. But when I look back and I, you know, I love your stuff and I read where they could have had pics, second round pics for Andre Drummond and management, upper management, Jerry and Michael didn't want to do that. So now he goes to Philly for nothing. They run this like the standard blueprint of how not to run a franchise, God bless them. They sell a lot of tickets, but they don't trade Caruso and then they end up with Josh Giddy. We'll see what he turns into. They don't trade Drummond. Now they have to move to Rosa when they should have moved him a year ago. Is this an incompetent front office or are their hands tied more than we realize? Well, I'd say both I think the front office really bought some things, you know, you've been around long enough to know that, you know, they're on a full scholarship. Jerry Ryan's door front offices have tons and tons of leeway to hang themselves over and over again before finally they're exited out the door and it takes a long time. So the hope that you have to have with the front offices, they've learned not to fall in love with their own product. I mean, don't smoke your own weed. I mean, and that's what they've been doing and it wasn't very good weed either. So, you know, you have to know when to move on from stuff. You have to be a tech company and understand the product you just put out is not a good one. Pull it off the shelves, reinvest and move on. The thing is they have the attendance to do that. You know, they act like if they were going to try rebuilding this two years ago or even a year ago, the fans wouldn't show up. I mean, the bull's fans are sheep, they will show up no matter what. I mean, you throw some hay in the United Center and bang hand, they're all going to be there. So, you can go ahead and blow this thing up and this fan base. I think Chicago overall has been really, and it's sad, but the entire sports fan base of Chicago has been very accustomed and willing for rebuilds and for a major city to be so accommodating for teams to botch their own product and botch over and over again and have to rebuild and fan to plot it and get all excited about the minor league guys or the G league guys or the prospects in the college draft over and over again. I mean, the blueprint there, you could have done this last year. So, yeah, and then the other part is when your bosses tell you we need a playoff push and you can't trade Alex through, so you can't trade drum and that kind of cups your hands a little bit, but you should have never been in that situation anyway. You should have moved off those guys. I mean, I love the initial boots trade, shouldn't have re-signed boots, shouldn't have moved off a boot to try trading him when it went before his pre-aging year. We all know how I felt about the Zach with the max contract and it was nothing personal against Zach. It just, that's not a guy you max. It's never worked in the history of the NBA to max a one-dimensional two-guard, never, ever, ever, ever has it worked. So, you know, I mean, shame on them for the mistakes they made, but, you know, also being handcuffed, getting help. Joe Colley from the Chicago Sun Times, if you talk bowls on the Captain Jay Hood Morning Show on the ESPN 1000 and streaming on the ESPN Chicago app, Joe, what's the likelihood that Zach Levine will be a bowl this upcoming season? Yeah, they're doing everything they can and I think this pick or this three-way trade helped them a little bit to get a couple more picks to possibly throw in there because there are teams that do value second round picks. You know, I always say second round picks are kind of like Bitcoin. They're kind of the eye of the beholder. Do you value Bitcoin or do you not? The bulls do not value second round picks like some organizations do, otherwise they would have moved drumming at the trade deadline and gotten a couple of second rounders. So I think they're doing everything they can because to bring him back at this point is kind of a disaster. I mean, your guard room's full already and that's not even including Lonzo Ball. He's not going to be happy. His agency and his representation is not happy. There's a total mistrust. They still feel, and they'll never admit it, but trust me, I've talked to enough people, they still feel like you could have rehabbed a little longer. You didn't have to opt for that surgery at that point. You did that to kind of say, "Oh, I'm a Detroit rumor." And I'm not even saying that Detroit trade was close. But the fact that it was being talked about and that was a possibility and you thumb your nose at it and say, "Oh, we're opting for surgery right now," that pissed them off. And on that side of it, ever since he's come here, he's been a trade rumor. So you either invest in me and believe in me or you don't, so I get both sides of it. But it's just a bad, bad relationship. And anything they say, if they can't get a trade done and they bring them back, they'll both do the song and dance that, "Yeah, this is what we want." They don't want Zach Levine anywhere in that building, trust me, and Zach knows it. In terms of attaching a first-round pick to get him out of here, I think that would be Asinine. You, me... No, no, you can't put a first-round pick at it, but if you could put a group of seconds in there... Yeah. Okay. I'll give you seconds. Anything. But I need more talent here. So in terms of the giddy trade, some of us have said, "How could you not get some of their draft capital?" Two, our tourist said, "I'm happy with the return." What do you think of that deal? Yeah. I mean, I think Stan Presti took him to the cleaners. I think, you know, not getting a pick from a team that has a surplus of picks and can't use them all, and I'm talking about first-rounders, is Asinine. It's Asin. It's a cardinal sin, as far as an executive. I'm hoping that being put in a corner and being pummeled and getting eight-count after eight-count will teach our tourists some lessons. Because I think he came thinking he was the smartest guy in the room and he's starting to find out he's not, and there's other GMs that kind of have it on him. But the nice thing is, I've seen executives grow on the job and smarting up and actually improve at what they're doing. So I'm hoping that he does, and so we'll see. I do know this for sure, and this has come straight from the top of the organization. They did wave talent out there since last year to acquire a 25-draft pick, and nobody was trading them. Nobody was. And I think we all saw yesterday, if you watch highlights, team USAvers, team select, and what Cooper Flag was doing to grown ass men at the age of 17, you are understanding what is coming to the NBA and how important it is. And, you know, maybe he busts out, but I will take my chances with that kid any day that ends with why. And so what he did yesterday, I think, is just a little glimpse of what it will see from him at Duke and what I think we'll see from him at the NBA, which is star power, immediate star power. Yeah, he would be the Bulls version of Caleb Williams, the Blackhawks version of Connor Badard. Like that is what, that is the shot of adrenaline that the franchise needs. They got to get lucky. Yeah, he'd be a total game. You're talking organizational, seismic game changer, if you can get lucky and hit on Cooper Flag. And, you know, I think they're building a team to make sure that they keep that pick. You know, that's why, like, the giddy thing, here's how I thought about the giddy trade. They were trading Alex Caruso, who is such a plus, minus positive winning guy. What they did is they traded giddy and for Caruso, but they also got their 25 pick back from the Spurs. That's how I looked at it. And because that's what, that's really what they were doing with that trade. And then obviously moving to Rose and even helps that cause. But they had to get that top 10 protected pick back just to be in that lottery and have that ticket. Joe, I always say that when you're in the middle, when you're in basketball, hell, it's the worst place to be. And I would say that it seems like Detroit, Toronto, San Antonio, even Memphis, those are teams, I think that where the arrow's pointing up, but not necessarily going down. So where the bulls are right now, where are they? Would you say that teams like the Pistons or the Spurs and the Grizzlies have more upside than the bulls at this point in time? Cause I, I feel like that they're stuck. Yeah, no, I, I think Memphis is definitely going to climb up with a healthy job. I think they're, they're a definite play in team San Antonio kind of in that same area code as the bulls, but they're going up with Wendy and what they've done adding Chris Paul and adding Harrison Barnes with some veteran guys, you know, they're, they're definitely going up. You have your teams that are definitely still in the cellar that you're going to be fighting with, your charlots, who knows what Atlanta is doing. You know, obviously Portland, you know, teams like that, but you're, the, the teams that just missed the playoffs, Houston, San Antonio, those teams are definitely going up. I don't think it's going to be hard for the bulls to be a bottom 10 team. I know there's some people that are arguing that there's definitely five teams worse than them, but there's no doubt that they could finish six, seven, eight easily. And that's with Zach living. I don't think Zach spells winning. He never has. I mean, fine. You want Zach? That's okay. That bumps you up one or two more wins. Keep it. So, you know, if you have, if you have no, no destination for him and you're hoping to maybe then move him by the trade deadline, you know, I, I don't think he results in, in 10 wins by then. So I definitely think they could finish in that six to eight area. You know, a cap is so crazy. The arts for us kind of show this press conference where he had this epiphany after the season like, oh, we have to make change. We have to make it. And it's like, we all saw this coming like it's almost. And the thing I don't know, Joe is, is that a green light from Michael Ryan's door, or is that our tour saying, I've seen enough, we continue to just hit, you know, hit our head against the wall. I don't know how the light just turned off from automatically when we all saw it every, you know, last few seasons. I think you kind of hit the nail in your head, I think ownership wanted that push during the season to try making the playoffs saw again that it wasn't working and said, all right, go ahead and do what you need to do. But at the same time, if you are an executive that believes in yourself, believes that you could do it, you go to ownership last year at the deadline and say, look, this isn't working. I don't believe that Lonzo is going to come back healthy, you know, Zach is not even a robin. Forget Batman and we paid him like, you know, a guy to save Gotham and he can't. We have to move these things and you brought me here to have that freedom to do that and I want to do that. I mean, and I think that's what he could have and should have done and put his feet in the ground and said, this is what we're doing. Unfortunately, when you don't act quick enough, this is what it looks like. You are basically, you know, kind of, you're getting pennies back on dimes and so and I get it. It's not such a bad thing if you can, you know, and it's not just Cooper flag in that 25 draft class, you know, Ace Bailey, I mean, there's, there's, there's to me, there's six, seven guys that are like, yeah, I'll take him. So you definitely want to make sure that your foot's in that door in that lottery class. So, but yeah, it's a shame that it's taken this long and we've all had to watch the same crappy product for two and a half seasons, by the way, if there was no pandemic would Sam Presti have been the head of basketball operations in Chicago because I know for a fact they talked to him. Yeah, you know what though, you know what he's he strikes me as kind of a Billy Bean type person where he likes being the big fish in the little pond, and there are, there's, there's not, there's been opportunities for him to go to a much bigger market and much like Billy Bean, I just don't know if they're wired like that. I think they like being the guy that engineers the little engine that could and the smartest guy in the room, but nobody challenging him. Very light media, you know, it's just, I don't, I don't know if he's wired like that, but who, you know, we'll see. I mean, his career is far from over. I mean, he's got something brewing again and OKC and we'll see if they could, you know, kind of sweep the leg and finish that thing. Yeah. Then, you know what, Sam would have been perfect in Chicago. This is run like a small market team. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah. It is a mom and pop. Yeah. So I mean, it's what it is. Hey, man. Have a great day. We appreciate your time. Keep up the great work, man. Because you're awesome. Thank you, Joe. All right, boy. You got to take care. You too. All right. Joe Colley from the Chicago Sun Times on the hotline. The car. It's higher. And I don't have. Rattle, rattle, thunder, batter, boom, boom, boom. Don't worry. Call the car. It's me. Yeah. Let's talk a little bit about the bulls, and Demar DeRosen, where are the bulls missing? Now that DeRosen's gone, we'll explain that next on cap and J hook.