Bulls reportedly reach out to 15 teams with Zach LaVine trade proposals

Arturas Karnisovas is doing his best to trade Zach Lavine. It’s just not that easy.

Karnisovas (with the backing of team ownership and in mutual agreement with LaVine’s camp) tried at the trade deadline last February. LaVine hoped to be sent to the Heat, 76ers, or Lakers, but the Bulls kept finding teams were more interested in Alex Caruso or DeMar DeRozan. The market for LaVine was lukewarm.

Karnisovas is back at it and has made proposals to literally half the league, reports K.C. Johnson at NBC Sports Chicago.

“Everything is on the table,” Karnišovas said in April… It’s why Zach LaVine’s future isn’t the only trade scenario that has been discussed, even if sources said Karnišovas has floated as many as 15 proposals centered on the two-time All-Star guard to various teams including the Sacramento Kings, Orlando Magic and Philadelphia 76ers.

All three of those teams make sense on some level. If the 76ers can’t land Paul George as a free agent, then Lavine fits in a tier with Brandon Ingram and others to consider as a wing to fit between Tyrese Maxey and Joel Embiid. Orlando and Sacramento are both looking for attacking wings and shooting to upgrade their playoff rosters, and LaVine fits that.

However, as noted above, the market for LaVine has been tepid. LaVine has value, he is a two-time All-Star and elite isolation scorer, a career 38.2% shooter from 3 and a bucket getter who last season averaged 19.5 points and 3.9 assists, with a 57.8 true shooting percentage — all numbers that were down slightly because of a foot injury that he eventually had to have surgery on and ended his season.

That injury history and his salary have teams hesitant to pursue LaVine. LaVine is owed $138 million over the next three years (an average of $46 million a year), and that’s a lot of money to pay a guy known to miss games for stretches (although he played 77 games in 2022-23 and 67 games in an All-Star season the year before that).

The Bulls reportedly “significantly” dropped the asking price for LaVine around the deadline and it will be interesting to see what kind of return they can get — but Karnisovas and the Bulls need to get something and move on. It is time to reshape this roster. Do they bring back free agent DeMar DeRozan? Re-sign Patrick Williams? Trade Alex Caruso? There are a lot of questions, but this team needs a roster shakeup and a new direction.

Trading Zach LaVine is part of that.