The long standoff between the Chicago Bulls and restricted free agent guard Josh Giddey ended suddenly on Monday afternoon after ESPN's Shams Charania reported that the parties had come to an agreement on a four year, $100 million deal. The deal is fully guaranteed and contains no player or team options.
Bulls critics will note that Giddey was one of the last meaningful free agents remaining on the market, and there weren't any teams who could have paid him what Chicago offered. He did have some leverage on his side too though. He could have taken a one year, $11 million qualifying offer and entered a much friendlier free agency landscape next summer where a third of teams (including the Bulls) will have cap space to spend. Had he gone that route, Chicago would have taken on a very real risk of losing him for nothing next year.
Were the Bulls too concerned about that doomsday scenario? Here's how I think each party did.
Josh Giddey contract grade
Did the Bulls squeeze Josh Giddey enough?
The Bulls had the leverage to squeeze Giddey harder than this, but give them some credit for at least learning from their previous mistakes and playing hardball to start.
Lead executive Arturas Karnisovas faced a similar situation last summer with restricted free agent Patrick Williams. There were very few potential suitors with the cap space to sign him. That didn't stop Karnisovas from coming to a deal on the first day of free agency, giving Williams a five year, $90 million offer with an average annual value of $18 million per year (I would have sign-and-traded him or given him no more than $12 million per year). One year out, Williams' deal looks like one of the 10 worst in the league.
This time around, Karnisovas made Giddey sweat for over two months. That got him down from his reported $30 million annual asking price, settling in at a $25 million average annual value. He will be the 81st highest-paid player in the league and the highest-paid on the Bulls this season in a statistic that is the most important to owner Jerry Reinsdorf.
The Bulls still had some time get Giddey down to a lower number. The Warriors and Sixers are following that strategy with their own restricted free agents, Jonathan Kuminga and Quentin Grimes, who remain unsigned.
Paying out $25 million for an average starting point guard isn't a bad deal in the grand scheme of things. The question then becomes this: Does Giddey meet that bar?
What is Josh Giddey worth?
Giddey does have obvious strengths. He's a good passer, he was vital in facilitating the transition attack that the Bulls rode to a somewhat miraculous 39-43 record last year, and he improved his shaky 3-point shooting tremendously during the regular season, hitting 37.8 percent from deep.
He also has glaring weaknesses. He's a good regular season player, but there are legitimate concerns on how well his game translates to the playoffs. The Thunder won a championship by discarding him for a much more playoff-tested contributor in Alex Caruso. Giddey was benched in the postseason in his last year with Oklahoma City because of how ineffective he was on both ends of the floor.
Those same issues re-emerged in the highest pressure Bulls game of the season, an embarrassing 109-90 dismantling in the Play-In Tournament against the Heat. Giddey was "guarded" by center Bam Adebayo, who mostly played in the paint and gave the Aussie guard a wide cushion to launch away.
Giddey shot poorly from outside against that coverage and became gun-shy about letting it rip. His defensive issues were also made apparent as the Heat clearly focused their gameplan on attacking him relentlessly.
One bad game shouldn't color the analysis of a player, but Giddey had several stinkers during the regular season too. His defense was problematic enough in a November loss to the Cavs that he was benched for the final minutes of that game.
Giddey also had several brilliant games, most of them coming in the last third of the season. If he were to keep up his post All-Star break averages of 21.2 points, 10.7 rebounds, and 9.3 assists per game, then he would easily outperform his new deal.
So which Giddey are the Bulls signing? Perhaps somebody out there knows the answer, but that person is not me. Even after 280 career games, there is a ton of uncertainty around what his future holds, which is why I would have gone with a shorter deal for more money and less downside risk.
My salary model had Giddey's poor start and hot finish to the season valued at $24.9 million. That is pretty much exactly what the Bulls gave him, so it's hard to be too down on this deal from the Bulls' side. They may have lost on the margins by not squeezing him harder (a critique that can be extended to almost every move that they make), but it's not a contract that is going to kill them and it does have some chance of providing positive value.
Bulls grade: C+
Josh Giddey grade
For Giddey, this deal is a win. He didn't get his $30 million, but he gave himself the best opportunity possible to earn a raise four years from now.
The Thunder and the early part of the Bulls season before they traded Zach LaVine proved one thing for sure. Giddey needs a very particular fit in order to maximize his talents. The Bulls are one of the few (if not only) places where most of those conditions can be met.
Giddey needs the ball in his hands, he has to play on a team that embraces fast pace, he needs to be surrounded by willing shooters, and he needs a good defensive center (I did say most, not all conditions were met).
He also needs to start at point guard, which he wouldn't be able to do on the majority of teams. The bar to be a lead ballhandler in the NBA is extremely high. As a frame of reference, I have Jamal Murray, Derrick White, and Tyler Herro as the 14th, 15th, and 16th-ranked point guards in the league next season.
Even the most optimistic Giddey fans would be hard-pressed to argue that he currently approaches that level of player. I have him ranked as the No. 22 point guard coming into the year. He is turning just 23 in October, and maybe there is a chance that he can get to that median level by the end of this deal. He will have the best possible opportunity to do so in Chicago.
Giddey grade: A