Now what?
Life after Jordan leaves Bulls at a crossroads
Posted: Wednesday January 13, 1999 12:28 AM
| |
As the Bulls look ahead, the future may be worse than imagined without Jordan AP |
CHICAGO (AP) -- Bring the rest of 'em back? Or allow the wrecking ball to
come crashing down on the rest of the dynasty?
Those are the questions Chicago Bulls owner Jerry
Reinsdorf and general manager Jerry Krause will have to answer. As of now,
it looks like they're unsure of which path they'll choose.
Monday night's news that Jordan is planning to retire will have an
immediate impact on the rest of Chicago Bulls. With only four players under
contract and 10 free agents, the possibilities are many.
Should they re-sign Scottie Pippen
and Dennis
Rodman and try to build from there? And what about Steve Kerr, Jud Buechler, Luc Longley, Scott Burrell,
Joe Kleine and
Bill
Wennington, the other free agents?
All could be expendable if the Bulls decide to completely rebuild.
But all of them could be back, too, if Reinsdorf and Krause think the
team has a chance to be a champion without Jordan.
"The guys we have back are basically young," Krause said of the Bulls'
four players under contract: Toni Kukoc, Ron Harper, Randy Brown and
Keith Booth.
"[We would] add more youth to them and see where we go from there to build
another championship team. We did that once before a number of years ago
with youth, stayed with youth and added veterans as we went along."
The Bulls technically will remain over the salary cap until they renounce
their rights to Jordan. But once that happens, and if they decide not to
keep Pippen and Rodman, they will be in position to immediately become a
major player in a free-agent market that includes Antonio
McDyess, Damon
Stoudamire, Jerry
Stackhouse and Rod
Strickland.
According to the agent for Rodman, a return by most of Jordan's
supporting cast isn't out of the question.
"This means that Dennis will not be playing with Michael again, but
everything else is up in the air," agent Dwight Manley said. "By saying
their first priority was to bring the entire team back, I feel that
demonstrated their sincerity."
CNN/SI |
|
"They still have to field a team, and there's a lot of possibilities as
to how they could do it," Manley said.
How's this for an opening night lineup: Kukoc, Harper, Eddie Jones, Elden Campbell
and McDyess?
It's not out of the question, and here's how it could happen:
Krause, the only executive able to sign Pippen to a contract worth more
than $10 million annually, makes an agreement with Pippen's agent to sign
him and trade him. Under the rules of the new collective bargaining
agreement, such a transaction would be permissible if Pippen's new contract
was for at least three years.
Krause then would trade Pippen to another team that could put together a
package of players whose salaries would equal Pippen's. Campbell ($7
million) and Jones ($2.2 million) would put the Lakers in that ballpark,
and since Los Angeles needs a ballhandler now that Nick Van Exel
is gone, Pippen would be a perfect fit.
If such a trade were made, Krause would then have to decide whether to
renounce the rights to Rodman and the other free agents to clear them off
the salary cap. If none of them were taking up space, the Bulls would be
close to having $9 million in cap room to offer McDyess.
If McDyess liked the idea of Chicago instead of Phoenix, Houston or
Denver, it might work.
The roster could be filled out with a player taking the new average
salary exception, another player taking the $1 million exception and four
or five others playing for the minimum.
By the time opening night arrives, a majority of the players due to
receive rings could be absent.
If Jordan shows up, he might not even recognize the Bulls.
First, it'll be up to the Jerrys to decide how much dismantling they'll
do.
Copyright 2003 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
| 
