NBA Trade Rumors: Lakers, Spurs, Raptors and Nets among teams pursing Luol Deng
By Josh Hill
Every since we started hitting the thick of holiday NBA trade rumors, a name that was brought up but won’t go away is Chicago Bulls forward Luol Deng. To catch up on the whole Deng trade rumor process, basically the Bulls dangled Deng on the trade block for a half a second before pulling him back, saying they won’t pursue a trade.
But what putting him out there did, was chum the waters for a trade partner to come to the Bulls rather than the other way around. According to Aggery Sam of CSNChicago, several teams are interested in trading for Deng and the pursuit to land him has apparently begun. Sam names the Los Angeles Lakers, San Antonio Spurs, Memphis Grizzlies, Cleveland Cavaliers, Brooklyn Nets and Toronto Raptors as teams league sources have informed him are interested in Deng.
The main question is, are teams interested in a trade for Deng or are they interested in picking him up this summer in free agency? If the latter is the case, the Bulls have even more incentive to lock up an extension now.
Nothing is imminent at the moment but the plan the Bulls enacted and then claimed they didn’t enact it playing out exactly like everyone thought it would. The only question is will enough assists get offered to the Bulls so a trade happen or will the Bulls shock everyone and hammer out a contract extension to keep Deng in Chicago?