Bulls projected lineup and rotations heading into 2023-24 season
Chicago Bulls starting small forward: DeMar DeRozan
DeMar DeRozan continues to do DeMar DeRozan things. The NBA has evolved around DeRozan over the course of his career but he continues to deliberately target defenses in the mid-range, often to great effect. He’s one of the best 2-point jump shooters in the league and there is absolutely still value there.
On top of his pristine footwork and knockdown pull-up jumper, DeRozan has made a concerted effort in Chicago to improve his playmaking. He’s better than ever at leveraging the attention he demands on drives down the lane to set up shooters on the perimeter. The Bulls do a good job of keeping DeRozan surrounded by shooters and leaning into his unconventional-but-effective strengths. He can bully smaller defenders in the post, torch slower defenders attacking from the elbow or simply get into his iso bag.
There are drawbacks to DeRozan’s style, of course. He doesn’t take many 3s and he’s probably the weakest link in Chicago’s defense. Billy Donovan has done a tremendous job of building up the Bulls’ defensive scheme but DeRozan is regularly hidden in the corner and kept out of actions despite his positional size and top-shelf athleticism.
Like LaVine, DeRozan has been a frequent subject of the “can he actually win?” debate. DeRozan has been much closer to glory than LaVine back in his top-seed Toronto days, but the Raptors always faltered on the big stage. It’s more difficult than ever to envision a true winner built around a player with DeRozan’s specific skill set, but he has made an effort to modernize his approach as times change. He was the Bulls’ only All-Star last season and he continues to be a focal point of opposing game plans every night.
Primary backup small forward: Ayo Dosunmu
Let’s address the proverbial elephant in the room here: Ayo Dosunmu is a guard. He’s 6-foot-5 and he was billed as a point guard coming out of Illinois. The Bulls re-signed him to a three-year, $21 million contract because of his guard skills. But here’s the thing about Chicago: there are several guards on the roster.
It, therefore, gets difficult to peg Dosunmu into a specific “position.” The Bulls are going to run plenty of three, even four-guard looks depending on where you want to peg DeRozan’s position (think guard on offense, forward on defense). Dosunmu, Caruso, and White will all defend multiple positions depending on what the evening’s matchup demands. LaVine will spend ample time as the de facto “three,” even if he’s still very much a skinny two-guard. That’s the nature of modern basketball, folks.