The Chicago Bulls now have a chance to gain relevance. Will they take it?

Ding-dong, the witch is dead.

That might be the reaction among Chicago Bulls fans, as the organization announced the firing of Artūras Karnišovas and Marc Eversley, the team’s two leading executives.

To be fair, the reaction is appropriate, as the duo bordered on incompetent during their six-year tenure, refusing to choose a direction for the Bulls and failing to secure a single first-round selection while trading Zach LaVine, DeMar DeRozan, Nikola Vučević, Coby White, Ayo Dosunmu and Alex Caruso.

However, while Bulls fans might celebrate the news, all is still not right in Chicago.

Once upon a time, the Chicago Bulls logo meant something. (Photo by Bobby Goddin/Getty Images)

(Bobby Goddin via Getty Images)

Bulls ownership remains

The people in charge of hiring decision-makers, the Reinsdorf family, have proven woefully inept.

They kept around Gar Forman and John Paxson at least seven years too long before making the change to Karnišovas and Eversley, and they should have removed this duo two or three years ago after they proved to be horribly overmatched in the tactics of trade negotiations.

The Reinsdorfs — led by Michael, the son of Jerry, who oversaw the Michael Jordan era — have a reputation of focusing on the financial aspect more than the actual on-court product.

With fans becoming increasingly apathetic and disinterested in the Bulls, the skeptical approach here is they saw the firing of Karnišovas and Eversley as an attempt to lure fans back in, to earn yet another quick buck by dangling the carrot of hope in front of the United Center crowd.

If that is the case, that won’t be good enough.

The fan base is more critical than ever, and rightly so. It will take nothing short of complete devotion to get the brand of the Bulls back to where it once was, and that means ownership buy-in on a basketball level.

So, what’s the play?

The Bulls could go a myriad of ways, including targeting Masai Ujiri, who won a title with Toronto in 2019, or they could go hunting within established front offices for young executives who understand the value of data, scouting and finding additional wins through basketball analytics.

My take? You go for both.

The Bulls should employ the largest front office in the league and do so by securing big-name executives who are established and carry immediate respect among their peers.

From there, they should seek out the best of the best who aren’t in leading roles around the league and offer them ridiculous pay increases to pry them away from their respective successful teams.

After all, the Bulls have done absolutely nothing but optimize earnings for almost 30 years, historically refusing to pay the luxury tax, and that has ultimately been at the cost of the fan experience.

Now is the time to pay it back. Now is the time to send a message to fans that one of the most recognizable sports brands in America will rise up from the ashes to recapture its former glory.

At this point, the franchise owes it to them.

Unfortunately, that’s never been how the Bulls have operated. If we go off their history, the Reinsdorfs will employ a few people with some name recognition and then turn right back around to doing what they’re used to doing: cashing in until the fans lose interest, then find new people and repeat the cycle.

How thrilling.

For the sake of the fans, it’d be nothing short of fantastic if the Bulls surprise us all by approaching this new situation proactively and with a newfound sense of dedication and excitement.

Whomever they hire, surprisingly, is stepping into a tremendous situation. The team is absolutely primed for a full-on rebuild. The Bulls have all of their draft picks. Outside of Patrick Williams, there isn’t bad long-term money on the books, and they have a blue-chip prospect in Matas Buzelis, who could become an All-Star.

That is by no means a bad situation, unless ownership makes it a bad one, which they shouldn’t. Not again. It would be nothing short of malpractice if the franchise continues down the middling road it’s been on since 1998.

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