Chicago Bulls: Why tanking will not result in a higher draft pick

The Chicago Bulls are officially in tank mode. Here’s a look at why the strategy may not work in their favor.

Hate it or love it, the Chicago Bulls are officially in tank mode for the remainder of the season.

Of course, the front office is not going to come right out and say as much considering Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban was recently fined $600,000 for stating on a podcast that his team would be better off losing games at this point.

However, in the light of the lineup changes that will be taking effect in the near future, that is exactly the direction the Bulls are going in.

By deciding to insert Cristiano Felicio and David Nwaba into the starting lineup, two of the veteran players who will see less playing time going forward are Robin Lopez and Justin Holiday.

Lopez — who has posted career highs in both points (12.3) and assists per game (2.0) — is the Bulls’ sixth leading scorer and brings a lot of intangibles to the table that don’t show up in the box score.

Meanwhile, Holiday is ranked fourth on the team in scoring with 13.2 points per contest, nearly doubling his scoring output from a season ago. Not only that, Holiday is also shooting a career best 37.4 percent from 3-point range.

While reducing the roles of these veterans is proof enough, executive vice president of basketball operations John Paxson provided further evidence of the team’s overall objective by moving Jerian Grant aside and giving Cameron Payne an extended look at the backup point guard spot behind Kris Dunn.

Wait, what?

Considering the fact Payne has sustained multiple foot injuries, converted just 33 percent of his attempts in 11 games last season and shot 9-for-26 in two Summer League appearances during the offseason, this move can be categorized as puzzling at best….that is, unless you’re trying to rack up as many losses as possible.

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In any case, even though the Bulls are doing what they can to position themselves for a higher draft pick, there are a couple of reasons why this strategy may not produce the desired result. For starters, one of the positives from this recent development is that Dunn, Zach LaVine and Lauri Markkanen will not see reduced minutes down the stretch.

What does this mean?

Well, each player has already proven his value to the team despite the fact they have appeared in the starting lineup together for a total of four games. Bearing that in mind, as the trio begins to understand the strengths and weaknesses of each other’s games; they will only get better the more time they’re on the court together. This alone should produce a few victories over the remaining 25 games.

On top of that, even after an abysmal 3-20 start, the Bulls have played at the .500 mark since that time and have just the eighth-worst record in the league heading into their matchup against the Philadelphia 76ers on Thursday night.

Furthermore, the Bulls don’t exactly have a daunting schedule down the stretch. In fact, the Bulls have an easier schedule than each of the seven ball clubs who have a worse record than they do. Let’s also remember that the New York Knicks will be without the services of Kristaps Porzingis due to a torn ACL injury, which means the Bulls could possibly move ahead of them in the standings as well.

Next: 2017-18 Week 19 NBA Power Rankings

Simply put, although the Bulls were predicted to be one of the worst teams in the league this season, outside of playing their reserves the rest of the way, they will not be able to accumulate enough losses to acquire a top-five or top-10 pick in this year’s NBA Draft, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.