Second NBA mock draft has Bulls picking Matas Buzelis at pick No. 11
The Chicago Bulls’ selection with the 11th pick in the 2024 NBA Draft could have serious implications regarding their future. They need to nail it. Jonathan Wasserman of Bleacher Report recently projected them to take Matas Buzelis, but before that, No Ceilings had them doing the same.
“One of the great mysteries of the 2024 NBA offseason will be what the Chicago Bulls do with their roster,” No Ceilings wrote. “The Bulls were a strange team to watch all season long. They were never as bad as some people made them out to be, nor were they ever as good as others made them out to be. With star players missing big chunks of the season due to injury, the Bulls relied heavily on Demar DeRozan and Coby White to carry the team for most of the year. Now, how does Matas Buzelis fit with all of this? The idea of Buzelis is a ton of fun. The issue with Buzelis is that most of his game is theoretical.
“For everyone claiming he’s a good shooter, he was not a good shooter playing for the G League Ignite this season. He’s never had a ton of scoring punch off the dribble, isn’t a big-time athlete, and needs to add strength and awareness on the defensive side of the ball. Buzelis makes sense at this point in the draft because of the lotto ticket that his future presents. Buzelis is gigantic, and he has some passing feel to him. If the jumper ever comes around, he could be dangerous as a perimeter gravity guy. Once again, the issue is that he hasn’t shown much of that up to this point. The Bulls, with all of their question marks, could look to Buzelis as a long-term building block of the future whenever they decide to move on from their current crop of vets.”
Can the Bulls afford to take a chance on Buzelis? Or should they go with a safer option?