NEWSLETTER
The Chicago Bulls decision to overhaul their front office might as well have been the best news of 2020. After years of mediocrity with no clear path toward contention, Arturas Karnisovas and Marc Eversley swooped in, picked up Bulls fans in their beautifully muscular arms, and began flying us to safety.
Make no mistake, though, both have to continue their fight (flight?) against the GarPax monster who left behind a broken team. The beast will take some time to overcome; not to mention, some additional sidekicks. Executives like assistant GM J.J. Polk and vice president of player personnel Pat Connelly joined the Bulls new front office crew this offseason, and both will surely play a pivotal role in the franchise’s return to relevancy.
Connelly spoke about as much in a recent conversation with NBC Sports Chicago’s K.C. Johnson on the Bulls Talk Podcast, providing us with a better understanding of this new front office.
“He’s [Arturas Karnisovas] taken bits from places he’s been before — from Houston, from Denver, from the league, as a player,” Connelly told Johnson. “Arturas has such a wide breadth of experience from different places and different roles that it’s been fun kind of going through it with him as we build up our processes. That’s what we did at the beginning, a lot of Zoom calls of, ‘this is how we’re going to refer to the certain positions. Here’s our jargon that we’re going to use as we describe players. Here’s our value system’ and going through that.”
In a typical environment, it must be rather difficult to get a new front office on the same page, so I can’t even imagine the challenges faced in the midst of a pandemic and confusing draft class. However, there is no sense of worry or frustration in Connelly’s voice. The man sounds nothing but confident in the Bulls new leader and the direction the organization is already heading. To put it differently, Connelly makes it sound as if the Bulls are operating with an experienced front office, which could say a lot about the people Karnisovas brought on board.
Connelly does have a prior relationship with Karnisovas, working with him in Denver as well as knowing him through his brother – Nuggets president of basketball operations Tim Connelly – for several years. On top of that, he mentioned knowing both Eversley and Polk prior to his time in Chicago.
We talked about it, kind of his vision, and then when he mentioned the other people that he was potentially bringing on to assist in the front office … when he kind of mentioned Marc Eversley and J.J. Polk, I was like this is almost like a no brainer. This isn’t going into a situation where we’re feeling each other out – what our work styles are, what our preferences are, how our personalities interact – those are guys I’ve known for my entire length of the NBA.
Chances are, this is why things have seemed to get off to such a smooth smart. The prior relationships inside the Advocate Center walls have allowed for this front office to jump right into the work. Of course, time will only tell how successful this team can be, but it sure is reassuring to hear Connelly portray this new bunch as such a cohesive unit.
Anyway, it’s fun to hear from one of the organization’s most important new contributors. If you got some free time, make sure to give the full interview a listen.
https://twitter.com/NBCSBulls/status/1323663730744283138?s=20
