The people have spoken. Due to an overwhelming number of highly questionable decisions by Bulls General Manager Gar Foreman and President of Basketball Operations John Paxson (together known as "GarPax") over the course of 10+ years, Chicago Bulls fans have decided that enough is enough.
A billboard stating "Fire GarPax" will be going up in the neighborhood of Pilsen in Chicago on July 19th. It will be up for an entire month. Fans raised a little over $8,000 on gofundme to make this billboard a reality.
Here is a picture of the location:
And here is the proposed billboard graphic:
Why are Bulls fans upset? Due to the puzzling trade of their best player, Jimmy Butler, on draft night for a "mystery box" consisting of players whose futures are either questionable or who have history of injury (as is the case with Zach LeVine and his ACL tear), in addition to a litany of other offenses over the past decade, the fanbase felt the need to take action.
Below is a rundown of the offenses, provided by Reddit user /u/duoloskerux:
(1) GarPax either has no long term plan for the franchise or is entirely comfortable lying to the Bulls fanbase.
- Justified Derrick Rose trade on the grounds of wanting to get younger and faster then proceeded to sign Rajon Rondo (yes, D. Wade too but that was a case of lucking into a star that they had to sign once Wade expressed interest).
- Claimed the Butler trade was the best offer available to them which ignores, first, that they had turned down a better offer for him already and, second, that there was no objective need for urgency in trading Butler, considering he had two more years on his deal and was playing at an all-star level.
- Have justified bad trades (including the Gibson and McDermott trade with OKC) in part by their love for Jerian Grant, Cameron Payne, and now Kris Dunn, using some version of the phrase "we were really high on [insert newly acquired pg's name] last year in the draft" each time. Meanwhile, the first two on that list can't get off the bench (or stay out of the D-League), and, regardless, are stuck in a roster with at least 5 point guards.
- Claimed to be setting a "clear direction" and "jumpstarting the rebuild" with the Butler trade but then sold a second round pick in the same draft to the Golden State Warriors who selected what appears to be a likely valuable rotation player in the near future.
Note: the mishandling here is compounded (as /u/skwerpsquad pointed out) by the reality that GarPax traded away two second rounders (Denver's 2018 and our own 2019) just to get rid of Jose Calderon who was bought out by LAL later that season.
(2) GarPax has a track record of making poor decisions based on (often negative) personal relationships rather than what is in the best interests of the franchise.
Compiled from /u/TLCplLogan's post:
- Did not renew Ron Adams' contract for seemingly no other reason than to spite Tom Thibodeau.
- Drafted Marquis Teague instead of Draymond Green, to the protest of Tom Thibodeau.
- Not handling Derrick Rose's first injury properly, leaving Tom Thibodeau and Reggie Rose to answer all the questions about his recovery.
- Firing Tom Thibodeau, the second-best coach in franchise history, apparently because Tom often disagreed with the front office.
- Signed Fred Hoiberg to a long term contract and failed to build the team around his coaching philosophy.
- John Paxson choked Vinny Del Negro during a disagreement. Read that again - a member of senior executive leadership choked the head coach during a confrontation about minutes.
What do you think. Overreaction? Or are GarPax getting what they deserve?