The Chicago Bulls are seemingly open for business as the trade deadline nears. And rightfully so. The organization finds itself stuck in all-too-familiar territory at the halfway mark of the season, holding a 119-22 record and sitting 9th in the Eastern Conference.
Another Play-In Tournament appearance and loss would be incredibly hard to stomach, which is likely why the front office is reportedly feeling the “pressure” to pick a new lane. There is also arguably no better time for them to do just that. They have seven expiring contracts on the books this season, which includes potentially lucrative trade chips in Coby White and Ayo Dosunmu. Cashing in now before potentially losing multiple players for nothing feels like smart business.
With that said, while we have spent a lot of time talking about who should be on the trade block, we have yet to discuss the opposite. Is there anyone on this roster who should be considered untouchable?
To be sure, if Victor Wembanyama is on the table, the answer is surely no. But let’s be more realistic than that. Assuming a generational young player isn’t up for grabs, there are three players it feels like the Chicago Bulls will refuse to discuss in the coming weeks.
Matas Buzelis
You do not give up the kind of player who has shown the flashes Matas Buzelis has shown.
The 2024 No. 11 overall pick has already given several rival organizations a reason to regret letting him stumble down the draft board. Once discussed as a Top 5 pick, Buzelis has looked the part with his jaw dropping athletcism and high-impact two-way play. He forced his way into the starting lineup mid-way through his rookie campaign, and he has been on a steady rise since.
The forward has nearly doubled his stats from last season with 14.8 points, 5.2 rebounds, 1.7 assists, and 1.4 blocks per game. Even more encouraging, his field goal percentage has been boosted to 47.7 percent. As the Bulls have tasked him with more on-ball responsibilities, Buzelis has only looked more comfortable and confident. That’s all you can ask for from a 21-year-old player.
Over the last month alone, we have seen Buzelis score a season-high 28 points, drain a career-high seven threes, dish a career-high 7 assists, and block a career-high 4 shots (twice). Development may not always be linear, but Buzelis has avoided those kinds of extended slumps that can raise an eyebrow. He genuinely feels like someone who is learning and improving each and every day.
Is Buzelis destined to be the No. 1 player on a championship team? That remains unclear, and it’s probably unwise to put those kinds of expectations on him right now. All that matters for the Bulls is that Buzelis increasingly looks like a key piece of a winning puzzle. Few players in the league have his combination of six and versatility. Giving up on him now would be giving up the kind of prospect that almost every franchise hopes to have in the building.
Josh Giddey
If the Chicago Bulls trading the highly coveted Alex Caruso straight-up for Josh Giddey didn’t tell you how strongly they feel about the guard, the new four-year, $100 million contract sure did.
Arturas Karnisovas and Company saw Giddey as a necessary building block. He seems to exemplify the way this organization wants to play, promoting unselfish and high-tempo basketball. Likewise, still only 23 years old, the Bulls have bet on Giddey’s ability to still blossom into the well-rounded and efficient player that OKC once thought he could be. To his credit, Giddey has shown signs of doing just that.
The numbers truly do speak for themselves. Giddey is averaging 19.2 points, 9.0 assists, and 8.9 rebounds a night. He’s also shooting a career-high 38.6 percent from long range on nearly 5.0 attempts a night. Add in his career-high 5.3 trips to the charity stripe per game, and Giddey has taken a real leap as a dependable scorer. His ability to do that became one of the biggest question marks.
Nevertheless, what continues to stand out more is his winning impact. Always known for filling up multiple areas of the box score, the guard has finally started to signal that he can be a genuine On/Off difference-maker. His +3.7 efficiency differential is by far a career-high, per Cleaning the Glass, while Dunks & Threes puts his +1.3 estimated plus-minus in the NBA’s 85th percentile.
Of course, there is still plenty of room for Giddey to continue growing his game. But that’s what makes him one of their few untradeable pieces! Particularly for a franchise that has been stuck in the mud for years, you can not afford to part ways with a 23-year-old who impacts the game in as many ways as Giddey. The guy sits one spot behind Nikola Jokic in triple-doubles for crying out loud! That’s something you bet on.
Noa Essengue
Selected with the No. 12 pick in the 2025 NBA Draft, Noa Essengue’s season was sadly cut short.
The overseas wing suffered a shoulder injury during a meeting with the Windy City Bulls that required surgery. He will now miss the remainder of the 2025-26 season, stripping him of some extremely valuable developmental time.
Considering the early-career injury and how little we know about Essengue, one could argue that he shouldn’t make this list. He hasn’t necessarily given the Bulls a reason to keep him around like the other two players. At the same time, Chicago did not select him anticipating an immediate return on investment. No one in this past draft class was viewed as a bigger project piece than Essengue. He was the second-youngest player on the board after Cooper Flagg, and he possesses an incredibly raw skillset with no elite trait.
With that said, the idea of Essengue is tantalizing. He is another six-foot-ten freak athlete with ridiculously long limbs and great mobility. You can’t have enough of that in today’s NBA. The overseas tape shows flashes of defensive switchability, elastic finishing, offensive rebounding, foul-drawing, ball-handling, and even a sprinkle of outside shooting. In other words … Essengue has the potential to do it all.
The Bulls would be silly not to at the very least get a full year of Essengue in an NBA rotation. Even then, he is going to need a couple of years of evaluation before they really know how high his ceiling rests.
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