I. End of an Error

I. End of an Error

By William Yang

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AKME (Arturas Karnisovas, Mark Eversely) were brought in as a collective to bring the Bulls organization back to winning. Sold to Bulls fans as front-office personnel with experience in bringing success to franchises. The first half being credited for scouting future HOF [1] Nikola Jokic, and the second for…checks notes…working with Bryan Colangelo (famous for the 76ers burner-account fiasco) under two teams (the other being the Raptors).

Their tenure with the Bulls can only be described as a snooze-fest and the opposite of success, although to their credit, the team they initially assembled had a decent playoff floor (i.e. Past the first round) in this writer’s opinion. AKME initially constructed a team that included Demar Derozan, Zach Lavine, Nikola Vucevic, Lonzo Ball, and Alex Caruso, which started the 2021-2022 season at the top of the East before Lonzo Ball went down with a knee injury. That injury would take Lonzo Ball out for the next two seasons and derail the vision AKME had for the team.

Besides the initial construction, AKME struggled to adapt. Draft results were always underwhelming (evidenced by choosing Patrick Williams with the #4 pick), and assets were held on too long, only being traded when their value was at its lowest. This resulted in a team capped at the play-in tournament.

With head coach Billy Donovan stepping down, the Bulls have an opportunity to reset heading into the 2026–27 season. The problem is ownership. The Reinsdorf family handpicked this front office, and there’s little reason to believe meaningful change is coming.

Best-case scenario? The Bulls stumble into the right leadership group and finally chart a coherent path forward.

[1] HOF: Hall-of-famer