The Chicago Bulls are taking a more aggressive approach to the NBA trade deadline this year.
After years of muted activity at the midseason, executive vice president of basketball operations Artūras Karnišovas kickstarted a flurry of activity Tuesday — first cementing a three-team trade to acquire Jaden Ivey from Detroit, then offloading Nikola Vučević to the Boston Celtics.
The Bulls acquired Ivey and veteran guard Mike Conley Jr. in a three-team trade with the Pistons and Minnesota Timberwolves in exchange for guard Kevin Huerter and forward Dario Šarić, both of whom went to Detroit. Minnesota also sent a draft pick swap for a protected first-rounder to Detroit in the deal, per an ESPN report. The Bulls then sent Vučević to the Celtics in exchange for guard Anfernee Simons and a second-round draft pick swap.
This isn’t the end of the action for the Bulls, who remain active sellers ahead of the deadline at 2 p.m. Thursday. The Bulls front office is continuing to target Coby White as a blue-chip trade asset to leverage contending teams in the Western Conference out of trade picks or young talent.
This uncertainty hung over the Bulls as they attempted to regroup for Tuesday’s game in Milwaukee against the Bucks, a 131-115 loss. Players cracked jokes in the locker room about who would get traded next. Only 10 players were available to participate in the game, with Tre Jones suiting up as a fail-safe despite the team having no expectation that the injured guard would play.
For White, the loss of teammates and anticipation of his own potential trade made Tuesday a difficult day to navigate.
Chicago Bulls center Nikola Vučević (9) dunks the ball in the second quarter during a game against the Philadelphia 76ers, Friday, Dec. 26, 2025, at the United Center in Chicago. (Dominic Di Palermo/Chicago Tribune)
“I think sometimes there’s a narrative — just in the NBA but in general — that it’s part of the business,” White said. “But we’re still human. … Vooch was a locker room leader. Seeing him go, it was kind of tough for probably a lot of guys. You’re gonna feel something, right? We’re all human. But we still got a game and we got a job to do, so we’re going to go out there and do it.”
Moving away from Vučević signalled the closing of a chapter for the Bulls. The center was the first acquisition of the 2021 roster rebuild for Artūras Karnišovas, who took a major swing to craft a roster that climbed to the top of the Eastern Conference before crashing out of a first-round series with the Milwaukee Bucks in the 2022 playoffs.
Although he struggled at first to fit his style of play into the Bulls’ system, Vučević thrived offensively in recent seasons as a facilitating center. He shot a career-high 40.2% from 3-point range last season and averaged 16.9 points and nine rebounds per game for the Bulls this season. The Bulls heard offers on the center at last year’s deadline but ultimately couldn’t find a suitable trade partner. With a move to Boston, Vučević achieves his ultimate goal of spending one of the final seasons of his career with a contender.
Teammates and coaches alike praised Vučević for his availability — playing 93% of possible games during his Chicago tenure — and work ethic during his time with the Bulls.
“The game has evolved and it’s always kind of changing and he’s always adjusted,” coach Billy Donovan said. “He was always available. We played a lot of games and he was always available. He found a way to always get himself ready. We could rely on him.”
After snagging a pair of second-round picks in a three-team trade on Saturday, the Bulls exclusively picked up guards in their pair of Tuesday deals.
Detroit Pistons guard Jaden Ivey dribbles past Phoenix Suns forward Ryan Dunn on Thursday, Jan. 29, 2026, in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)
A 6-foot-3 shooting guard who was averaging 8.2 points per game for the Pistons this season, Ivey fits the mold for Chicago’s current youth development plan as a third-year player at age 23. The guard missed the majority of the 2024-25 season after breaking his left fibula, a significant injury that required nearly a full year of recovery. He still hasn’t returned to his full vitality this season — the guard was averaging 17.6 points per game in the first 30 games of that season before the injury — but there is hope that he will continue to rebuild to that prior output with another year’s removal from the incident. Ivey is the son of Notre Dame women’s basketball coach Niele Ivey.
Conley is a 38-year-old veteran who moved to the bench for the Timberwolves this season and averages 4.4 points per game. Simons — a 6-foot-3 guard averaging 14.2 points per game off the bench for the Celtics — is younger at 26, but still not on the same age timeline as the rest of Chicago’s preferred roster.
All three of these players are on expiring contracts, which provides the Bulls with their ultimate objective of flexibility. But as it stands right now, the Chicago roster includes 10 guards — and only two centers, including two-way rookie Lachlan Olbrich.
Still, with more than a day left until the trade deadline, there’s still plenty of time left for Karnišovas to balance this roster.