A problem is the Bulls players are all fairly good. There's not many obvious upgrades except at PF and C, but those positions are manned by guys we expect significant improvement from anyway.

I've been looking around and trying to figure out any conceivable means of turning some of our extras into long-term piece somewhere and I'm not seeing a lot of obvious ways to do it.

If we want to get a player who's a clear upgrade to what we have, we have to find another team that has a bad situation they want to escape from. Memphis with Gasol was an example there. Or Seattle with Ray Allen last year. Not that I think Allen would have been a perfect fit for the Bulls; my point is that the Sonics wanted to go in a different (money-saving, youth) direction.

So step one is to find a team that wants to change.

Step two is to find a player on that team that could help us.

Step three is to see if any of our players would fit what they're trying to do.

So look at the potentials:
Atlanta: Their ownership issues are still a mess and they'll have several free agents. If they somehow miss out on the playoffs, or they just look obviously outclassed, it seems to me they might consider big changes. Joe Johnson would be interesting, as would Josh Smith.

Dallas: Is going nowhere fast and paying a zillion dollars to do it. They've got $79M in guaranteed salary next year already, and the luxury tax will be something like $70M If they miss the playoffs or get bounced early, they might look to cut costs. Perhaps they'll auction off their lottery pick the way Phoenix did when we got Deng, or be willing to make some sort of salary saving trade to get depth (they'll only have 6 players under contract next year and last time I checked you need 14). They'll need to make some kind of move

Denver: Somewhat like Dallas but not quite as bad, they project to pay about $7M in luxury tax for a team that's barely making the playoffs.

Charlotte: Has lots of guys locked into long-term deals, including Jason Richardson and Gerald Wallace, but again, they aren't going anywhere.

Milwaukee: Ditto. Michael Redd might be overpaid, but I'd still prefer him to Gordon or Hughes.

Anyway, you get the idea.... if we're going to make a move, we're going to have to find a team that wants to shake things up themselves.