Bulls receive strong Austin Reaves warning amid growing free agent buzz

The Chicago Bulls have one of the better salary cap situations in basketball heading into the offseason, so they are expected to be major players in NBA free agency.

The Bulls have made just one playoff appearance in the last nine years and went 31-51 this past season, so they may not exactly look like a marquee destination, but it’s a big market, and Chicago now has a new regime coming in which could change things.

As a result, the Bulls may comprise a surprisingly attractive landing spot, and one name that has surfaced as a potential option for the team is Austin Reaves.

Reaves has become a very popular player over the last several years, establishing himself as a versatile, All-Star-caliber wing for the Los Angeles Lakers. During the 2025-26 regular season, he averaged 23.3 points, 5.5 assists and 4.7 rebounds over 34.5 minutes per game on 49.0/36.0/87.1 shooting splits, so you can see why he is garnering so much attention.

But would Chicago be making a mistake if it pursued him on the open market? Bleacher Report’s Grant Hughes seems to think so.

The Chicago Bulls have been warned about Austin Reaves

While Hughes appreciates how well Reaves has performed, he feels the 27-year-old will get overpaid thanks to his blistering start this year.

“Potential suitors will include the Brooklyn Nets, Chicago Bulls and Reaves’ own Los Angeles Lakers. All three should be wary of viewing this year’s 51-game sample as a production baseline going forward,” Hughes wrote. “Reaves performed like a superstar through the end of November, thriving in an upsized role while Luka Dončić and LeBron James missed time with injury. After that, his numbers were much more in line with what he did in 2024-25, when he posted 20.2 points and 5.8 assists on a 61.6 true shooting percentage. Those are still stellar stats, but it’s hard to argue they’re worth a potential five-year max with the Lakers, which would check in at a total of $241 million.”

As Hughes noted, those are obviously still very good numbers, but the Bulls absolutely need to be cautious with how they spend their money. If they ultimately sign Reaves to a max deal in free agency, it would severely inhibit their chances of improving the roster elsewhere, and the last thing Chicago needs is to be saddled with an albatross.

To be fair, Reaves has shown steady improvement each and every season, and he’s still relatively young. But is he worth being your highest-paid player? It’s a question the Bulls will need to ask themselves, and the answer is almost certainly “no.”

There will be plenty of other options for Chicago to consider this summer, so we’ll see if the Bulls end up going in a different direction than blowing all of their cash on Reaves.

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