All signs point to coach Tom Thibodeau and the Chicago Bulls splitting in the offseason, but if that weren't to happen it could bode well for the Los Angeles Lakers next summer. If Chicago doesn't trade or fire Thibodeau, and instead keeps him on the payroll for another season, Grantland's Zach Lowe believes there's a possibility of Thibodeau becoming the Lakers' next coach in 2016.
Chicago's season ended Thursday night, and the majority of league insiders believe an offseason split between Thibodeau and the team is inevitable. The Bulls will first try to deal Thibodeau, but absent a trade- the New Orleans Pelicans and the Orlando Magic are considered possible suitors - the Bulls may decide to fire Thibodeau and just eat the remaining $9 million salary he's due over the next two season.
Nobody believes the Thibodeau-Bulls relationship is salvageable, but if for some reason Chicago does keep Thibodeau around for another season, it could end up working in the Lakers' favor.
"Waiting a year, either in Chicago or as a coaching free agent, also carries one big benefit: the possibility of the Lakers job opening once Byron Scott's placeholder timetable expires and the Lakers are (theoretically) ready to get good again," Lowe wrote Friday.
Again, by all accounts Thibodeau and the Bulls' front office are finished with one another. The purported friction between the two sides has been called irreparable, and every report suggests Thibodeau doesn't have a future in the Windy City. If Chicago were to keep Thibodeau for whatever reason, maybe because of a lack of favorable offers and an unwillingness to lose out on millions of dollars, it'd almost certainly be for one more season. Maybe Thibodeau is reticent to accept a buyout on his $9 million guaranteed now, but agreeing to a buyout next year on the remaining $4.5 million he's due will look much more appealing if it saves him from going into the 2016-17 season as a lame duck.
Coaches - especially ones in high demand like Thibodeau - never want to go into a new season on an expiring contract.
Sure it's unlikely Thibodeau is on the Bulls' sideline next season, but if for whatever reason he is, the Thibodeau-Lakers possibility Lowe raises would be intriguing. Especially since Los Angeles would throw all kinds of money at the defensive guru, whom the team would see as its coach of the future.
Unfortunately, it looks like the Lakers won't get the chance, given Thibodeau's reported interest in taking over the Anthony Davis-led Pelicans.
